Always (Spiral of Bliss #5) (25 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

DEAN

NICHOLAS AND I SIT AT A
window table with our chocolate ice-cream cones. He swings his legs back and forth, working industriously at the ice cream and looking outside at the frozen lake.

“So it’s just gone,” he says.

“For now.” I’m wearing a baseball cap, though of course Nicholas noticed that something was off about me as soon as he saw me waiting for him outside the school.

At Liv’s suggestion, I’d agreed to pick him up and tell him about both Liv’s and my hair before Bella gets home. Maybe if Nicholas deals with it well, she will too.

Nicholas glances at me. There’s a ring of chocolate around his mouth.

“You’re not sick too, are you?” he asks.

“No. I did it so your mother wouldn’t have to be the only one.”

“Will hers grow back too?”

“One day, yes. But it might take a while.”

“What about yours?”

“Mine will grow back faster, but I’m going to keep it shaved off until your mother is better again.”

“So she won’t be the only one?”

“Yeah.”

Nicholas processes this as he licks a ring around his cone. “Does she look funny?”

“She looks like Mom. Just without hair. It’ll take us all a little time to get used to it, but it doesn’t change anything about her. She’s exactly the same.”

He shrugs. “Okay. Can I see your head?”

“Sure.” I lean forward so he can take off my baseball cap.

He does, then studies my head for a minute. “You look weird.”

“I know. But do I still look like your dad?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s all the matters, then.”

He seems to accept that. We finish our cones in silence and toss the napkins into a nearby trash can. I put the cap back on.

“I’m counting on you to help Bella be okay with this,” I tell Nicholas as we walk back out to the car. “She doesn’t really understand about Mom being sick, so it could upset her to see both Mom and me without any hair.”

“Is Mom wearing a hat?”

“She’ll wear a scarf most of the time, I think, but not always.”

“What about you? Will you always wear the hat?”

“No. I just wore it so I could tell you first. It’s a little easier for men not to have hair because a lot of men lose their hair as they get older. But it’s harder for women.”

“Is Mom crying?”

My chest constricts. I have to think about the best way to respond.

“She did cry when we first cut it off,” I finally admit. “But she’s not anymore.”

Nicholas nods. I get him buckled into his seat and we return home. Liv is waiting for us in the kitchen. She’s dressed in a polka-dot blue skirt and a white blouse, with a pale blue scarf tied around her head. She’s wearing makeup, little silver earrings, and her
Fortune Favors the Brave
necklace. Though Liv always looks good, I can tell she’s taken extra care with her appearance.

“Hi, Nick-Nack.” Liv holds out her arms. “How was school?”

“Good.” Nicholas approaches her somewhat cautiously, but as soon as her arms close around him, he hugs her with his usual after-school enthusiasm. “We had rehearsal for the music concert, and Dad took me out for ice cream.”

“So I see.” Liv indicates the ice-cream ring around Nicholas’s mouth.

He studies her for a second, and I wonder if he’s going to ask her if he can take off her scarf. Instead he says, “You look like a pirate.”

“Really?” Liv smiles, as if he couldn’t have given her a better compliment. “Thanks. We both know how cool pirates are. Now come sit down and show me your schoolwork.”

She takes Nicholas’s backpack, and they sit down at the kitchen table so he can show her the worksheets and drawings he did that day. Within seconds, he seems to have forgotten about her hair, though I know it’ll be tough for him to see her without the scarf.

As they talk, I start getting dinner organized. Half an hour later, the front door opens. Liv and I exchange glances. I grab my baseball cap and put it on, hurrying to get to the foyer before Bella and Claire come into the kitchen. Claire is helping Bella off with her coat.

“Hi, Daddy,” Bella says.

I crouch and hold out my arms, letting my daughter dash into them. After a hug, I ease back to look at her.

“Do you remember when we told you Mommy would lose her hair?” I ask. “Because of the medicine?”

Bella nods, her gaze going to my baseball cap and the obvious lack of hair beneath. A worried look crosses her face.

“Well, Mommy did lose her hair,” I explain. “And I cut mine off so she wouldn’t be the only one without any hair.”

Bella frowns. She grabs the brim of my cap and pulls it off. She stares at my head, then gives a little whine and pulls away from me to run back to Claire.

“It’s okay, Bella.” Claire takes Bella’s hand. “Let’s go see your mom.”

She marches past me into the kitchen, leading a reluctant Bella. Alarm flickers through me. I follow, trying to get in front of my daughter as if I can protect her from the shock.

Nicholas and Liv are still sitting at the table. Liv rises from her chair with a smile.

“Hi, sweetie.” She approaches Bella and holds her arms out, but Bella doesn’t move, her eyes narrowing suspiciously at the scarf on Liv’s head.

“So let’s see it,” Claire says brightly, giving Bella a nudge forward. “We know Dean still looks great without any hair, but what about you, Liv?”

“Hey, we’ll take it from here.” I step forward to stop Claire from interfering further.

“Bella, Mom just shaved her head,” Nicholas says. “It’ll grow back, like Dad’s.”

“I don’t like it,” Bella whines.

“At least losing your hair is better than losing your boobs, right?” Claire says with a laugh.

What the actual fuck?

Liv looks stricken, two spots of color appearing on her cheeks. Claire opens and closes her mouth, faint horror appearing in her eyes.

“I’m s-sorry,” she stammers. “Liv, I didn’t mean—”

“Enough.” I grab her arm. For the benefit of the kids, I keep my voice calm as I say, “Kids, say goodbye to Claire. She has to go now.”

“Bye, Claire,” Nicholas calls.

Bella looks like she’s about to cry. I guide Claire gently but firmly to the door.

“That was completely unacceptable,” I say, low and angry.

“Oh God, Dean, I’m so sorry.” Claire groans and presses her hands to her cheeks. “I totally did not know what to say or do. I meant to research how to talk to kids about chemo and hair loss, but I forgot and the whole thing caught me off guard. I didn’t realize Liv would lose her hair so soon. I’m so sorry. Please don’t fire me.”

“I’m not going to fire you.” I sigh, suddenly tired. “But we’ll handle how we talk to the kids about Liv.”

She still looks upset as she pulls on her coat. There’s a knock on the door, and I answer it to find Archer standing on the porch.

“Hey.” He holds up a kit of power tools. “Just returning this. I was going to leave it in the garage, but the door is locked.”

“Thanks.” I take the kit and set it on the floor, then hold the door open for Claire.

She mumbles another apology, tells me she’ll call Liv later, and hurries back out to her car. I close the door behind her, aware of Archer looking at me.

“Liv lost her hair,” I explain, gesturing to the cap. “So I shaved mine off too. Bella’s not taking it very well. Nicholas is okay with it so far.”

He follows me into the kitchen, where Liv is standing a distance away from Bella, trying to coax her closer. Bella is staring at her mutinously, her arms crossed and her expression set.

“Hey, everyone,” Archer says loudly, pushing past me to grab Bella and swing her in a circle. She giggles, her expression clearing.

“Hi, Uncle Archer,” Nicholas calls, scrambling off his seat to come over.

“How’s it going, dude?” Still holding Bella in one arm, Archer high-fives Nicholas.

“Mom lost her hair and Dad shaved his head,” Nicholas says matter-of-factly.

“I don’t like it,” Bella cries.

“No?” Archer looks puzzled as he sets Bella down and approaches me, reaching out to take the cap off my head. He laughs. “Hey, man, the Mr. Clean look suits you.” He grabs me by the shoulders, pulling me into a hug and slapping my back. “You need to paint your head black like an eight ball or rent it out for advertising space.”

He chuckles again, all jovial cheer and humor, reaching up to rub my head. “Hey, Bella, come here.”

He turns to Bella, who is watching him warily. Archer grabs my neck and pushes my head down.

“It’s like a drum,” he tells Bella, rubbing my head again.

“He looks scary,” she says.

“It’ll grow back,” Archer assures her. “It’s not like when Nicholas cut off Miss Lulu’s hair and it didn’t grow back.”

Bella still doesn’t look convinced, but she tentatively reaches out to pat the top of my head. She looks at Archer again. He tousles her hair and moves to whisper something in Nicholas’s ear. Nicholas chortles with delight and races off to open the low kitchen cupboard where we keep the art supplies.

Archer says something to Liv, who nods and smiles. Next thing I know, Nicholas and Archer are organizing a set of finger-paints on the kitchen table.

“Up you go, Bella Umbrella.” Archer lifts Bella into her seat at the table and shoots me a glance. “Sit down, man.”

I know where this is going. I sit down and lower my head as Nicholas and Bella get their hands sticky with paint and begin to slather it on my scalp. Bella laughs, slapping her wet hands against my head, happily indulging in her love of messes. Nicholas is more precise, painting swirls and designs that he wipes away with a paper towel before starting again. Their laughter is music.

Though paint drips down my face and into my eyes, and my neck gets a kink from being bent, I could sit there for hours letting our children paint my bald head.

Only when Nicholas complains that he’s getting hungry do they show any signs of stopping. Liv hands me a few towels to wipe my head. She’s smiling her usual Liv smile, the one that hits me in the middle of the chest every time.

“Awesome work, kids,” Archer remarks.

He grabs the pink paint and squeezes some onto his fingers, then paints something on the top of my head. Nicholas laughs.

“I don’t want to know,” I say.

“Thirty years, and I finally have revenge,” Archer remarks.

I go to the mirror in the foyer to find that my brother has drawn a pink bow on the top of my head. He follows me to the door, grinning.

“You’re an ass,” I tell him. “And a genius. Thank you.”

“No problem.” He glances down at my hand. “By the way, nice bracelet.”

“It’s a
wristband
.” I extend my wrist, which is still wrapped with the looped string holding Liv’s wedding ring against my pulse.

“Whatever you say, man.” Archer pulls open the front door. “Okay, I gotta get out of your hair.”

I shake my head in amusement as Archer grins again and goes to his truck. Thirty years ago, I’d never have imagined how grateful I’d be to have him as a brother. But today I know I’m grateful beyond words.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

OLIVIA

WINTER MELTS INTO A RAINY SPRING,
with slushy puddles covering the streets and sidewalks. Our lives continue to be punctuated by doctor’s appointments and the hours-long chemo infusions, but the heavy weight is eased by the simple fact that every day, something good happens. Every single day.

Bella and I make perfectly round pancakes. Nicholas comes home with a decorated paper bag overflowing with Valentines from his classmates. We find new flowers on my lantana plant in the sunroom. I hear Dean reading
Peter Pan
to Nicholas and Bella, his deep voice filled with enthusiasm as he says, “I do believe in fairies. I do, I do!”

Friends come to visit almost daily. The Moms bring me a box filled with beautiful cotton turbans and scarves. Dean’s mother and sister send me gift packages of fancy herbal teas, books, and a cashmere shawl. Archer makes me a playlist of classic rock “power songs” to listen to during chemo infusions—or whenever I need to.

Steppenwolf’s “Magic Carpet Ride” proves surprisingly captivating, especially since I’d always thought it was about a psychedelic drug trip.

I guess that’s sort of what I’m on right now, though I’m sure Steppenwolf’s trip felt a lot better than mine.

Each night before bed, all four of us sit in the living room to write in our Important Things journals, then Dean reads our entries aloud. Our family snow globe sits on the coffee table in front of us.

“Superman,” Dean reads from Nicholas’s journal. “Dirt. Pencil sharpeners. Fire trucks. Dogs. Uncle Archer’s motorcycle. Rope swings.”

Dean switches to Bella’s journal. “Elephants. The color blue. Hoot. Santa. The zoo.”

And my journal. “Sunrises. Marzipan. Thank you notes. Singing, even if you can’t carry a tune. Walking in the woods. Origami. Libraries.”

Dean turns to his journal. “Multiplication tables. A good run. The perfect spiral in football. The Piazza del Duomo in Pisa. Comic books. Sandwiches.”

Warmth flows through me, heavy and welcome. Nicholas and Bella are both on either side of me, their heads resting against my breasts. Before long, I lose track of whose journal Dean is reading from, and all the Important Things coalesce and merge into a bright ribbon that wraps around my family like a protective shield of sunlight.

“Finger paints. Sugar cookies. Getting a pet snake one day. Falconry. Keeping your room clean. Oranges. Jellyfish. Hot showers. Gargoyles. Going somewhere you’ve never been before. Fuzzy slippers. Babies. Miniature golf. Picnics. Flying buttresses. The sky. Monopoly. Sleeping in on Saturdays. Swinging so high your butt comes off the seat. Having lunch with a friend. The
Lord of the Rings
trilogy. Filing cabinets. Monkeys. Colored pencils.”

Sometimes Dean’s words are so rich and soothing that Bella and Nicholas both doze off under the spell of his voice. In those moments, I know that our strength as a family is undiluted.

Nicholas will always believe in superheroes and Legos. Bella will always know cute animals and finger paints are better than medicine. I will always champion doing your best and taking risks. And Dean will always stand guard over us, only allowing the good into our dreams.

At least three times a week, a wrapped package appears on our doorstep, holding a butterfly of some sort. We receive a beautifully embroidered butterfly pillow, and a set of colorful wire wall hangings that Dean puts up above the staircase railing.

There’s a painting of an African butterfly, a set of butterfly potholders, a photographic collage of exotic butterflies, pottery jars with butterfly patterns, and a bunch of butterfly balloons. Not to mention plenty of edible things—butterfly-shaped cookies, cakes, and chocolate—along with a butterfly shirt for Bella, and a live butterfly garden with real caterpillars, which appeases Nicholas’s demand for a greenhouse.

The thrill of the mysterious sender is a bright spot in our lives, and Nicholas descends on each gift with a plastic magnifying glass to check for clues and fingerprints.

I love that our house is now filled not only with butterflies, but the unspoken power of their lovely transformation.

On my good days—or in my good hours, as is often the case following an infusion—I try to get things done, even if it’s just cleaning up the sunroom or filing Nicholas’s school papers. Allie emails me different projects, but I suspect it’s all stuff she has already completed and is sending to me as busy work. I do it anyway, glad at least to have something else to fill the time in the hours when Dean is on campus and the kids are at school.

I also make an effort to continue drawing “things that make me happy.” I can grudgingly admit North was right—creating pictures of the Eiffel Tower and a lantana plant refills the dry well inside me, filling me with the reminder that I’m so much more than my illness. That this will not last forever. I will get through it to decorate cupcakes again, see Notre Dame cathedral again, dig my toes in the sand at the beach again.

Friends drop by with gifts and meals, often staying to visit. Kelsey comes to see me after work every day, always bringing little gifts—a new fluffy pillow, a pair of slippers, bottles of thick, rich cream to help with my increasingly dry skin, tubes of fruit-flavored lip balm. She and Archer are always on hand to help, and they often stay into the evening to spend time with Nicholas and Bella.

“I picked this up on my way over.” Kelsey opens a shopping bag and holds up a boy’s leather jacket. “I guessed at the size, but I think it’ll fit him.”

“Cute.” I struggle to sit up on the sofa. “What’s it for?”

“Nicholas’s school concert tomorrow, remember?”

I search my fuzzy brain for something about a concert, but come up empty. “No, I don’t remember.”

“The first-grade classes are doing a concert with songs from the 1950s, and the director asked parents to have the boys dress up like Elvis or in jeans and leather jackets. The girls are supposed to wear poodle skirts or something similar. Dean said Nicholas didn’t have a leather jacket, so I picked this up. Got him some hair gel too, if he’ll let me give him a James Dean pompadour.”

Something inside me cracks. I pull my knees to my chest and rest my forehead on them.

“Hey.” Kelsey puts her hand on the back of my neck. “What’s going on?”

“I can’t go.” Tears clog my throat. “I can’t go to my son’s first-grade concert because I’m so fucking sick. I didn’t even remember he was having it.”

“Oh, Liv, there will be other concerts. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel even shittier.”

“It’s not your fault.” I wipe my eyes, lifting my head. “Thanks for taking care of it for him. I just wish I could go, you know?”

Kelsey March is nothing if not a woman who gets things done. So I shouldn’t be surprised when she shows up at the front door at ten a.m. the next morning and tells me to take some anti-nausea medication, get dressed, and get in the car. I shouldn’t be surprised when she drives me to the school gym, where dozens of parents are seated in folding chairs arranged in rows in front of the tiered stage.

I shouldn’t be surprised when Dean and the school principal come into the gym and lead me to a set of empty chairs with a clear view of the stage.

I shouldn’t be surprised when the first-graders file in, heartachingly adorable in their 1950s costumes, or when Nicholas spots me and Dean in the audience and waves with surprised excitement.

I shouldn’t be surprised when the off-key, six-year-old chorus of “Hound Dog” and accompanying dance makes me cry. I shouldn’t be surprised afterward when teachers and other parents greet me warmly, when children from Nicholas’s class shout “Hi, Nicholas’s mom!” in passing, or when my son gives me a bear hug before trotting back to his classroom.

I shouldn’t be surprised.

But I am.