Beautiful Tragedy (A Standalone Romance Novel) (21 page)

“Nothing…to me, I mean.” Liar, liar, pants on fire.
“It’s my grandmother.”

“Oh, what’s wrong with grandma? Is she okay?”

“She’ll be fine,” I told him. Wow, he even sounded
worried about my grandma. I wish he would just once be a jerk and make this
easier. “She just has this thing with her hip, and she’s going to be laid up
for a couple of days. I need to go stay with her this weekend to help her out.
I’m sorry, Brock. I have to catch the bus tonight so I’ll have to cancel on
dinner.”

“
It’s
okay, Molly,” he said
the words, but sounded so disappointed. “Do you want me to go with you? Or at
least drive you? Suzie would be up for a little drive. Grandma told me she only
lives about an hour away, right?”

God, he was so incredibly sweet. Sometimes I couldn’t
stand it. “It’s really okay, Brock. I’m going to catch the six o’clock bus. If
I leave now I’ll just make it. I’m sorry again, about cancelling.”

“It’s really okay. I’m just going to miss you,” he
said. “Tell Grandma I hope she feels better soon, and call me if you need
anything, okay?”

“Okay,” I said, really fighting the tears now. “I’ll
miss you too. Bye, Brock.”

“Bye sweetheart,” he said. I hung up feeling crappier
than crap. I hate lying, I hate cancer.

“Did you hear me, cancer?” I yelled at the empty room
like a crazy person. “I hate you!”

 
I got out my
overnight bag and packed what I would need. I’d bet my last dollar that Dr.
Harris was going to admit me…I had been right, he admitted me right away and
started running all of the fun and glamorous tests to find out if my kidney had
stopped working.

First came the IV, at least the nurse was good, and
gentle. As my body began to fill with the fluid, they stuck in the urinary
catheter, which I despise. Then there were MRIs and CT scans and Pet scans and
blah, blah, blah. Finally, four hours later, Dr. Harris was at my bedside. It
was already nine o’clock at night. By now I should be in Brock’s arms.

“Hey Molly,” he said, like we just ran into each other
at the mall.

“Hey Doc,” I said, playing along.

“Where’s your grandmother?” he asked.

“I’m assuming she’s at home,” I said. “She doesn’t get
out much.”

He gave me that disapproving doctor look. I guess
sarcasm was uncalled for at a time like this. Then he said, “Don’t you think we
should call her?”

“I wanted to see what was going on first, Dr. Harris. I
don’t want to worry her unnecessarily.”

“Okay, fair enough,” he said. “You’re an adult. Here’s
the bottom line…your kidney is no longer functioning. The tumors are rapidly
multiplying now; they’re causing your nephrons to harden, and they’re blocking
blood flow which has caused the tissue in your kidney to die rapidly.”

I wished that I would wake up from this nightmare. He
was telling me that my kidney was no longer working. It was gone, dead,
kaput
. I wished that I would wake up all shaky and sweaty
and even in tears. Then, Brock would pull me over into his strong arms and tell
me it was all a bad dream and everything would be alright. I tried denial first,
“So can we just take out those tumors, the ones that are blocking all the stuff
in there?” I knew the anatomy of a kidney inside and out by now. I knew that
wasn’t possible, but what was I going to do or say? My brain didn’t want to
process this.

He looked at me like he was trying to decide if he
should call psych and order a consult. At last he said, “No, Molly. We have to
take that kidney out. If we don’t, the cancer will just continue to spread to
your other organs. This way, we at least get it out of your body.”

“But….I can’t live without any kidneys, Doc.” Jeez, he
went to medical school. You think he would know that.

“We’ll get you on the donor list, Molly. You’re an
excellent candidate and I think you’ll place near the top. We will also have to
get you started on dialysis.”

I was trying hard to process this.
Donor list? Dialysis?
What my head interpreted
that into were medical issues…forever. I was never going to be normal…not ever,
and then I would die, probably very young.

What that horrible realization translated to was that
I was going to have to break up with Brock. I think I had finally decided that
I was falling in love with him. No, I know that I’m falling in love with him,
and if I have any concept of what love is at all, I have to tell myself that
the most important part of it is wanting the person you’re in love with to be
happy. What kind of a life can a man who is sitting in a hospital with his sick
girlfriend have? Worse yet, what about the guy who’s in his early twenties and
sitting at her funeral next to the grandmother who way outlived her? A
miserable life, that’s what he would have. I can’t be responsible for that. I
won’t be.

“So what’s first?” I asked him. I was trying to be
brave, but I was scared to death.

“I’m going to arrange for the surgery to take place
early next week. We need to have you complete a course of antibiotics first. In
the meantime we’ll also get the donor paperwork filled out, and get you set up
for dialysis. We’ll probably put in the Vas-Cath while we have you in surgery
to take out the kidney.”

I knew that a Vas-Cath was a tube that went in through
your main artery, near your heart. It would be where they would pull out my
blood and wash it and put it back in…two or three times a week. Dr. Harris and
I had talked about this before…just in case. Then after a while, they would
either put in a fistula which is another set of tubes in my arm or they would
let me do my own dialysis using a bag and a tube and…well anyways, none of it
was going to be attractive. It would hardly be a selling point on a dating site:
I like long walks on the beach and warm water in my peritoneal dialysis bag.

“Would you like me to call your Grandmother?” Dr.
Harris asked.

It was nice of him to offer, but I needed to be the
one to tell her. I would actually rather tell her to her face. I knew she would
take it well like she takes everything. She would tell me everything was going
to be fine and not to worry. Meanwhile, she would do all the worrying. She used
to tell me that was her job and I shouldn’t try to take that from her.

“No, I’ll talk to her,” I said. “Can I go home and
take the antibiotics?” I asked him.

“Yes, tomorrow,” he said. “You’re running a
temperature tonight. We’re going to keep an eye on you and give you some more
fluids.” He looked at me then for what seemed like a long, uncomfortable amount
of time. I actually think that he was considering the possibility that I was
suicidal. I couldn’t tell this older, professional man that my heart was
breaking though. I’m sure he wouldn’t understand. He finally said, “Are you
okay, Molly? Is there anyone I can call for you tonight?”

Brock please… “No, Doc. I’m fine, thank you. I’ll call
everyone who needs to know.”

“Okay, let us know if you change your mind. I can get
one of the counselors down here too.”

“Okay, thanks, Doc.” Thank you for telling me that I’m
going to lose the best thing that ever happened to me. I should have stuck with
my guns about not wanting a boyfriend. Or I should have gone for it right away,
and had more time with him. I don’t know what I should have done. I do know
what I have to do. As soon as I get out of here, I had to break up with Brock.
I wasn’t going to put him through this, and I’m not telling him why I’m
breaking up with him either. I could very well be dying…I couldn’t stand to see
the pain in those pretty blue eyes when I told him that. It wouldn’t be fair;
we barely got to know one another. If I break up with him, he’ll get over it
and move on. If I make him watch me die…we’ll that would probably affect him
for a long time.

I stuck out the night with the nurses waking me up
every hour like they do. When Dr. Harris came in the next morning, my
temperature was down, and I had plenty of fluids in me to keep from getting
dehydrated for a while. I still couldn’t pee, and I was already feeling the
bloating that Dr. Harris said I would get from retaining fluids. He gave me the
prescription for antibiotics and let me go home. I had an appointment the next
day with the transplant doctor, and one after that with the nurse who ran the
dialysis unit. It would be a busy week, but there were a few things I had to
take care of first.

I went back to the room, and Megan got there not long
after. She was surprised to see me.

“Hey. Brock told us you had to go help your Grandma.”

I looked up at her and that was it, just a look.

“Oh, Molly. You’re sick again, aren’t you?”

I nodded. I hadn’t really cried yet, and I was afraid
if I tried to speak I would start. Megan came over and sat on the bed next to
me.

“Tell me what’s going on.”

I opened my mouth to try, and all that came out was a
croak, and then the dam opened up and the tears came out like a flood. Megan
hugged me and let me soak her T-shirt with tears and mascara. She was an
amazing friend. I knew for a fact that she was wearing a new blouse. It had
been stupid of me to put the make-up on, I know. But I had planned to go talk
to Brock, and even though I was breaking up with him I had wanted to look good.
That thought triggered more tears, and Megan, God bless her, just let me cry
for a really long time. When I was finally able to stop, she got me some tissue
and came and sat next to me once more.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Stop it. You haven’t got anything to apologize for.
The world needs to apologize to you, I think. When you’re ready, I’d like to
know what’s going on.”

I finally told her…everything. When I finished she was
looking at me like she didn’t believe it, or she didn’t want to. She hugged me
again and as I felt her body shake I realized that she was crying now too. When
she sat back up she wiped her face and said, “I’m sorry.”

I gave her the same look and lecture she gave me. Only
hers included the fact that she was the best BFF in the world, and I was so
damned lucky to have her.

She finally asked the question of the hour, “What
about Brock?”

“I don’t want him to know, Meg…please.”

“Molly, you two have gotten so close. How is he not
going to know?”

“I’m going to break up with him,” I told her.

“Molly…” she said.

“Hear me out
Meggs
, please,”
I told her that my chances of dying were high and how unfair that would be to
him. I told her everything I’d been thinking for the past twelve hours or so.
When I finished she said, “I wish you would change your mind. But…I won’t tell
him, or Jake. Just promise me you’ll at least think about it, Molly. He’s
really into you. Breaking up with him alone is going to hurt him.”

“I know,” I told her, “but not as much as watching me
as I wither away, and then having to attend my funeral would.” My mind was made
up, and short of Dr. Harris calling and saying he made a mistake; I was
breaking up with the best thing that ever happened to me today.
 

I called Grandma while Meg was in the shower. I told
her honestly what Dr. Harris had said. She of course said I should have called
her last night, and then said, “I’m on my way.”

“No, Gran. I’m fine today. I will let you know as soon
as they schedule the surgery, I promise.” She was quiet on the other end. She
didn’t like it, but she finally agreed, telling me that if I ended up back in
the hospital and didn’t call her, she was going to kick my butt. She even
threatened to call Debbie. I believed that she was serious.

Lastly, I called Brock.

“Hi good-looking,” he said. “Are you back?”

“Yeah, I’m back,” I said. “I was wondering if we could
talk.”

“Absolutely!” he said with so much enthusiasm I almost
started crying again. “Do you want me to come there, or come get you and bring
you over here?” he asked.

“No, Megan’s going to bring me and pick Jake up,” I
told him. “She said to tell him to get ready.” She heard Brock repeat that to
Jake, and then a few minutes later he said, “He wants to know what he’s getting
ready for.”

I laughed. Thank you, Jake for always amusing me.
“Tell him she didn’t say, and she’s in the shower. So, if he knows what’s good
for him, he’ll just put some decent clothes on and be ready when she gets
there.”

Brock laughed too and repeated what I said to Jake.
Then he said, “I can’t wait to see you.”

That did it the tears took on a life of their own
again. I said, “Me too” and hung up as quickly as I could, before he figured it
out.

When Meg finished in the shower I cleaned my face up
again, this time taking all the make-up off. It was pointless. I was sure I
wasn’t finished crying.

She dropped me off at the apartment. She gave me a hug
and said, “Think about it, Molly, please. I know he would want to be there for
you.” I knew that too, and as amazing as that made him, didn’t she see that was
the problem?

She must have texted Jake, because as I was going up
he was coming down. “Hey Molly,” he said with his big Jake grin.