The Girl and Her Ren

by Pepper Winters

  “We’ll give you drugs to combat the side effects. They’ve proven to help with nausea and hair loss. We won’t keep you on it long. Just enough to zap those bastards.”

  I looked away, my eyes dancing over the room, desperate to find something that wasn’t a medical sketch or graphic image. I wanted trees and grass and sunlight. I needed to get out of this godforsaken place.

  “We should discuss what happened in the field,” Rick said. “What made you pass out? Pain? Breathlessness?”

  I shrugged, dropping my gaze to the floor. At least that was boringly safe with its grey-yellow linoleum. “I couldn’t breathe. I don’t remember, really. Just…air that refused to come.”

  “Okay. Have you been overdoing it?”

  I chuckled under my breath. “Define overdoing it.”

  “Working from sun-up to sun-down, not resting, not stopping to eat a decent meal?”

  “Ah.” I grinned morosely. “Based on that, then yes. I might have been overdoing it.”

  Rick scowled, his Scottish accent thickening. “This isn’t a joking matter.”

  “Don’t you think I don’t know that?”

  “I know you’re trying to get your life in order…before you can’t. But you also have to give yourself the best possible chance—”

  “No. I have to give her the best possible chance. My pain ends when I die. Hers doesn’t.”

  Rick stilled. “Are you in pain?”

  I clenched my jaw. I hadn’t meant to reveal that. I’d done a good job of hiding that even from Della. It wasn’t often. It wasn’t all the time. But the discomfort was starting to weigh on me.

  “If you need painkillers—”

  “I can handle it.”

  Rick clicked his pen with sharp stabs. “It’s not about handling it, Ren. It’s about taking that uncomfortableness away, so your body can focus on other things.”

  “So your answer is yet more drugs? Drugs on top of drugs.” I rolled my eyes. “I’m surprised I don’t bleed chemicals at this point.”

  Rick sighed, frustrated. “What other option do you have? Be a walking infusion of pharmaceuticals or die sooner? It’s not really something that can be debated.”

  My hands curled. None of this was fair.

  I knew I was being a prick. I knew my surly temper wasn’t helping. And I knew that I’d deliberately done this to myself because I shouldn’t have worked so damn hard.

  I knew all of that.

  And yet…Della.

  I couldn’t leave her in a one bedroom stable at the generosity of the Wilsons. Of course, they’d never turn her out, but it wasn’t just her anymore.

  My allegiance had grown to incorporate my wife and my son.

  And they both needed protecting the best way I could.

  John had overstepped and given us land that we could never afford, and that ate away at me every goddamn day. But at least, by working the fields and making it earn its keep, I had an income to pay him back. A little at a time, a dollar here, a hundred there, until I’d repaid him at market value of what the hundred acres were worth.

  I wouldn’t finish that duty before my dying day, but I could whittle out a large chunk. Then the land would truly belong to Della and Jacob because I’d bought it for them with blood, sweat, and the occasional tear in the dark.

  A tear for everything I would miss.

  A tear for everything I loved.

  “Wh-what about surgery?” My voice was small, hunching in on itself.

  I didn’t want to be cut open, but I would if it gave me more time.

  I would do anything for another year, another day, another hour.

  Rick inhaled. “Surgery is an option. However, as with everything, it comes with risks.”

  “What sort of risks?”

  “Well, there are a few procedures. EPP, Extra Pleural Pneumonectomy, is the most radical as it removes an entire lung, the lining around the lung, and the diaphragm. Needless to say, recovery after surgery can be long, and you’d have to change your lifestyle to accommodate living with a single lung, as well as be prepared for other complications down the line.” He clasped his hands together, discarding the clicking of his pen. “I have thought about it, I won’t lie. But with your tumours being so small and in both your lungs, it’s not something I’d recommend.”

  I swallowed hard. “And the other options?”

  “Pleurectomy/Decortication, also known as lung-sparing surgery. It’s more detailed than EPP but leaves the lung intact and only removes the pleura lining. Again, I wouldn’t recommend it. The only one I might consider is Thoracentesis, which can be done under local anaesthetic where a long, thin needle is used to drain fluid in the pleural space, or Pleurodesis, where talc is injected into the layers of the pleura and then suctioned out.”

  I winced. “Sounds painful.”

  “It’s actually a fairly straightforward procedure that requires minimal healing, and ninety percent of patients claim it gives them relief from pain and breathlessness. The lungs create scar tissue, effectively sealing the pleura and preventing any more fluid build-up.”

  I nodded, doing my best to drink in long words and scary explanations.

  Rick picked up his infernal pen again, clicking. “With multimodal treatment, you can still have years left, Ren. Don’t give up just because you’ve progressed. We all knew that would happen. Don’t let it get you down, okay?”

  I forced a smile. “I’m not giving up, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “I wouldn’t dare think that. Out of any case I’ve seen, you have something unique tying you here that will prove to be better than any surgery or drug.”

  “Oh?” I raised my eyebrow, coughing softly. “What’s that?”

  “Love.” He smiled. “True love has its claws in you, and I doubt it will ever let go. Fight for that. Live for that. And we’ll make sure to buy you enough time to watch your son grow.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  DELLA

  * * * * * *

  2023

  THAT FIRST YEAR with a new-born and a husband fighting the worst kind of unfairness, I couldn’t lie…it was the hardest year I’d ever endured.

  After the initial wash of endorphins in the hospital with Ren and me kissing, watching baby Jacob as if he was the most fascinating thing we’d ever seen, and living in a cocoon of delight, life interrupted and sped up far too fast.

  There was no time to tell Ren how shit-terrified I’d been when he’d collapsed.

  No space to yell at him and tell him to take it slow.

  He already knew he’d screwed up, and I didn’t need to drag yet more sadness into our tentative world.

  So, we buckled down and fought.

  God, we fought.

  We fought so hard I don’t remember anything else.

  All I remembered was the exhaustion from a baby thrust into a world of sad instability and eyes that were permanently swollen from all the tears I refused to shed.

  While I nursed a grizzly baby, Ren had treatments every other week. One week, he’d be subjected to Keytruda—a drug I was fond of as it had helped him before. And one with chemo—a drug I was not fond of as it made him sick.

  Even with the pills that Rick Mackenzie gave him to counteract the side effects, Ren had a rash where the chemicals entered his skin and complained of bone aches so bad, he submitted to taking painkillers on top of all the rest.

  By the fourth session of chemo, his cheekbones were more defined and his body more sinew than muscle. He hadn’t lost weight exactly but tightened, somehow. The parts of him that made him so dependable and capable sucking deep within to fight.

  By the second month of Jacob being home and the builders kindly racing to finish our house, even while we lived there, Ren became allergic to sunlight.

  His eyes couldn’t handle the brightness, even with sunglasses. His skin burned instantly, even with sun cream. Whatever the doctors had injected into him had done something to his biological makeup, and it was hard no
t to smash apart everything in our newly finished house.

  It was hard to stay strong for him when I was so helpless.

  It was hard to keep Jacob happy when I didn’t know the meaning of the word myself anymore.

  It was in those moments—those life-sucking, abyssal moments—that I carried my child to the willow grotto and sat amongst their fronds.

  I’d allow myself to be sad, only for a moment.

  I’d allow myself to talk to Jacob about things no baby should know about their terminally-ill father, piecing myself back together again to be brave.

  Even dealing with so much, Ren never let me down.

  We took turns bathing Jacob and putting him to bed. We’d tell stories together, finding laughter amongst so many heartaches when we relived our own tales of childhood.

  John hired an out of town contractor to finish the baling and, on the days when the chemo hit Ren bad, Cassie became a godsend by babysitting Jacob while I held Ren on the bathroom floor as he shivered and vomited and apologised for ever letting me see him that way.

  Like I said, that first year was the hardest I’d ever endured.

  But even though our life was a sequence of tough and tougher moments, I never regretted for a moment having Jacob.

  As he grew from toothless babe to inquisitive bright-eyed creature, I could see why Ren had both hated and loved me when I was young.

  I hated not knowing what I was doing. Hated the lack of rest, the loud crying, the struggle to learn a language I didn’t know. But I loved, loved watching him develop a personality. I loved being responsible for his learning, growth, and the fact that he blossomed in weight, happiness, and joy even while his parents lost those things.

  We’d been given the gift of life with our son, and the payment seemed to be the cost of his father’s soul. And as much as I loved Jacob, I honestly didn’t know if I could afford the price.

  My heart broke on a minutely basis.

  That was until Jacob’s fourth month and Ren’s oncologist announced he was happy with his results and took him off chemo.

  The tumours hadn’t shrunk like last time, but they had stabilised, and he was given a positive outlook again.

  It was all agreed that Ren would stay on Keytruda…for the rest of his life. And slowly, as the chemo side effects left his body, he put back the weight he’d lost and ventured outside again where the sun was no longer his enemy.

  We’d walk together over the meadows with Jacob in his arms, and we’d soak in the beauty of a sunset, imprinting the memory, clutching it tight for the day when they’d be no more.

  Luckily, by the time Christmas arrived, no one would guess Ren was sick.

  His smile was broad, strength impressive, and attitude toward life still as vicious and possessive as before.

  When summer returned, there was no argument about who would work the fields, and Ren took his place on his beloved tractor, sucking hay, tipping his hat, his skin tanned and glowing.

  On our son’s first birthday, he made love to me with such passion and power, he convinced me what we’d lived through was just a nightmare.

  A nightmare we’d woken from.

  A nightmare we wouldn’t have again.

  As his body thrust into mine and his lips cast a spell over my mind and heart, I threw myself into a better dream.

  One where Ren would be around to watch his son have his own sons and daughters.

  A dream where we grew old together.

  And for a while…it came true.

  * * * * *

  2024

  Jacob turned two, and we spent the day with the Wilsons in the old farmhouse.

  Cassie helped me bake a cake with two Spiderman candles, and John bounced his honorary grandson on his knee while Ren shared a drink with Liam and Chip on the couch.

  So far, 2024 had been the opposite of 2023.

  Ren was healthy—in relative terms—and happy.

  Jacob was walking and into everything.

  And Cassie’s horse business—that she’d named Cherry Equestrian—had been running for six months. So far, she’d broken in three horses and entered one local show-jumping contest where she came second. The prize money was enough to buy more tack and a new saddle.

  After an afternoon of birthday presents and eating cake, Jacob passed out as Ren carried him across the field to our house.

  Occasionally, he’d cough, but thanks to Keytruda and painkillers, Ren was almost as content as the year when I’d been pregnant and he’d made the impossible possible by building a house, marrying me, and becoming a true Wild.

  “By the way, I did what Rick suggested.”

  Ren’s voice settled around our feet as the moon cast him in quicksilver shadows.

  I looked up, my heart skipping a beat at the sharp lines of his jaw, slight stubble, and perfect lips. His brow was drawn and eyes dark, but his hair danced to its own beat with the slight breeze over the paddock.

  “Oh?” I reached out and squeezed Jacob’s tiny foot. It was too irresistible, dangling from his father’s embrace, encased in a miniature sneaker. It constantly amazed me that manufacturers could make adult apparel in toddler sizes.

  “About the lawsuit.”

  “Ah, right.” I nodded.

  Rick had mentioned it to me, too. He’d told me alone, actually. Mentioning the god-awful subject of after.

  After Ren was gone.

  After.

  I hated, hated that word.

  Apparently, due to having his life cut short by unnatural means, Ren was fully within his right to claim compensation. There were claimants and lawsuits toward the asbestos company numbering in the thousands, but the successful pay outs were either while the victim was still alive or the person left behind filed within one to two years.

  After that, it was too late.

  Letting Jacob’s foot go, I shuddered. “I don’t like the thought of benefiting from your…” I swallowed, cursing the familiar sting in my eyes.

  Ren shuffled Jacob to one arm, then reached for my hand. His grip was warm and dry and strong. “If it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t be going anywhere for a very long time.” His voice hardened. “You know I hate charity, but this…it isn’t like that. This is justice. They killed me when I was ten years old, Della. The least they can do is compensate you and Jacob.”

  “I’m not taking money from those monsters.”

  “But I will.” He squeezed my fingers. “I’d do anything for you. Rick’s already filed my case with a lawyer who has a few active claimants. He said there’s better success in numbers, so he’ll wait for a couple more to come forward and then take it to trial.”

  I sighed heavily, kicking at weeds and pulling up the roots out of habit. “When will you know if you win a settlement?”

  “Not sure.” He kissed Jacob’s downy blond head. “But hopefully not too long.”

  He didn’t say it, but he didn’t need to.

  These days, there were conversations flying around all the time that weren’t said.

  Hopefully not too long.

  Hopefully before I’m dead.

  * * * * *

  2025

  Christmas was whiter than usual with a blizzard that meant the tractor was used as a plough, fashioning a pathway between our house and the Wilsons.

  Ice laced window frames, and trees were sacrificed to burn to keep the chill at bay.

  This year, with Jacob three and Nina eleven, we opted to have Christmas at our place where the sparse amount of furniture meant opening presents and reaping season carnage wasn’t nearly as destructive as in John’s house with its over-packed bookcases and rooms that held more than just mementoes; it held entire lifetimes.

  Ren and I had yet to create that amount of clutter, and the main point of decoration was a small pine tree Ren had cut down, potted, and taken me shopping to buy as many gaudy baubles as I wanted.

  I had to admit, I’d gone a bit overboard with the tinsel.

  But watching our son laugh and
rip into brightly printed paper, revealing a remote-control car, books that could be read in the bath, and a set of miniature diggers to play in the dirt, it was worth it.

  “I still remember our first Christmas,” Ren murmured, slotting himself beside me as I leaned against the kitchen bench after serving warm apple and cinnamon muffins. We’d had a big lunch of roasted veggies, turkey, and all the trimmings, so appetites weren’t all that hungry.

  I wrapped my arms around his waist. “I remember it, too.”

  I remembered how Cassie had come into our room and made fun of me for sleeping in the same bed as Ren. How her tone had been weird, and I didn’t like it whenever she looked at the boy who was mine.

  “You kissed me under the mistletoe.” He chuckled as Jacob fell over the plush rug by the fireplace, chasing his remote-control car as Nina careened it into things, kamikaze style. “Remember?”

  I didn’t actually.

  My five-year-old brain had been obsessing about Cassie and the strangers I didn’t like, rather than the comforting presence of my beloved brother. I scrunched up my nose, pretending I did. “I think it was you who kissed me, not the other way around.”

  He pursed his lips, his excellent memory that would’ve made him worthy of any scholar or doctor or any profession he chose whisking through time to a different Christmas and snowy night.

  “You know…you’re right.” He turned me to face him, planting possessive hands on my hips. “I scooped you up and asked you to kiss me.” His face glowed with fondness. “I gave you my cheek, but you smacked my lips instead.”

  “Like this?” I stood on tiptoes, pressing my mouth to his.

  But this time, I didn’t smack like a child.

  I kissed like a wife.

  And there was nothing innocent about it.

  He groaned, his body tensing for more. “Exactly like that.”

  We laughed together, enjoying our inside joke of five-year-olds kissing fifteen-year-olds—both totally unaware what existed in their future.

  Our lips parted, tongues touched, and later, once everyone had left and Jacob was asleep in his bed, Ren took me in all the ways he could.