by Mary Ramsey
“I can see that.”
“I explained everything in that letter, including my plans for our future together.”
“So, Remy was the idiot?”
“No, I carry the entirety of the blame. Remy was never strong. No, that’s not the word—”
“Talk to Jen,” I snapped. I quickly handed the phone over before I said anything I would regret. How was he so easily manipulated? By the sound of Jen’s voice, she felt just the same way. Just before she took the call outside, I heard her snapping at him that it didn’t matter how “unworthy of his family” he felt, he shouldn’t have lied and dropped off the edge of the fucking planet. She was too mad to talk to him for long, and soon came back in to hand off the phone to Sara, back on speaker.
Sara wiped her eyes as she took the phone. “Hi, Diego.”
“Hi, sweetheart, I’m so sorry for missing your wedding,” he said. “Trust me, you wouldn’t have wanted me there.”
She looked like she was going to argue, and then decided to save that for another day. “I’m going to call my mother. If there’s anyone who can help, it’s her.”
“I don’t want to burden her.”
“You’re family. I want to write to you. You’re still my best friend.”
“I’d like that.”
Maria had a few minutes with her son, in Spanish, then asked Jen if she would like to add her phone number to Diego’s list of contacts. Jen agreed, but I really couldn’t blame her for being mad. She’d had the same damn number for at least five years. He father’s excuses for staying away seemed thin, at best.
We would visit a few more times, once before going to the boardwalk, and again before heading to the zoo. The rest of our time was spent at the RV eating grilled food while exploring the surrounding nature. During our downtime, when she wasn’t watching movies in my arms, Shauna loved picking flowers and finding bugs.
The day we needed to leave, taking the faster route this time, Johnny woke with the sunrise, ready to get on the road.
I was lying in bed with Jen and Shauna as the RV left the park and the turn in the road made the sun glare in my eyes. “It’s too fucking early.”
“You can go back to sleep,” Johnny called back.
“Not with your psychotic driving.”
Shauna snuck into the front seat with Johnny as he drove. She once told me she liked Johnny’s driving because it made her feel like she was on a rollercoaster.
After a few minutes, I made myself comfortable in the space directly behind them.
“My favorite part of the trip was the ferris wheel,” Johnny said to Shauna.
I had to agree. Seattle’s famous wheel was made up of small pods that could hold large groups of people. Shauna had sat next to me, feeding me cotton candy while Jen took pictures, and Sara held Johnny close, looking into his eyes. Everyone had been so happy. It was such a great trip.
“My favorite part was racing the lobsters,” Shauna declared. “Thank you for not cooking my lobster.”
I couldn’t help but snicker—after she’d woken up with a bad dream, we’d ended up telling her a white lie that Puppy had escaped back to the ocean.
“Next summer, can we visit North Dakota?” she asked.
Johnny chuckled. “North Dakota is not as interesting as Seattle.”
“I want to visit Grandpa in prison. And Auntie Sara said your parents have a farm with baby animals.”
“That’s true. There are piglets, chicks, mainly baby cows.”
“Do you ever think about your baby? I wished I could have met my cousin.”
“All the time,” Johnny said softly.
I could hear the pain in his voice. He did well to stay cool; it wasn’t always easy answering a kid’s blunt questions.
“Will you try to have another baby?” she asked.
“I leave that up to God.”
Nineteen
One beautiful autumn morning I awoke to an odd sight— Johnny taking it upon himself to clean the rain gutters. He’d found a ladder and was currently outside my window.
“Daddy has people who do that,” Izzy called from the ground.
“While I do appreciate the offer, little lady, where I come from, we don’t mind getting our hands dirty.”
I made my way outside with Sunflower, my new rescue pit bull. She plodded alongside me as I went over to see how Johnny was doing.
He was using a broom to sweep out the leaves, and I could already see a problem. Or two. The bottom of the ladder was resting in a notch between curved tiles, and the roof was a good two feet higher than the ladder. And then he took a step down, his foot missing a rung. He fell, hitting the metal fencing surrounding the garden on his way down, his crotch taking the brunt of the fall. The ladder crashed down on top of him, seconds later.
Jen ran out. “Johnny!”
Shauna was sobbing as I struggled my way over. “Mommy, Uncle Johnny fell off the roof and hit his ‘bad touch’ place on the railing of the garden.”
Johnny’s face was gray.
“Sean, please watch the girls. I’m taking Johnny to the hospital,” Jen said, reaching in her pocket for car keys.
“This isn’t necessary,” he croaked. “I’m … fine.” As Shauna started to cry all over again, he gave her a small hug. “I’ll be okay, sweetie.”
“I want to go with you.”
“No,” I said, knowing Johnny didn’t want kids anywhere near him if he had to be examined. “You’re going to stay here with Lucy, Izzy and Sunflower. Right, Izzy?”
My little cousin nodded. “Let’s go see what’s happening inside my house. Maybe we can help cook dinner.”
“Okay, I guess.”
With Jen driving, we arrived at the ER in record time. An orderly out front helped get the van door open. At the sight of Johnny’s face, and given Jen’s explanation that he’d fallen off the roof, a gurney appeared in moments. I went with him while Jen parked the van.
With the privacy sheet closed, I tried to help Johnny get undressed. He removed his own shirt, but had to lie down to remove his jeans. “No!” he shouted in agony when he felt my hands on his zipper.
I laughed, a little startled. “Just trying to help. Don’t be shy around me.”
Suddenly, Dr. Elena Rocca appeared. “Hello, guys.”
I shook her hand. “What are you doing in here?”
“The hospital’s understaffed. I’m doing a shift in Emergency. So, what gives?”
“Metal gate in the balls,” I answered for him.
“Let’s take a look at the damage.” Dr. Rocca put on gloves and proceeded to forcefully remove his jeans and boxers.
Johnny kept his eyes closed, shivering.
I glanced. Couldn’t help it. Couldn’t help staring, either. The guy was a mess. “Fuck, Johnny.”
Dr. Rocca’s face showed genuine concern. “There’s significant hemorrhaging. I’m going to send you for an MRI, and someone will be in shortly to get an IV started.”
A few minutes later, there was a tug on the curtain. We were expecting a nurse, but Sara suddenly appeared with a generous pile of cold packs. “Need some help with that?”
Johnny grimaced up at his wife. “How did you know I was here?”
“Hello to you, too,” Sara said, opening a cannula set from her kit. “Let’s get some morphine into you.” She examined Johnny’s arm with gentle pressure, then got the vein on the first try. “Nailed it.” Sara applied some tape to the port to secure it in place, and then set up the IV.
Johnny tried to relax. “I can’t believe she told him.”
“What were you thinking, trying to clean the gutters?” Sara asked, reaching beneath the sheet covering his privates.
He caught her wrist. “Please don’t— and how did you know I was cleaning the gutters?”
“Izzy posted a video online. You would not believe how many followers she has,” Sara replied.
“Fuck my life.”
I felt for him. Yeah, come to think of it, Izzy did
have her phone out. She’d been taking photos of the plants for class.
“After the MRI, Dr. Rocca is going to have to examine you anyway.” Sara indicated the cold packs. “I think you would want to be as numb as possible.” She kissed Johnny’s cheek. “If you’re still here in three hours, I’ll check back in on my lunch break.” Sara gave me a hug as she left. “Take care of him.”
“You know I will.”
After the scan, we waited forty minutes for Dr. Rocca to come discuss the results.
“Your scan shows some abnormalities,” she said carefully. “It’s difficult to tell if what we’re seeing is the direct result of the trauma, or something more troublesome. You need to follow up with Dr. Fong in Urology sometime next week.”
“I have classes,” he said, knowing it made no difference.
“You’ll just have to decide what’s more important— your classes, or your sexual organs.”
Over the next week, Johnny’s swelling steadily went down. He still suffered constant throbbing pain, making sure we all knew about it, but after a few days in bed, he was able to get to class and do his assignments.
When he and Sara returned from his appointment that Friday, Sara was in tears.
“They’re pretty sure it’s cancer.”
“Wow.” I grabbed a couple of beers, handing one to Johnny and the other to Sara. “God. For sure?”
“They want to do more bloodwork, but from the ultrasound, Dr. Fong can already see the tumors.”
I cracked open a beer for myself. “What’s the next step?”
Johnny wiped his eyes. “At this stage, the advisable options are aggressive chemotherapy, or complete removal of the organ.”
“What about fertility?” I blurted, then felt bad. One damn issue at a time.
Johnny gave a miserable shrug. “The hospital offers a service to store my sperm until we wanted to try for IVF.”
Twenty
The surgery was the following Tuesday. I sat with Sara back at the guesthouse on Wednesday afternoon as she told me about the previous day’s events. She wound up sleeping in the on-call room overnight. There had been complications—additional tumors found closer to his pelvic bone. It was possible the diagnosis had come too late, and that cancer had already spread. The secondary tumors also had to be removed and sent for testing.
Johnny had ending up losing a lot of blood and came around with horrible pain in his hips. Jayden had specifically asked Dr. Fong not to discharge him until he and Sara were off work.
Sara paced for a while, and finally a car pulled up outside. I watched as Jayden helped Johnny through the door.
“Are we headed to the bed or sofa?”
“Sofa please,” Johnny said, his voice trembling.
Jayden helped him lay on his back. Sara brought him a pillow and blanket. Shauna, who’d been sitting on the floor watching cartoons, turned off the television to help cover Johnny’s shivering body. Jen was about to serve dinner and offered to save him a plate, but he just wanted to sleep.
I said nothing that night, but something inside me broke.
The next morning, I woke to the sight of Sunflower resting her head on Johnny’s chest. When she caught sight of me, she instinctively returned to my side. “Aw, did you sleep with Johnny, last night?”
I tried to see the humor and cuteness of the moment, but all I could feel was anger. I was angry at God, fate and, well, I was angry at Johnny. No matter how strange and wrong that felt, Johnny had no right to be sick. But worse, he had no right to my sympathy.
Over the next few days, Johnny would keep waking in inconsolable agony. He was still a mess by the end of the weekend, and I was getting worried about the pharmaceutical pile he was stashing in his gut.
“Sean,” he cried, “Can you get me my medicine? And maybe some ice?”
I took the pill container and doled out one dosage.
“Can I please have more?”
“Sure, in two hours.” I replied, looking for ice. I wheeled over to the kitchen, grabbed a gallon-sized ziplock bag and filled it using the icemaker on the fridge. I frowned as he tried to snatch it from my hand. “Hey, ease up.”
“You gave me one lousy pill.”
“Yep.”
“Please Sean, after everything I’ve done for you?”
“Exactly—that’s why I’m not helping you overdose on pain meds,” I said, throwing the bag at him. The full bag landed on his lap with a thump, causing him to wince. I bit my lip to keep from saying something I would regret. Johnny needed to be strong, because I needed him to be the person he always was— the complete opposite of me.
Shauna cuddled up next to him like a doll. My little girl did not fully understand what Johnny had gone through; all she saw was her uncle in terrible pain. The look in her eyes caused me to finally calm down.
“Uncle Johnny is hurt, you need to say sorry.”
“I apologize. If it’s medically possible, I’ll leave Uncle Johnny my balls when I die.”
For the next few days, Johnny was inconsolable. Jen fed him small snacks and helped him use the bathroom. Johnny would cry to the point of pissing himself. He stopped working out, drawing, cleaning, anything that the old Johnny used to excel at.
Jen, bless her heart, tried to talk to him, to get him to at least sit up. But nope, Johnny was content to lay on the sofa as if his soul had been removed. At my wife’s request, I took a step back, and focused on the person who needed comfort but didn’t act like a slug: Sara.
My sister tried to play off her husband’s behavior. “He doesn’t want to sleep in our bed. So what? He’s in pain. I respect that.” Sara would claim that it was safer for them to be apart, in case she accidentally hit him in her sleep or some bullshit.
“You’re a medical professional, and he’s acting like a depressed turtle.”
That at least made her laugh.
I watched as she kissed him goodnight and retired to her bedroom alone. I brushed my teeth and tried with every fiber of my being to leave her alone, but as I passed her door I could hear her crying. That asshole made my sister cry. “Sara?”
“Go away!” Her voice was trembling.
“It’s been almost a month since his surgery; you need to talk to him, you need to find a way to get through to him.”
“I don’t know what else to say. He knows I love him, he knows I support him, but you can’t just wave a magic wand and force someone to be strong.”
Or can you? That gave me an idea.
Johnny was really getting on my nerves. He needed to pull himself up and get back to living his life. And if he wasn’t able, someone needed to give him a little push.
As Johnny slept, I had Jen drive me to the store. She waited in the car while I bought a garden hose extender.
I put it to work as soon as I got back because Johnny had moved all of twenty feet from the couch to the back garden. I turned the water on full blast, hitting Johnny in the face and chest. He sprang up, roaring, then dropped to his knees, begging me to stop.
I kept my fingers around the handle. “Do you promise to go back to school?”
“Yes! Fuck.”
I stopped. Johnny was gasping for air.
I smiled as I turned it back on. “Do you promise to reconnect with your wife—my sister?”
“Sean!” Jen shouted.
I knew I was in trouble, so I reluctantly shut off the hose.
Jen shook her head at me as she helped Johnny up and walked inside with him. “Let me draw you a warm bath …”
In the days that followed, Johnny returned to his classes. I assumed my tough love plan had worked. The only part Johnny was not living up to was reconnecting with Sara.
“Is Uncle Johnny going to be okay?” Shauna asked me as we took Sunflower for a walk through the vineyard.
“Yeah, totally,” I replied. “Your Uncle Johnny is tough.”
“What about Grandpa? When can we see Grandpa?”
“Grandpa is all the way in North Dakota.”
That was about as much as I was prepared to tell her. Jen and Sara kept in touch with Mom, who was doing her best to get Diego an appeal. He was in bad shape, apparently suffering blackouts and seizures.
“I miss him,” Shauna said with a pout.
“I miss him too. Maybe you can write him a letter or draw him a picture?”
Her face brightened. “Can we go back to the house now?”
“Already?”
“I already know what I want to write. I’m going to tell Grandpa about Portland, and Izzy and Uncle Jayden, and I’ll draw him a picture of Sunflower.”
Back at the house, Sunflower ran straight towards the empty sofa, barking loudly. She was frenetic. Panicked. And suddenly, so was I.
“Um, Jen, where’s Johnny?” I asked, trying not to alarm Shauna.
Jen came in from the kitchen. “I don’t know … he was asleep last time I looked. Maybe he’s in the bathroom?”
The bathroom? Johnny wouldn’t go after his pills, right? I had to be sure. “Shauna, go watch TV in my room, please.”
With Sunflower by my side, I made my way to the bathroom door. Please God, let me hear water, pissing, something normal.
For a moment, I heard nothing.
“Johnny? Can you open up?” I said calmly, knocking.
Then I heard sobbing.
“Johnny?”
No reply.
“Open this fucking door.” I heard a click, so I shoved my way in. But in doing so I felt the wood smack against him. I pushed my way in awkwardly—he’d dropped from a seated to a fetal position—then got the door shut and locked up behind me. The last thing I wanted was Shauna to walk in on this. “Johnny, what did you take?”
“Nothing …” Johnny’s arms were crossed close to his chest. As I carefully unfolded them, I saw that he’d broken open a disposable shaving razor and used the shards to cut up his hands and wrists. There was blood everywhere.
“What the fuck, man?” How did he manage to go from “going back to school” to attempted suicide?
