Always and Forever (17 page)

He lifted her chin and looked hard into her eyes. “I’m sorry you had a bad day.”

“I overreacted. Forget it.”

“But you still don’t want to tell me about it?”

“There’s nothing to tell. Honest.”

He let it drop and Melissa was grateful. They stood in the clearing, quiet except for the sounds of the woods. Ric finally broke the silence, his voice hesitant and gentle. “Melissa, I want to ask you something. I was going to wait till Saturday, but I’m going to ask you now.”

Suddenly she was alert. Her mouth went dry, but she forced some levity. “Ask away.”

“Spring break’s coming up.”

“I know.”

“Some of the guys from the house and the dorm floor are planning a trip down to Sarasota to spend a few days on the beach.”

“I thought everyone went to Fort Lauderdale.”

He grinned. “Highly overrated. Who wants to be stepping over bozos from Michigan and Ohio?” He brushed a wisp of her hair off her cheek and the gesture
moved her. Ric never thought twice about her hair being a wig. “Doug’s aunt has a place on Sanibel Island and he’s taking Cheri there. Doug wants me to come along. And I want you to come with me.”

Startled, she stared into his dark, coal-colored eyes. She knew what he was asking. She dropped her gaze and stared at the ground, where she unearthed a rock with the toe of her shoe. “I … I don’t know …”

“I want to make love to you, Melissa. I want to sleep with you and wake up with you.” He’d slipped his hands into the back pockets of his jeans but he somehow made her feel as if he were holding her.

“Ric … I … just can’t take off for a weekend. What would I tell my mother? Michael?” She tried to swallow her rising panic.

“If you asked, I know your friend Jory would cover for you.”

He’d already thought about the details for her, but she shook her head. “I don’t know … ”

Then Ric touched her, taking her gently by the shoulders. “You don’t have to answer now. But will you think about it?”

“Ric … I don’t—” She stopped, groping for the right words. “I mean … I’ve never … ”

“I know you haven’t, Melissa. But when you do, I want it to be with me.”

Her cheeks burned, not from modesty, but from the overwhelming emotions she felt. Hadn’t she wondered about what making love would be like? Hadn’t she read passages in books that told how it felt? Watched old movies that aroused romantic feelings? “I don’t know … ”

He unbuttoned the top button of her blouse and gently ran his fingertips over her skin. Her knees
went weak and she thought her heart might explode. “I’ve always thought you were pretty … from the first time I saw you. You were sitting in that hospital bed and you were combing your hair. That beautiful hair …”

She took a step backward, surprised that her legs could support her. Her brain whirled back to some long ago conversation, and she asked, “Who was Megan?”

Ric let his hands drop. “Why do you ask?”

“You mentioned her once. I wondered at the time, but didn’t ask.”

“She was just a girl I was dating when I was first diagnosed.”

“And?”

“And she couldn’t handle it.” His expression darkened and his mouth pressed into a hard line.

She thought of Brad. Big and blond and so totally attractive to her. “Why can’t anyone ever handle it?” she asked, but she didn’t expect an answer. She raised her hand and laid her palm on Ric’s cheek. “I will think about it, Ric. I’ll think about it very hard.”

He turned her palm and kissed it. “Two weeks,” he told her. “We’ll leave the weekend after next.”

“You awake, Mom?” Melissa peeked into her mother’s bedroom. Mrs. Austin was reading, propped up with pillows, a pile of file folders scattered over the bed.

She smiled and pushed her reading glasses on top of her head. “Come on in, honey.” She shoved aside the folders, making a place for Melissa to sit. “This is a nice treat. To what do I owe the honor of such a visit?”

Melissa curled onto the bed and shrugged. “No reason. Do I need one?”

“You never needed one before. Actually, I’ve missed your visits. Remember how you’d always come in after dates and fill me in? And we’d pig out on cookies and milk?”

Melissa remembered. So much had changed for her over the past six months. “I guess most of it sounded pretty stupid.”

“Au contraire …
it kept me young.” Melissa allowed a comfortable silence to stretch between them. Finally, her mother asked, “Got a problem?”

“No. Why do you ask?”

“Between school and Ric, you’re very busy, honey. Is everything going all right for you?”

Melissa felt her inner defenses go up. She wasn’t sure why she’d come into her mother’s room. She certainly couldn’t bare her soul about Ric’s invitation to spend the weekend with him. “Everything’s fine, Mom. Don’t make a big deal out of a simple little nighttime visit.” Melissa felt guilty for sounding short. “I was lonesome, that’s all.”

“No need to feel lonely. I’m always here.”

Melissa nodded. “Yes. You’re always here.” She longed to tell her mother about Ric. Longed to have her tell her what to do. She’ll say no, she thought. It was a mother’s place to say no to such things. But I have leukemia, her reason argued. I might never face this choice again.

“Is this a private party or can anyone come?” Michael asked.

“Boy, this is my lucky night,” Mrs. Austin said with a warm smile. “Both my kids at once. Come share the bed,” she said.

“Can’t—I’m too grubby,” Michael said, sinking to the floor. “So what’s up?”

“Nothing,” Melissa said. “Just girl talk.” Her heart went out to him. “How’s your balloon club?”

“You make it sound like a kiddie club.” His grin was impish.

“That’s what I get for making polite conversation with a man.” She emphasized the last word as if it were a dirty one.

“Watch it, woman, or I may gag and tie you and take you up with me this weekend.”

“Thanks for the invitation,” she said, “but I hardly ever have a good time when I’m nauseated.”

The three of them laughed and Mrs. Austin tossed off the covers. “Cookies,” she said. “This occasion calls for cookies and milk. You two wait right here and I’ll bring back a tray.”

Michael held her robe and Melissa watched them, feeling how much she loved them both. She remembered the early days of her diagnosis and hospitalization. The angry words she’d hurled at her mother and the way Michael had always retreated from any conversation about her illness. None of them had really accepted it yet—especially her brother—but right now, in the comfort of her mother’s room, it seemed that nothing could hurt them.

Melissa shook her head to clear it. She would think about Ric and cancer and choices tomorrow. Tonight she would be the little girl who used to sit on her mother’s bed and share her heart’s secrets.

“Lots of cookies,” she called. “Chocolate ones. And make sure the milk is real cold.”

Melissa sensed a tension in the clinic. DeeDee Thomas was a jangle of nerves, dropping the tourniquet she was trying to tie around Melissa’s arm, contaminating
the sterile needle and having to pop open another.

“What’s wrong?” Melissa asked, watching DeeDee hunt for a vein along the inside of her arm.

“Just a typical crazy day. Don’t mind me.”

“It’s always crazy around this place. But today seems crazier and you’re kind of distracted. Are you sure nothing’s wrong?”

DeeDee looked up, half-smiling, and her eyes looked tired. “I was working half the night upstairs in oncology. Then two people called in sick down here and someone had to fill in. I’m wiped out, that’s all.”

“My blood work’s still looking good,” Melissa said, trying to make conversation.

“Good. I want you to be well, Melissa. I want all of you to be well,” DeeDee said.

“All of us?”

“The kids. All the kids.” She gestured vaguely and taped a cotton ball across Melissa’s vein.

Usually when her lab work was complete, Melissa tore out of the place, trying to escape the antiseptic smells and reminders of this other world she belonged to. But today she hesitated. “Know what?” she said to DeeDee. “I think I’ll go up and visit the floor. Dr. Rowan said that it was a good idea to go up every once in a while so that the really sick kids can see that that part doesn’t last forever.”

“No, Melissa. Don’t go up. Not today.”

DeeDee’s sharp directive surprised her. “Why not?”

The nurse’s eyes were evasive. “It’s just a bad day up there.”

An icy cold feeling seized Melissa’s heart. “What’s wrong? What’s happened?”

DeeDee straightened and absently tried to tuck
some wayward hair behind her ear. “We had a death,” she said. “It was a long fight, but we lost it.”

“Who?” Melissa felt her stomach churn.

DeeDee sagged. “The little girl, Rachael Dove. We put her on a respirator yesterday, but today there was no brain activity. We turned off the machine less than an hour ago.”

The ride in the elevator was smooth and silent. Melissa shivered at the haunting familiarity of the oncology floor. It was as if she’d walked into a time warp. Everything was exactly as she had left it months before. Almost.

The atmosphere was subdued. Nurses moved efficiently, their voices softened, their expressions grim. Melissa hadn’t expected the loss to have affected all of them so obviously. She’d figured that they must be used to it, conditioned to it. Yet grief was etched clearly in their faces. She’d never thought of them as anything other than trained professionals, just doing a job, but she saw them now as people,
grieving
people.

She stood near the nurses’ station, momentarily confused, unable to decide what to do, where to go. Which room had been Rachael’s? She wanted to ask one of the nurses, but couldn’t bring herself to approach anybody. They might ask why she wanted to know, and she had no reason. She began to walk slowly down the hall painted with a gay circus theme, glancing into doorways, inexplicably drawn. She didn’t want to go. She
had
to go.

She knew she’d found the right room the second she peeked inside. Machines banked one wall, and a hospital bed stood in the center of the floor, empty. Melissa entered, her heart pounding so hard, she felt sick to her stomach.

“Can I help you?” The unexpected voice caused Melissa to jump. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

The girl was about Melissa’s age, dressed in a pink striped uniform, preparing to make the bed. “I-It’s all right. I didn’t think anybody was in the room.”

“My name’s Laura Lopez. I work here as a volunteer.”

Melissa felt disappointed that she wasn’t alone. “I’m Melissa Austin.”

Laura shook out the sheet and smoothed it across the forlorn-looking bed. “My father’s a doctor here at the hospital and my brother’s a physical therapist. I guess you might say this place is in my blood.” Melissa watched Laura expertly tuck in the corners of the sheet. “Did you know Rachael?” Laura asked.

“Yes. We sometimes had our clinic appointments at the same time.”

Laura straightened up from her bed-making. “Oh—you’re
Melissa.”

“Yes.”

“Rachael talked about you a lot. She called you her ‘big friend with the nice eyes.’ ” Melissa felt a lump in her throat. Laura continued, “I used to read to her at night when her mother couldn’t stay. Even when I wasn’t on duty, but just studying here in the hospital library, I’d stop by to see her.” Laura smiled. “Rachael had a way of growing on you, didn’t she?”

“Yes, she did.” Melissa cleared her throat. “I didn’t even know she was back in the hospital. The last time I saw her she seemed better.”

Laura continued fluffing the pillow. “When it happens, it happens quickly.”

“ ‘It’?”

“Dying.” Laura said the word solemnly.

Melissa dug her fingernails into her palms and turned to gaze at the monitors and machines. They were mute and indifferent. There was no life force for them to measure now. “Did she hurt before she died?”

“No. She was even a little excited. At first, she was afraid of going away. That’s what her mother had told her—that she was going to a beautiful place where she could play and never hurt again. She wanted her mother to come with her, or at least one of the nurses.”

“But, of course, no one could go with her.” Melissa said the words absently. “It’s something everyone has to do on her own.”

“She slipped into a coma and died.”

“Thank you for telling me. I’m sorry I didn’t know sooner so I could have visited with her.”

“There’s a few of her things left in a bag,” Laura said kindly. “I gathered them up to send to her family. Would you like to look through them?”

Laura handed her a plastic sack. She saw the teddy bear first, the one she’d given Rachael. It was worn in places, the fur rubbed off, and it was missing an eye. It’s red felt tongue was half pulled out. “Looks like she loved it a lot,” Laura observed.

Blinking furiously, Melissa sorted through papers with scribbles and pages from coloring books. She saw one of Prince Charming holding the glass slipper for Cinderella and her breath caught. “Do you think it would be all right if I kept this one? You see, I have the one of Cinderella in her ball gown, and … ” Her voice cracked and Laura touched her shoulder.