Bright Side

by Kim Holden

  Gus brings me out of my trance. “What’s your address, dude?” As I tell him, he repeats it into the phone. Returning the phone to his pocket he grabs a towel off the rack and wets it in the sink and begins to gently wipe Katie’s face and hairline. He looks me in the eyes, waiting. He’s looking for answers.

  I tell him what I know. “Katie has cancer.”

  All the air rushes out of his lungs and he falls back against the wall behind him. The tears come in a torrent. “No. No. No.” He’s trying to deny it away. “This can’t be happening again.”

  “Again?” I ask at the same time there’s a knock at the door and Gus struggles to his feet to answer it.

  Paramedics charge in and I grudgingly release Katie to their care. I don’t want to let her go because I’m afraid I’ll never get her back. I tell them everything I know and give them her medication bottle. They have her hooked up to an IV and loaded in the ambulance in minutes. Gus rides with her.

  After I wake Stella and load her in the Green Machine, I drive faster than I’ve ever driven in my life. The hospital is in Minneapolis. Stella is fast asleep in the seat next to me. I’m not a religious person and I’ve never said a prayer in my life, but during the entire drive I find myself pleading aloud, “Please dear God, please give her more time … please don’t take her yet … I need her here with me … Gus needs her … Stella needs her … Shelly needs her … Clayton needs her … I love her so much … please, please, please.”

  Stella is sleeping in my arms when we find Gus in the ER admittance room. He’s filling out paperwork. I slump down into the chair next to him. “How is she?”

  His eyes are red and swollen. “She’s stable. They’re examining her now. Said they were going to call her doctor, the one that prescribed the medication.”

  I sigh and hug Stella to me. Her head’s resting on my shoulder and she’s limp in my arms, heavy with sleep. I set Katie’s bag in the chair next to me and with one hand I search for her wallet. When I find it, I pull out her ID and insurance card and hand them to Gus.

  After finishing the paperwork and taking it to the admittance desk, he returns. “There’s no news yet. I’m gonna run outside, I need a cigarette. Come and get me if something changes.”

  I nod. He looks how I feel: hopeless, helpless, and tense.

  Gus returns ten minutes later and after what feels like an eternity, the doctor greets us. “Family of Kate Sedgwick?”

  Gus jumps to his feet. “Yes.”

  “Kate is stable. We’ve moved her to PCU room 313. She’ll need to stay with us overnight for observation. The trauma to her head resulted in a mild concussion. We spoke to her oncologist, Dr. Connell, and as I’m sure you’re already aware Kate has recurrent and metastatic ovarian cancer—”

  “What?” As I start to question the doctor, Gus holds up his hand gesturing for me to keep quiet. I do. He obviously knows this part of Katie’s history. I don’t.

  The doctor continues. “—Which has spread to other organs, her lungs and liver. Kate is in the advanced stages, the equivalent of Stage IV, inoperable and unlikely to respond to treatment. Kate’s chosen to forgo any such treatment and has opted for pain and symptom management. She wants to be kept comfortable and that’s what we, and her oncologist Dr. Connell, are trying to do.”

  Gus speaks first. “How much time does she have left?”

  “Although we cannot predict a precise amount of time, Dr. Connell tells us two months, maybe three. The cancer is aggressive. The progression over the next several weeks will be dramatic.”

  I watch Gus swallow the lump in his throat and he nods. “Can we see her now? Room 313?”

  The doctor nods. “Yes. I’m sorry.”

  I follow Gus because right now I can’t focus on elevators and directions. I have a firm hold on Stella; she’s the only thing tethering me to reality. I’d get sucked into the black hole of complete despair if I let go.

  Katie looks so small in the big hospital bed. She’s still hooked up to the IV, which I assume is distributing some intense pain medication. Her eyes are open but they look hazy, groggy. A bruise is blossoming beneath the surface of her left cheek and there are stitches along her cheekbone where she must’ve hit the bathroom floor. She raises her hand a few inches above the bed in a wave. “Hey, it’s my three favorite people.” Her voice is hoarse.

  Gus tries to smile. “How’re you doing, Bright Side?” He sits on the edge of her bed and takes her IV-free hand in his.

  “Better now.” She smiles.

  I sit in the chair on the other side of her bed, Stella still asleep in my arms.

  She looks at Stella and frowns. “I’m sorry you had to get her out of bed, Keller.”

  I rub Stella’s back. “Don’t worry about it. Stella’s a deep sleeper. A freight train could pass through this room and it wouldn’t wake her.”

  Katie’s still frowning, but the corners of her mouth are turned up. “She’s so precious, Keller. You’re so blessed to have her.”

  The look on her face is heartbreaking. She’ll never have children. She’ll never have what I have. It’s not fair.

  “When did you find out?” Gus is whispering. He doesn’t want to upset her, but he has to ask.

  “Right before I left to come to Grant.”

  He looks crushed. “But you said your check-up went okay?”

  She nods.

  “Why didn’t you tell me the truth?” He’s trying not to cry.

  She squeezes his hand. “Because I needed to come here and you needed to go on tour. If I would’ve told you, what would’ve happened?”

  He doesn’t hesitate. “I would’ve cancelled or postponed the tour to stay with you.”

  “Exactly. You would’ve put your dreams on hold, or thrown them away, to sit at home waiting for me to die. I want more for you than that. You’ve worked so hard, Gus. You deserve to be out there performing every night, making people happy with your music. Do you know how happy it makes me to know that you’re out there living your dreams?”

  He nods. “I know, but you’re more important.”

  She shakes her head. “No, I’m not. Our friendship means more to me than you’ll ever know. But life doesn’t come with a guarantee, Gus. We had twenty years together. Twenty years. That’s pretty amazing when you think about it.” She smiles and her eyes sparkle. “And that friendship won’t die with me, I know that. It will live inside you for the rest of your life. It’s like a little piece of me gets to go on with you. And I want to be one helluva ride. You have so many things to do, and people to meet, and someone out there to fall in love with, to have a family with. It’s going to be beautiful. I don’t want you to stop living your life just because I’m sick. But I promise to keep bugging you every day I can. Nothing needs to change. I still love you and you still love me, I know that whether you’re sitting here in this room with me or you’re a thousand miles away.”

  The tears are streaming down Gus’s cheeks. “Why? Why you? Why now?”

  She shakes her head. “I don’t know, dude. I guess it’s my time. Maybe Gracie misses me as much as I miss her and she put in a request with the big man upstairs.” She yawns and looks over at me. “Keller, you want to lay Stella in bed with me? There’s room, she might be more comfortable.”

  Even though I don’t want to let her go, Katie scoots over and I place Stella at her side. Stella doesn’t wake but she snuggles into Katie’s side for warmth and comfort. Katie smiles. “Thanks. I think I needed that.” She kisses Stella’s forehead and yawns again and looks at me. “I don’t think I can keep my eyes open any longer. This is one hellacious cocktail they’ve got me hooked up to. Come here and give me a kiss.”

  I oblige although I feel like I’m falling apart. How could this radiant woman be fading away before my eyes? “I love you, babe.”

  “I love you, too, baby.” Her eyes shift to Gus and she motions to him. “You too, come here.”

  Gus kisses her on the forehead. “Good night, Bright Side. I
love you.”

  She mumbles, “I love you, too,” as she drifts off to sleep.

  I summon my courage and clap Gus on the back. “Come on man, I’ll buy you a cup of coffee.”

  We grab two scalding hot coffees from the vending machine on the second floor and return to Katie’s room. Katie’s free arm is wrapped around Stella, whose head is resting on Katie’s shoulder in the crook of her neck. I can’t help but smile looking at the two of them. I take a picture of them in my mind, carefully cropping out the IV and machines around them, just two sweet, sleeping faces in the frame, Katie’s bruises hidden against the pillow.

  Gus is smiling at them as he drops into a chair on the other side of the room. “She would’ve been the best mom.”

  I slide the other chair over to sit with him. “Absolutely.”

  His smile grows. “You should’ve seen her with her sister, Grace. She was amazing. I don’t know how she did it. She took care of her sister every day. Don’t get me wrong, Gracie was easy to love. But being someone’s full-time caretaker is a lot of work, and Bright Side never once complained. Their mom was never around. Janice preferred the company of men to the company of her children.” There’s disdain and judgment in every word. “And even when she was around she didn’t take care of them. She had some mental health issues that required medication, but I don’t know what was worse, Janice on her meds or off. She also drank … a lot. And she was a big fan of coke.” Gus pauses, shakes his head, and chuckles sardonically. “Bright Side’s home life was a fucking nightmare. She took care of Gracie because her mom couldn’t, or wouldn’t. They spent a lot of time at our house. Ma and I always considered them family. And after her mom committed suicide—”

  I interrupt. “Wait. Katie’s mom committed suicide?”

  “Yeah. She hung herself from a ceiling beam in her bedroom one night. Bright Side found her the next morning.”

  I rub my eyes with my palms; my head is starting to hurt. “Shit.”

  “Yeah, it was fucked up. Janice had been hitting the bottle hard for a few months and stopped taking her meds altogether. I guess it was finally too much and she couldn’t take it anymore. As bad as it sounds, I was kinda relieved for Bright Side and Gracie. It was like being let out of prison. They were free.”

  “She must’ve been bad.”

  He shakes his head. “You have no idea. Of course, my mom and I didn’t find out about most of it until after Janice died. Bright Side got really drunk one night right after her mom died and told me everything … the drugs … the beatings.” He sighs and tightens his fist that’s resting on his thigh. “There’s no way we would’ve let them stay with her if we’d known. Bright Side never said anything while Janice was alive because she was afraid that social services would come in and split up her and Grace. And she was probably right, because there was some bad shit going down. Bright Side took the brunt of it, especially the physical abuse, to protect Grace. God, I don’t even want to think about it. It still makes me sick.” He shakes his head. “We never knew.” He takes a deep breath and continues, “Bright Side was just getting ready to graduate from high school when her mom died. She had a scholarship to go to Grant and play violin, and she gave it up so she could stay in San Diego and take care of Gracie. A week after the funeral she went to the doctor for a routine annual exam and found out after a series of tests that she had ovarian cancer, ‘a serous carcinoma,’ they called it. The next two months were brutal. They operated on her and removed it all. Then she went through a round of chemo. She and Grace stayed with us and we took her to all her appointments. You don’t know hell until you watch someone go through what she did. She lost her hair and she was so sick with the chemo. She couldn’t eat. She threw up all the time. She lost so much weight they had to hospitalize her just to feed her and get fluids in her. It was awful, but she never complained.” He points at Katie. “She’s a fucking fighter, that little woman. She had faith she was going to get better and it was all worth it. And she worried about Grace, of course. But eventually, she did get better. She went back to work and she rented a place for her and her sister. My mom wanted them to stay with us, but Bright Side said they needed to be on their own.” He laughs. “You should’ve seen their place.”

  “She said they had an apartment.”

  He laughs again. “That’s a stretch. It was a single car garage. They had a double bed that they shared, some boxes they kept their clothes in, and a card table. That’s it. They fucking loved it.” He laughs again. “Only Bright Side and Gracie could live in a fucking garage and think they were in paradise.”

  “Didn’t their mom leave them any money?” This just keeps getting worse.

  “Hell no, that’s another thing we didn’t find out until after Gracie died. Apparently Janice had been living off Bright Side and Grace’s child support all those years. She never worked. Their old man left when Bright Side was a baby and moved back to England where he was from. I guess he met someone and started a family and forgot about the one he had in California. He never talked to Bright Side or Gracie, but he paid Janice a pretty penny to raise them. Janice just spent it all on herself. The guy’s loaded, so paying her off was nothing to him. The money stopped when each of the girls turned eighteen and Janice started getting deeper and deeper in debt. When Bright Side sold the house and her mom’s car, it barely covered the debt Janice had racked up. Bright Side walked away with her van and the clothes on their back. She and Grace lived on what she made working in the mail room with me at my mom’s advertising firm. It wasn’t enough to get by, but somehow they did.”

  There’s a surprise at every turn with this girl. “I never knew she had it so bad.”

  He huffs. “That’s because it’s Bright Side we’re talking about. The girl never complains. She hates it when people feel sorry for her. I bet if you woke her up right now and asked her about her cancer she’d tell you that there’s someone out there who’s worse off than she is. That’s Bright Side.”

  Sunday, November 27

  (Kate)

  My phone’s vibrating across Keller’s dresser. I blink the sleep out of my eyes and glance at the clock. 1:37am. The ringing stops before I answer it, but once I have it in my hand, it vibrates insistently again. It’s Franco.

  “Hey Franco,” my tongue feels too big for my mouth, making my voice sound thick and slow. This new pain medication makes waking a slow process. As if consciousness doesn’t agree with me. It’s powerful shit.

  “Kate. Sorry to wake you, but what in the hell is up with your boy?”

  I pull myself to a sitting position and say, “What? What’s wrong, Franco?” I glance at Keller sleeping beside me.

  “Gus. The punk ass shows up yesterday afternoon at the venue fifteen minutes late for soundcheck, wasted out of his fucking mind. Then he disappears afterwards. We find him at a bar down the street and have to practically carry him out to get him back for the show, which in hindsight was a mistake of epic proportions. That show was a full blown shit-storm. He was so drunk he forgot half the words, he refused to play his guitar, he cursed at the crowd, and he fell down twice. It was fucking brilliant.” The sarcasm weighs heavy in that last declaration. “Sure, he can perform drunk. He’s done it a million times. But this … this was beyond fucked up. He’s locked himself in the bus now and won’t let anyone in. He won’t talk to any of us. His phone goes straight to voicemail. What the hell happened in Minnesota? I’ve never seen him like this.”

  Shit. This is bad. I know that Gus shuts down when he’s upset. The only people he’ll talk to when he’s like this are his mom and me. It’s always been that way. I can’t hold back the sigh.

  “What is it Kate? What’s wrong? It’s bad, isn’t it?” The anger in his voice softens.

  I whisper, “Yeah, hold on,” as I slip out of bed.

  Keller stirs in bed next to me. “Babe, what’s wrong?”

  I hold the phone away from my face. “It’s okay, baby. I’ll be back in a few minutes. I need to take t
his call.” I put on my coat and boots and open the door to step outside as quickly and quietly as I can. It’s freezing out here. “Okay, Franco. Sorry, I had to go someplace I could talk.”

  “It’s fine. Sorry to wake you, Kate, but I didn’t know what else to do. This isn’t Gus. I’m worried.”

  “Yeah, me too.” I take a few deep breaths before I speak. “I’m sick, Franco.”

  “Oh. Fuck.” And then quieter, “Fuck.” And then louder, “Please tell me the cancer isn’t back?”

  “It’s back.” I feel terrible saying it, like I’ve somehow let him down giving him the answer he didn’t want.

  I hear a loud crash like he’s kicked or hit something followed by silence.

  I continue. “Gus found out Thursday night. We spent the night at the hospital. He dealt with it pretty well until we dropped him off at the airport this morning.”

  “Yesterday morning,” he corrects.

  “Right, I guess it is Sunday, isn’t it.”

  “So, what’s the prognosis?” He sounds scared.

  “Not good.”

  “Oh Kate.” And now he just sounds sad. “I’m so sorry.”

  Keller’s voice breaks through the darkness. “Katie, it’s freezing out here. Come inside and talk. You won’t wake Stella. She’s asleep on the loveseat.”

  My boots crunch against the snow as I walk shivering back toward the door.

  “Listen Kate, I gotta go. I may have to bust the goddamn door down on that bus.”

  I’m whispering when I step inside and Keller wraps his arms around me. “I wish there was something I could do to help you. To help Gus.”

  Franco laughs but there’s only a hint of amusement behind it. “And there’s the Bright Side Gus loves so much. We’ll take care of him, Kate. You take care of yourself. Fight the good fight. Do you hear me? Fucking fight this.”

  I nod even though he can’t see me. “Okay,” I say, even though there’s nothing to fight now.

  “Later.”

  “Bye Franco.”

  This is why I didn’t want Gus to know. I’ve just become his downfall.