The Winter Games

by Sharp, Dr. Rebecca

  “Tamsin!” she exclaimed, but then got distracted by some commotion in the background and the sounds of my sisters getting closer.

  “I’m driving, Mom. I’ll call you in a few and let you know when I’ll be home to visit.”

  “Oh, okay. Jenny! Why is Kat upset?”

  I shook my head, a twinge of homesickness rolling in my stomach. “Love you, Mom!”

  “Love you, honey!”

  The noises got louder just as I hung up. I was already in a group family chat with all nine of my family members (aside from Trevor who wasn’t old enough to have a phone), but at least that I could put on ‘Do Not Disturb.’ If one of them got on the phone (especially Jenny)… I’d be here until next Tuesday.

  Ten minutes early, just as planned. My oversized sweater caught on the edge of my purse as I got out of my car and stared at the ominous white building in front of me. It was the only place where everything was pristine, perfectly organized, and completely sterile; I should have loved it. Instead, I hated coming here.

  It reminded me only too much of myself.

  “I will be calm. I will be mistress of myself.”

  —Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility

  THE SHARPEST WORDS CAN CUT you down, but they aren’t the ones that kill you.

  It’s the dull ones. The ones that don’t have malicious intent and yet their meaning accomplishes just the same. They wear at you, through you, the worn edge rubbing over and over and over again in the same spot until it finally draws blood. And then it repeats the process, only deeper.

  I’d always struggled when it came to that time of the month. And by struggled, I mean that every month the Texas Chainsaw Massacre went on inside of my uterus. The Tamsin Chainsaw Massacre. Blood. Guts. And days when I swore I was dying.

  But I’d learned to manage it.

  The doctor told me that it could make having sex painful. Less of a problem since I hadn’t found the one yet. She also told me that I was at a greater risk of infertility.

  Those words had been sharp.

  They’d cut right through the dreams that I’d had of finding the love of my life, getting married, and having kids. Growing up with a family like mine, it was all I’d ever wanted. Growing up with a family like mine, I should have been less traumatized than I was about the thought of having to adopt if I ever wanted kids. My parents never treated my adopted siblings any differently than their biological children and I’d even bet that most days my mom couldn’t remember which of us she’d pushed out and which of us she’d brought home.

  Still, I’d been worn thin over the years by these words playing like a morbid soundtrack in my brain: endometriosis, infertility, barren, childless. But today was finally the slice that drew blood.

  Cancer.

  I’d been so blinded—equally by the possibility of infertility and by optimistic hope, that the other possibility—the other complication of endometriosis—ovarian cancer, had stayed completely under my radar.

  I sat in the chair in the doctor’s office, my hands fidgeting in the knit of my sweater until Dr. Gentz walked in with one of the nurses who’d seen me the past few times. It felt wrong for a woman who looked so kind and healing, to speak words that were so destructive. I watched her nude lip-sticked lips move and even though my ears didn’t hear her, my body did.

  “…It was barely detectable, that’s why we had you come in for so many tests and finally sent the samples to our sister-lab in Denver, but they did find the CA125 protein…”

  “You’re lucky that you had these symptoms so early. We believe that you are only in stage 1 and the cancer is only affecting your ovaries.”

  “…Surgery will be required to confirm the CA 125 findings and assess the extent…”

  “…both ovaries, fallopian tubes, possibly the entire uterus will need to be removed so that…”

  “…start with a low-dose round of chemotherapy to make sure all of the cells are eradicated. Don’t worry, it shouldn’t make you lose any of that lovely hair.”

  Hair. They’d ended with a small smile because my hair wouldn’t fall out, like they hadn’t just told me they were going to have to cut out pieces of me—pieces of my dream.

  When faced with that, who cared about hair?

  I’d thought that endometriosis and its symptoms—the potential for decreased fertility—were my only unhappiness in life. But that was the thing about unhappiness; it was only unhappiness until something worse came around, then you realize that it was happiness all along.

  I choked on the chilled air outside as I fled the doctor’s office. It was an unseasonably cold day for the beginning of spring; it was the kind of cold that made the air taste dry and still—like there was nothing to it except the frost it breathed into your body; it made me feel hollow.

  Raindrops—cold little liquid balls of despair—grew more rapidly along with my footsteps. My hands were shaking by the time I reached my trusty Subaru station-wagon.

  It was almost eight. I’d been the last patient of the day since I’d worked later today so I could take off early tomorrow for the Snowmass Bash. It was no wonder the receptionist hadn’t given me a hard time about moving my appointment back when I’d called on Monday after talking to Becca—no one wants to end the day with cancer.

  Actually, my reality was much worse, but I couldn’t face it right now—the chemo, the surgery, missing work—having to leave my job.

  And definitely no kids.

  I felt like Miss Colombia after Steve Harvey realized he’d made a mistake—that Miss Ovarian Cancer had, in fact, won the contest and was taking all of my reproductive organs as her prize. Bitch.

  I shuddered at the rare unspoken expletive, but the thought had stopped my heart.

  Breathe, Tamsin.

  I pulled my phone from my purse. I should call someone but I didn’t know who to call.

  My stupid organized brain reminded me like an internal alarm that I was supposed to call Jessa when I was done.

  I couldn’t call Jessa. I couldn’t call anyone.

  Opening up my message to her, I texted her the only thing that would make her understand.

  TAMMY

  The Tower.

  My pink-haired, Tarot-reading best friend had insisted that she read my cards a few months ago on one of the rare nights when I’d indulged her with a bottle of wine. A simple reading: past, present, future. My future had drawn the Tower—the card of great upheaval, complete destruction, and turmoil. She told me something was going to happen that would shake me… break me… something that would rip the very foundation of my beliefs out from under me.

  She’d insisted that it could turn out to be a good thing, all depending on how it was handled, but the sense of dread I’d felt when I’d picked the card told me otherwise.

  And now, that something was here. Cancer was my Tower.

  Tears fell freely down my face like my cheeks had a fresh coat of Rain-X on them. My nails dug into my palm. Stop this, Tamsin. Calm down, Tamsin. I was always the one in control, the one in charge. I took care of everyone when they were falling apart. But now that it was my turn, I didn’t know who I could go to. I was suffocating even though there was air all around me.

  And the guilt only compounded my suffering. I should be dialing one of my girls, my mom, my sisters—any one of the million people who loved me with their whole heart. I should be driving home knowing that any one of them would rush to be there for me when I got back. I should. I should. I should…

  They were the right choice.

  I was tired of making the right choices. Right choices hadn’t saved me from this. Right choices had brought me here. Right choices had destroyed me.

  “Hello?” the whiskey-smooth voice answered, somewhat surprised, on the other end of the line.

  “Frost?” I croaked out as though I was expecting someone else to answer his phone.

  He let out a long sigh. “And here I thought your delicious ass finally decided to give me a call.”

&
nbsp; “What?” I blurted, momentarily stunned and confused.

  “I thought you butt-dialed me, Tammy.” The deep rumble of his laugh was like static over my skin, sending every hair to stand on end. “Is everyone okay?”

  Because on any other day, that was the only plausible reason I would be calling Nick Frost. Not because I needed him to make me forget. Not because I needed him to set my body alive—to make it feel something other than all of its inadequacies and impending loss. But because there was an emergency that had nothing to do with how my body begged for every bad thing he would do to me.

  “Y-yes,” I stuttered. Well, everyone but me. “I’m calling because I need your h-help.”

  With every word, my throat became thicker and thicker—not because it was trying to stop the words, but because it was trying to stop every other feeling. The words were the only thing that came easily.

  “My help?” he asked. I could hear the smirk that punctuated his question. “What can I do for you, Priss?”

  I disliked that nickname. I disliked it not because it was true; I disliked it because he made it sound taboo—like a dirty little secret that only he was allowed to whisper. And because it made my entire body flush with heat.

  “I need to fall apart,” I replied softly, praying that he would remember the words he’d said to the awkward, drunk girl in the bar a few months ago and the promise that he’d made.

  Dead silence met my statement. And for a moment, I thought that Nick Frost—the man who’d seen the inside of more women than your average OBGYN—was going to turn me down.

  My mouth parted, the words ‘never mind’ on the tip of my thick and embarrassed tongue when a growl on the other end of the line stopped my heart. “I’ll text you my address. Come to the guest house.” And then he hung up.

  The dullest words could destroy me tomorrow. Tonight, I was sending a flood named Frost and I was going to drown them out.

  I would have told him that I knew where he lived, even though I’d never been to any of his infamous parties, but he hung up before I got the chance. Probably kicking out whatever naked women were already rambling about.

  I groaned, my head dropping onto my hands that gripped the steering wheel. What had I just done?

  What was I about to do?

  I should just go home, drink a cup of chamomile tea, and go to bed. With renewed determination, I turned my car on and looked back up at the hospital. Cold and sterile, just like me. The next thing I knew, I was driving to Frost’s house like the hounds of hell were chasing me.

  I was beyond nervous. I’d never been so nervous in my entire life—not even before coming to the doctor’s today. Because I knew what was going to happen; a part of me knew that they’d finally found what they were hoping not to. But this? Frost? I had so many ideas and yet no idea what to expect. What happened behind his bedroom door was a bigger secret than what went on at Area Fifty-One.

  There were rumors.

  All I knew for certain was that I would never be the same.

  My mouth dropped open a little as the huge, wrought-iron gates to his property opened. Slowly, my car inched forward and down the winding drive. I couldn’t believe this is what was back here; I’d picked Jessa up here one night after a party in high school, but it had been too dark for me to get a good look.

  What I saw first had to be the main house, though house was the wrong word. There had to be at least twenty bedrooms in this compound. It was like a mountain castle covered in Greystone that was climbing with ivy and complete with a few turrets.

  I kept going, my gaze refocusing in front of me. I then realized that there was a covered walkway that connected the main mansion to the guest house—a guest house that was easily larger than most middle-class homes in the country. The guest house was swallowed in ivy—not in an unkempt way, but as though it was trying to disassociate from the castle to which it belonged; it wanted to blend in with the rest of its surroundings in an attempt to be forgotten.

  I pulled up and put my car in park, reaching down to grab my purse and cell.

  Crap.

  A million times crap.

  I looked like a stuffy librarian in my baggy sweater that hid my tight jeans and ended just above my tall, practical rain boots. There was nothing sexy about what I was wearing right now. That was the entire point. I mean, besides the fact that I watched over small children all day where comfort and propriety were imperative. I didn’t date. I didn’t sleep with guys. I didn’t even flirt with them.

  Why?

  Because of how my brain worked. Because everything in my life was a part of a plan, part of the long haul, and allowing a man into my life meant that I saw him as my husband. Problematic, to say the least, in a world ruled by Tinder and one-night wonders. I couldn’t think of a guy as just a boyfriend, as just a temporary piece to be removed at a later date, and definitely never as a one-night fling.

  Always looking at the long haul. Only now, my long haul was missing a very large piece.

  Of course, I had a plan to accomplish my goal. Step one: Stay away from dating until I was old enough that men were interested in the same kind of permanence that I was. Step two: Hope that by then my body had better answers for me.

  Today, my plan had officially failed. Waiting had turned into fearful avoidance and answers had become a life-sentence.

  Do. Not. Cry.

  I pulled down my visor and opened up the mirror; it still had plastic covering it—that should tell you just how many times I worried about my appearance before getting out of the car. I thought I saw something move in the window out of the corner of my eye, so I quickly flipped it closed; the last thing I wanted was for him to know I worried about what he thought of me.

  Opening my door, I stepped right into a giant puddle. “And that’s why you wear rain boots,” I placated my unfashionable practicality.

  Shoving my keys and my phone into my pocket, I looked up at the guest house again. It looked like the cottage straight out of Sleeping Beauty—only I knew that the inside was definitely going to be fit for a princess.

  My heart raced even as my feet slowed, nearing the front door. So far, no sign of other females. Then again, he’d had about fifteen minutes to make anyone scarce. Raising my hand, my mouth dropped when Frost opened the door before I could even knock—wearing nothing but a low-hanging pair of sweats.

  “H-hi,” I stuttered like I was a child at a restaurant who was informed by my parents that I would have to order my own dinner. I gulped. ‘I-I’d like to o-order one Nick Frost. Raw. With everything on top.”

  “I have not wanted syllables where actions have spoken so plainly.”

  —Jane Austen, Sense & Sensibility

  HE LAUGHED AND LOOKED ME up and down. I hated his eyes. Not because they made me self-conscious, imagining just how many other women that they’d seen. I hated them because if wind had a color—they would be it. And just like the breeze, I could feel the invisible touch of their gaze penetrating underneath each and every one of my carefully crafted layers to blow right through me.

  “Did you expect me to ravish you on the front doormat?” He smirked tauntingly.

  My mortification and uncertainty grew, screaming at the Tamsin that they didn’t recognize.

  ‘Maybe,’ was the answer. Maybe I had expected it on the doormat. And maybe I’d been hoping for it.

  “N—No,” I ended up murmuring as he turned away, leaving the door open for me to enter.

  I was right. This place was fit for a princess—or in this case, the Ice Prince. The inside looked like whoever designed the chateau of Versailles had come here and regurgitated every piece of furniture and decor that could fit.

  “Wow…” My astonishment slipped from my lips. “This is beautiful.”

  I kept looking around because it distracted me from the very sculpted back—and backside—that moved in front of me. Where we were going, I had no idea. But for what he promised me, I would follow him anywhere.

  Ice-cold eyes
turned to grab mine. “To you. But a cage is only seen from the inside,” he sneered.

  My stomach rolled at how true that was. My cage was cancerous.

  We walked through the foyer, the chandelier over the entryway reflecting against the walls. Sconces lit our way through a formal dining room—that’s right, a formal dining room in a guest house—to a living room, complete with a fireplace that was already crackling.

  My eyes drifted shut for a moment as I felt the wash of warmth diffuse over my skin. How were fires always so beautifully mesmerizing? Maybe because they warmed and soothed, but only from a distance. Too close, and they incinerated you.

  Then I realized that I wasn’t staring at the fire. I was staring at Frost.

  “So, what happened? Why are you here?” he drawled, reaching for a glass that I hadn’t seen sitting on the mantle and taking a sip of the amber liquid within.

  My head whipped back and forth—a little too vigorously, probably. “No,” I said. “No questions. I-I can’t answer questions.” I’d piqued his interest. I could tell by the way every perfectly formed muscle in his body seemed focused on me. “That’s not what I’m here for.”

  I couldn’t answer them because I didn’t have answers. I was here to forget about the questions.

  What we were… what we could be… was a giant question mark at the end of an impossible statement. ‘No questions’ wasn’t just literal. ‘No questions’ meant ‘no us,’ too.

  His pale eyes flickered at my words. If I could trust my thoughts right now, I would think that he was upset by what I said; but I didn’t trust them.

  “So, you call me, ask for…help, come to my house, and now you’re making the rules?” Even the way his eyebrow arched seemed like an art form. I bit into the side of my cheek because I was being ridiculous. This is what happened when you didn’t date and worked with tiny humans ninety-five percent of the time.

  He drained the remainder of his glass and stepped in front of me. Immediately, the warmth that I’d felt from the fire disappeared, doused by his presence. I sucked in a breath. He was so hard, so cold. But it was because he was cold that I burned; good, bad, fire, and ice—they all blurred together in his presence.