Dog Lived (and So Will I) (27 page)

• • •

By week two, I’d come to know my fellow radiation patients. After my Wednesday zapping, when I returned to the waiting room, Ms. 9:30 and Mr. 9:45 and his friend, a heavyset African American man whose e-reader I’d begun to openly covet, were seated, each quietly reading.

“I’ll get changed and wait for you,” I said to 9:30.

“Great, I brought a scarf. I can’t wait to have options besides all these hats,” she said.

“But you look cute,” I said.

“I’m sixty years old! Cute is not what I want. I want sophisticated. I want to look like you.”

“Well, we have the same hairstyle, so you are off to a great start,” I said. Everyone in the room laughed. We all had the same hairstyle.

The day before, Ms. 9:30 had asked me how I tied the head scarves I wore. Just as I’d given up the wigs in favor of scarves for the summer, she had given up wigs in favor of a variety of cute, sporty caps.

I’d now amassed an impressive selection of scarves, including the several expensive, large, luxurious silk scarves Trudi had given me and the many my mother had sewn especially for this purpose. My mother was still battling shingles and could not come out for another visit, so she’d busied herself sewing. And quilting. (I now also owned a pink ribbon quilt.)

I received daily compliments on my headgear from the staff and other patients. I promised Ms. 9:30 I’d teach her how to tie the scarves. My verbal instructions failed, as did my demonstration on my own head, so today we were moving on to full demonstration with class participation. I took off my scarf to demonstrate the tying.

“You have hair,” Ms. 9:30 said.

“No, I have stubble. And it’s weirdly dark.”

“You have more than I do. If I had that much, I wouldn’t be putting anything on my head.”

I thought about that for a moment. At home, I’d begun to go without any head covering. But I wasn’t quite ready for a full public viewing. Still though, it was nice to hear.

After a few tries, she mastered the art of pirate-scarf tying.

“I need hoop earrings,” she said.

“And heavy, dark eyeliner, a la Johnny Depp.”

“Very cool!”

I liked this group of people I was getting to know. All of us were fighting the battles of our lives, but everyone had time to be kind to one another. The nurses told me how the dynamic of a waiting room changed with the groups that came through, and ours was a particularly kind group. They’d had nervous groups who increased the anxiety in one another, groups who flashed their scars at one another, and groups who competed over who’d suffered the most. I was happy for my group.

But then one day, about halfway through my treatments, when I exited the dressing room, dressed for work, I walked into a discussion among the other patients. A new patient had joined our ranks and was demanding to know everyone’s numbers.

“So what’s your number?” she said to me.

“My number?”

“Was yours breast cancer?”

Cancer patients are possessive of their cancers, I’d noted. There is much talk of “my cancer” or “your cancer.”

“Oh, um, yes. Breast cancer. Triple-negative.” I looked at my fellow patients—the regulars. Ms. 9:30 looked like she was trying not to laugh and others were just shaking their heads slowly. I was aware that “triple-negative” was not a number, but I wasn’t sure what she was getting at. At least “triple” was number-y.

“So like 5 percent?”

“I’m sorry. Five percent what?”

“Five percent chance of recurrence. You know. These doctors all give us our numbers. So we know. We know if it’s coming back. What’s your number?”

Wow. This total stranger wants to know the odds of me dying? Why? So she could decide if she’d be wasting her time getting to know me? “Ah. That number. Well, I have an 85 percent chance my cancer is not coming back.”

“So you have a 15 percent chance of recurrence.”

“No. I have an 85 percent chance it’s not coming back.”

“That’s a 15 percent chance of recurrence!” She stepped closer to me, her brow furrowed, as though I was failing to understand and it was her job to set me straight.

“There’s nothing wrong with my math. That’s just not how I’m going to look at it. I prefer to think I have an 85 percent chance it’s not coming back. But thank you for asking.” I looked past her to the patients seated in the room. Ms. 9:30 gave me a thumbs-up, and I could see that several of the other patients were now smiling. As I left, I heard the newcomer explaining to the others that I was in denial.

That evening Chris and I took a fully recovered Seamus for a long walk, and I told Chris what had happened. We’d been banned from our hot tub for months. Walks with Seamus had become our new talk time.

“That’s shocking,” he said.

“I know. Right? Like I need reminding I might die from this. From a total stranger!”

“Well, that’s not all that surprising. People are rude. No, I’m more surprised at you.”

“At me?”

“Giving scarf tying lessons, cheerful talk…when did you become little Miss Pollyanna Optimistic? Focusing on the positive? Are you sure your brain wasn’t zapped in that lightning storm during radiation? Maybe they swapped your personality with some poor cheerleader somewhere who’s now yelling ‘just do your fucking job and let us go home’ on the sidelines of a football field somewhere.”

I laughed. He had a point. Not about the poor cheerleader, of course, but about me. My first response had been a positive one. An optimistic thought. No doom. No gloom. Me!

The dog lived and so did I.

And it seemed I really believed that now. It wasn’t just a hope or a mantra. I gave Chris a quick kiss and finished the walk still smiling. On the last day of radiation, Chris came with me. I finally got my diploma and a cheerful graduation ceremony from Dr. Hocko and her wonderful staff. I thought, briefly, that I’d even miss the radiation oncology center. I’d come to know my fellow patients and the staff well, and in many ways my recovery had started there. When we left, Chris took a picture of me in front of the center, clutching my diploma and throwing my hat into the air, proudly displaying my half inch of hair and grinning ridiculously.

• • •

As we headed into summer, daylight was lasting longer and so was my energy. I came home from work one evening to find a group of friends with Chris on our back patio, sipping French rosé wine and watching the sun go down.

“We were just telling Chris how wonderful he’s been through this whole awful experience,” Jane said.

I pulled up a chair, and Chris poured me a glass of wine. “Yeah, I know. I tell him that, too. I also told him how popular he’d be with the ladies if I didn’t make it. He’d have his choice of women.”

“It’s true. Oh my god,” Becky joined in. “A guy who not only stuck by his woman and went to every single doctor’s appointment, but also did this crazy thing with his hair just to show support? They’d be lining up. Wait, where do I get on the waiting list?”

“Seriously. I’m in,” Laureen said.

“You can’t be; you’re already married,” Becky said.

“Okay, well then I’ll just be his pimp. I’ll handle the scheduling for Mr. Popular Young Widower. This will call for great organization skills.”

We were all laughing, and the riff went on for some time. Chris added a few names to the waiting list himself.

“Hey, people, I’m still here! I’m not actually dying. A little respect for Cancer Girl, please!” I said.

“You started it,” Becky said. “And seriously, I’ve never been around someone with cancer, and I never thought I’d be able to joke about cancer things. So I guess I have to thank you for that—for showing me how to handle this and making it easier.”

“Well, I’m a little concerned I may have made you all a bit too comfortable. I’m worried about the next woman you all know with breast cancer. She may not laugh at you pimping out her man.”

“No worries. We won’t,” Laureen said. “We’ll be too busy pimping out Chris.”

I was happy to hear the laughter, but even happier to hear the toast that Jane made next.

“I mean it, Chris. You were outstanding through all of this. So I’d like to make a toast to Chris.” She raised her glass, and we all held our glasses up. “I’ve never been so happy to have been so wrong about someone.”

I caught Chris’s glance across the glasses, and I could see he was happy to hear this. After all we’d been through, finally everyone could see what Chris and I knew all along. (Well, Chris knew all along; I was a little slower to the realization of what we had.)

“That means a lot, Jane. Thank you,” Chris said, touching his glass to hers.

It meant a lot to me, too, and I drank in the moment as the sun dipped below the hill and our friends continued talking and sipping wine on a gorgeous June night.

• • •

• • •

Chris and the friends at our house that evening had begun plans for a
Survivor
-themed celebration of the end of my treatment. They made invitations and T-shirts with a parody of the
Survivor
reality television logo. The logo was pink and said, “Out-Chemo, Out-Radiate, Out-Live.” The party would be held in our friend Michelle’s backyard, recently landscaped and looking just like Provence. She had the added bonus of two large dogs, Will and Nellie, who were Seamus’s best friends. Seamus viewed her yard as a sort of Doggie Disneyland, so much so that it was difficult to get him back in the car after we visited.

Over one hundred friends and clients came throughout the day to celebrate with me, despite the temperature hitting 118 degrees, one of the hottest days on record in Riverside. Folks came from as far away as the Bay Area, Oregon, and Colorado. Dr. Karam came in from Los Angeles, spreading his good karma and causing quite a ruckus among my female friends when he changed his shirt into one of our
Survivor
T-shirts, revealing a full back tattoo as well as one around his bicep.

He also finally got to meet Seamus.

“He’s so cute,” Dr. Karam said, kneeling to pet Seamus.

“Diabolically cute, that’s the problem.”

“But he survived cancer and he helped you, so he gets away with it.”

“Exactly.”

Dr. Karam stood up and Seamus ran off in the direction of the barbecue, howling for hamburgers.

“So, I have a question for you, Amer.”

“Anything. Ask away.”

“I know you were new to UCLA when we came there. Was I your first patient?”

He smiled sheepishly. “Pretty close.”

“It’s okay. Obviously it worked out fine, and I wouldn’t have cared even if I knew then. Seamus was only the third patient of Dr. Dutelle’s, and we loved her. So what number was I?”

“Third is probably about right.”

“Ha! So, that’s why you went to all my appointments with me.”

“Yes, I was learning my way around the campus, too.” He grinned. “And I got to meet some other doctors.”

“Glad I could help. But I guess I can’t tell everybody else to expect that sort of treatment.”

“No, maybe not. But I will try.”

I knew he would.

Chris’s parents and both sisters, along with his aunt Susan, all came to the party as well. I tried to exercise my new powers of optimism to not stress over the fact that their attendance meant that members of my family—my dad and stepmother and my younger sister and her husband and kids—would meet members of Chris’s family for the first time. But I was nervous. By the time we saw our fathers shake hands, Chris and I had been dating for just over five years and living together for three, but we still held our breath. I nearly hyperventilated when my dad met Chris’s mother, but they smiled and complimented each other on their respective children and how well we’d handled our cancer odyssey together. In other words, they behaved like the civilized adults they were. The universe did not, in fact, implode. I could finally exhale.

Chris walked across the lawn and handed me a frozen margarita from the machine my friends insisted on renting. “So they’ve met.”

“They have. And no punches were thrown.” I raised my plastic glass to his.

“Not even verbally. Seems all is good.”

I drank in the moment, standing next to Chris, watching my family and friends. I could feel myself healing in the warmth of the full sunlight.

Seamus ran howling by, Will and Nellie in full pursuit. “All is good,” I said, leaning in to Chris’s embrace. I was deeply happy. “Very, very good.”

• • •

• • •

I wasn’t sure if I should be excited or not. Chris, though, was ecstatic.

We were getting haircuts.

As I’d promised my mom when she couldn’t travel to me, Chris and I went to Missouri in August to visit (and, as it turned out, have another
Survivor
party). Chris, with his by then massive Whi-fro, had endured a humid Midwestern summer visit. I, on the other hand, had the perfect summer cut for such a trip, the same buzz cut my ten-year-old nephew sported in my honor. But Chris stayed true to his promise. He wouldn’t cut his hair until I needed to cut mine.

By December, I had nearly two inches of wavy brown hair. It didn’t need to be cut so much as shaped. But that was good enough. We were heading to Hawaii, and I did not want Chris to have to vacation with that hair again. At the rate his hair grew, we’d have to buy another airline ticket for it if he didn’t cut it.

“Do you want to go first?” I said.

Chris sat one chair away from my stylist Kelly’s chair and extended his hand from me to her chair. “After you. I can’t cut mine until you’ve cut yours. A deal is a deal.”

“I can’t believe you did that,” Kelly said. “It’s almost crazier than shaving your own head. And, in your case, definitely more difficult.”

“Eh, it was fun,” Chris said. “And I’ve single-handedly revitalized the hair product industry.”

Kelly trimmed my hair, mostly in the spots where some original hair had hung on—never leaping from my head through all four rounds of chemo. (Chris called them “little hairs—big attitude.”) She then used a shaping product to give my hair some texture and hold. She ran her hands through my hair and pulled some pieces in different directions. Then she spun my chair around so I could see my new look.

“Wow. I actually have a hairstyle.”

“It’s really cute,” Kelly said.

“You can pull off short hair. I told you that,” Chris said.

I liked the look. Kelly had given me a funky, sporty style and done away with my chemo-victim look. I’d just have to get used to being a brunette now. “And at last, it’s your turn.” I rose from the chair and offered it up to Chris.

“I cannot wait!” Chris excitedly moved into position.

Kelly ran her hands through his tsunami of hair. “I’m going to have to chop at this with scissors before I can use the clippers!”

“Hack away. You’ll probably need new scissors when you’re done.”

Massive chunks of salt and pepper hair fell and instantly overpowered and covered my wispy little brown chemo curls on the floor.

When Kelly finished, a half hour later, Chris looked in the mirror. “And I’m back!”

“You look great. More Vince Gill, less Jay Leno.”

• • •

When we decided to go to Hawaii to celebrate the defeat of cancer and ignore that holiday that shall not be named, friends offered us the use of their condo in Maui.

“Just let me know the dates you want to use it and we’ll reserve the place,” my friend Ted had said. He was aware of my history with December and his wife, Sandy, a nurse, had followed my treatment progress on the blog.

“That’s incredibly kind of you. As for the dates, I only have two requests: I want to be there on the twenty-fifth and I don’t want to be flying on December 23.”

Ted barely skipped a beat. “No, that really wouldn’t be fair to everyone else on the plane.”

Chris’s parents then offered to pay for five nights at a hotel on the big island as well. I wasn’t even suspicious that there’d be separate rooms reserved or that Chris would be kidnapped and flown home without me. I was simply grateful and thrilled.

Now I’d have to see if I could give December another chance at being kind.

• • •

On December 23, one year from when the doctor called to tell me the results of my mammogram were “highly suspicious of malignancy,” Chris and I walked Keawakapu Beach in Wailea sipping mai tais and watching the sunset for the third night in a row, with no hurricane in sight. I wore no makeup and left my hair tousled in the salt air. My right breast still had remnants of the “reverse tan” from radiation (the breast was darker than the surrounding skin), but my scar had faded greatly. I wore my pink
Survivor
T-shirt to commemorate the day and the year we’d been through.

It simply didn’t matter what I looked like. I no longer needed armor. We’d won the battle. Seamus had brought me some Irish luck after all.

And of course, walking the beach, seeing other dogs playing and running in the surf, I missed Seamus. But I knew he was safe at Ruff House with his adoring fans and, most importantly, we were both healthy. I figured I’d given up enough for Seamus without giving up a trip to Hawaii, too. (I could almost hear him howling at this thought:
Fooooooookers! I love the beach! Come get me! Get me out of here! Noooooooooooooow!!! Also, bring toast! AAAAAARRROOOOOOOOO!!!
) I’d already bought him a green aloha print collar.