On Grace

by Susie Orman Schnall

  I turn to look at Cameron and she’s holding the phone, staring straight ahead with a stunned look on her face. All of a sudden, she hangs up the phone, straightens up in bed, and turns to me.

  “So, yes, I have breast cancer. Specifically, I have invasive ductal carcinoma in my left breast and lobular carcinoma in situ, which means that there’s an increased risk of cancer developing in my right breast in the future. I have to have surgery, and then based upon the pathology, they’ll be able to figure out what comes next in terms of postoperative treatment with chemotherapy and maybe radiation,” Dr. Stevens says in a very detached, clinical voice.

  “Oh my God, Cam.”

  “Don’t worry, Grace. It’ll be okay. They caught it early, and I’m going to be okay. Really, I am,” she says definitively. I can’t tell if she’s trying to convince herself of that or if she knows more about breast cancer statistics than I thought she did, being a pediatrician and all.

  So I decide to go along with her positive attitude and leave my worrying and freaking out for when I’m alone.

  “So what happens now?” I ask, deciding to be more matter-of-fact, because I know that’s what Cameron is comfortable with.

  “Well, I have to find a breast surgeon to do the procedure. Shannon recommended someone at Sloan-Kettering who she says is the best. I’ll ask around and see if there’s anyone else I should meet with too, just to get another opinion. I’m assuming they’ll just need to do a lumpectomy, but since they found the lobular carcinoma in situ, it may indicate a double mastectomy. That’s what I have to find out from the surgeons.”

  “Okay, is there anything I can do to help?” I ask calmly, trying not to sound patronizing.

  “No, and you know what, Grace?” Cameron asks, looking determinedly into my eyes.

  “What?”

  “I’m really lucky.”

  “Okay,” I say, unsure where she’s going with this.

  “I’m lucky because I live in New York, one of the best places in the world for medical care and for cancer care. I have the connections and the resources to find the best doctors and get the best treatment. That is so empowering. It completely eliminates the stress of having no idea what to do next. I could be some scared woman in a small town in North Dakota who gets this diagnosis and has nowhere to turn. Can you imagine how overwhelming that must be? Instead, not only did I get my biopsy results the next day, I can make one phone call and have an appointment tomorrow with a leading breast surgeon at Sloan-Kettering. I’m really lucky, Grace.”

  “You’re right, Cam, you are lucky. And I know that you’re going to do what you have to do and find the right people and get yourself better.”

  “I am. That’s exactly what I’m going to do.”

  “But aren’t—” I hesitate.

  “What, Grace? Say it.”

  I turn to her and my eyes betray my fear. “Aren’t you scared, at all?”

  “Oh, Grace,” she says looking into my eyes and then she hugs me. “Of course I’m scared. But I do scared very differently from you. You do scared all crying and sad and retreating and needing love. I’m not judging, I’m just saying. And that’s fine. That’s your scared, and you don’t know how to do it any other way. And sometimes I think that way of doing scared would be more comforting because other people help you get through it. But you know me. I do scared like a battalion on the front lines: a plan, a rush of adrenaline, and then lots of ass-kicking,” Cameron says, making karate chops with her hands.

  I laugh.

  “Yes, if it makes you feel better, then yes, I’m absolutely, ridiculously, fucking scared, but I’m not going to let it paralyze me. I’m just going to do what I have to do and get on with it. I am not seeing this as a death sentence at all. I know this is beatable. So I need you to not see it that way either. Deal?” she asks, turning toward me and putting her hand out.

  “Deal,” I say, shaking her hand and drying my eyes. I smile at my friend who does scared really well and give her a hug.

  “Now, I need to make some calls and schedule some appointments, but I’m not done with you and this Darren shit show, so don’t go anywhere.”

  While Cameron goes into her study to get on her computer and make some calls, I open her windows, make her bed, clean up the muffin crumbs, and thank my lucky stars for this strong woman who is my best friend. I hear my phone ring, so I rush to find it in my purse before it stops ringing. It’s Darren.

  “Hey,” he says in a detached voice.

  “Thanks for calling me. I really need to talk to you.”

  “What’s up?” I hear him typing. He’s not paying attention to me, so I just spill it.

  “Cameron has breast cancer,” I say in a lowered voice. Cameron is downstairs, but I don’t want her to hear me.

  “What?” The typing stops. I know I have his full attention.

  “She went to the OB yesterday for a routine exam, and he felt a lump. She had a mammogram yesterday and then a needle biopsy. She just got the results. It’s cancer.”

  “Shit.”

  “I know.”

  “How is she doing?”

  “She’s being very Cameron. I’m at her house right now, and she’s on the phone making appointments with breast surgeons. She’s acting very gung ho and normal, so I don’t know if she’s in denial or if she’s really that strong. I would normally say she’s really that strong, but this is cancer, Darren.”

  “I know. Well, I guess we need to let her handle it in her own way. I can’t believe what a bad run of it she’s having.”

  “I know. It’s horrible.”

  “Do you think it’s okay if I send her an email and let her know I know?”

  “Yes, I think that would be really nice. I’m sure she’d appreciate it.”

  “Okay, I’ll do that.”

  “Do you have time to talk about some stuff with me right now?”

  “Not really, and I’m not really ready to talk to you anyway. I need to figure some things out in my head, and I’ve just been really busy at work, so I haven’t had much downtime. I’m actually calling because I have on my schedule that you need me to be home early so you can meet your father in the city for dinner. Do you still need me to do that?”

  “Yes, thank you. I have one of the high-school girls from the neighborhood coming over after school, but if you could get home by 6:30 or so, that would be great. And I know the boys would love to see you.”

  “Okay.”

  “Darren—” I start.

  “I gotta go, Grace.”

  And then I realize he has hung up.

  I take the 4:42 train to Grand Central. My train gets in at 5:26, a half hour before I’m supposed to meet my dad at the Oyster Bar, his favorite restaurant in New York and a convenient one at that, being on the bottom floor of Grand Central. I walk up to the balcony of the terminal and go to The Campbell Apartment, one of my favorite bars in New York City, for a glass of wine and some quiet contemplation.

  The Campbell Apartment was the private office of John W. Campbell, who was a tycoon in the 1920s. It is a spectacular space with soaring ceilings, a huge leaded-glass window, and enough historic Grand Central architectural details for me to admire in one sitting. The bartender gives me the wine with a sly smile, motions to the other end of the bar, and tells me the man sitting there has bought the wine for me. I look to see who my benefactor is, a little annoyed that I’m now going to have to deal with some stranger’s overtures and wondering why the guy didn’t just make the extra effort to notice that I have a wedding ring on, the universal sign for, ‘No need to waste your time and money on me, friend.’ I see an attractive older man with slicked-back, graying hair impeccably dressed in a dark suit, a white shirt, and a decidedly Hermès ice-blue tie. He raises his glass, and I do the same, and then he smiles and gets up from his seat.

  “It’s my father,” I say to the bartender, not wanting him to think I’m that easy. Or into old guys.

  “Uh huh,” he says and gives me a l
ook that means he’s heard that one way too many times.

  “Hey, Gracie,” my dad says to me, giving me a kiss on the forehead.

  “Hey, Dad. Thanks for the drink. Funny meeting you here.”

  “I was early, and I remember you mentioned this place to me last time we ate at the Oyster Bar, so I figured I’d give it a try. And you were right. It’s magnificent.”

  “Well, I’m happy to see you. How has your trip been going?”

  “Fine, just fine.”

  My dad and I sit amongst the splendor of The Campbell Apartment, enjoying our drinks, and talking about the case he’s working on.

  “Do you remember the first time I bought you a drink?” I ask, nudging my dad in the shoulder.

  “I certainly do. It wasn’t in quite as rarefied a place as this,” he says, laughing.

  “No, not quite,” I say, laughing along.

  “A beer on tap from Smokey Joe’s, I believe,” he says.

  “That would be the place. But in my day we called it Smoke’s, Dad.”

  “Right, Smoke’s,” he says of the dive at Penn, my dad’s alma mater as well as mine. He had been in New York for work one week and took the train to Philly to visit me for an afternoon. After a walk through campus, I decided that we should go to Smoke’s so I could buy him a beer. I remember feeling so grown up. I wasn’t even 21, but my fake ID worked fine at Smoke’s, and my dad didn’t mind. I know he was proud of me that day, that he stopped seeing me as a little girl and was starting to look at me as a woman. And I could tell by the way he said goodbye that night that, in his own way, he felt sentimental about his baby being all grown up.

  “Well, shall we?” my dad asks as he hands money to the bartender, who winks at me.

  “We shall,” I say, sneering at the bartender.

  My dad has been coming to the Oyster Bar forever. A venerable New York institution, the restaurant opened in 1913 but fell into disrepair until it reopened in the 70s as the much-lauded, beautifully designed restaurant it is today. I am smitten with the vaulted Guastavino tile ceilings as much as I am smitten with the gorgeous astronomical ceiling in the terminal’s main concourse. The dining room is crowded and filled with an interesting mix of tourists, commuters, and native New York Oyster Bar devotees. After we order—oysters Rockefeller and a tuna steak for my dad, and a shrimp cocktail and grilled salmon for me—I tell him about Cameron.

  “Oh, Gracie, that’s just terrible,” my dad says with a grimace, setting his butter knife and roll back down on the plate.

  “I know. But she says the statistics are in her favor, and she’s going to go all Cameron on cancer and get rid of it.”

  “Well, I hope that she’s going to be okay.”

  “I know. I can’t imagine losing someone else close to me.”

  “I can’t imagine it either,” he says, looking into my eyes, knowing that I’m talking about Danielle just as much as he’s thinking about her. For someone so tough as nails in the courtroom and so seemingly emotionally simple, I know my dad is deeply distraught to this day over the death of his daughter. He smiles at me and we make a silent truce to change the subject.

  “How’s Darren’s business going? The market is doing quite well these days.”

  “Well, yeah, Darren’s doing well. Very busy.”

  “I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to see him.”

  “It’s just hard with sitters and all, so I thought it would be easier if he stayed home with the boys. Next time, though. Hopefully, you’ll come in for longer, and you can come up and see the boys.”

  “That would be nice, Gracie.”

  I stare down at my plate and fidget a bit as I decide whether to tell my dad about my and Darren’s problems.

  “What is it?” my dad asks, sensing my internal debate.

  “I don’t know if Eva already told you, but Darren and I are having some problems.”

  “She didn’t. What’s up?” he asks, taking my hand across the table.

  “Well,” and suddenly I’m embarrassed sharing something so personal with my dad. “Believe it or not, he cheated on me.”

  “Oh, Gracie.”

  “Yeah, he was at a conference over the summer and it’s a long, drawn-out story, but the bottom line is he had been drinking a lot with his friends, and somehow the cocktail waitress ended up in his bed.”

  “Ouch.”

  “Exactly. It’s been really tough. He only told me a couple weeks ago.”

  “And how do you feel about the whole thing?”

  “Well, that’s an interesting question. I have gone through all the predictable feelings: anger, sadness, humiliation, you name it, I’ve felt it. But right now, I feel mostly like I don’t want to let it ruin my marriage. I don’t want to give that random woman who serves martinis in a hotel bar in Chicago the power to destroy what Darren and I have created together. I love him, Dad. It’s been really hard.” I decide to leave out the pivotal Jake part of the story, despite the fact that it was actually the turning point in my journey to forgiveness, because I don’t want my dad to be disappointed in me.

  “I’m sure it has been,” he says, and he evades my eyes.

  “What do you think?”

  “Oh,” he says with a bit of a chuckle that sounds more like a grunt than a laugh, “I’m not a big fan of people cheating on their spouses, but I know it happens all the time. It’s real hard to understand when the cheater says he, or she, didn’t mean anything by it, but I think I’ve realized over the years, that it might actually be true,” he says, again looking somewhere over my right shoulder.

  His lack of eye contact confuses me. Reed Roseman the cut-throat defense attorney has made a career out of eye contact, persistent, penetrating eye contact. It’s only when he’s uncomfortable that he looks away. Why is he uncomfortable? I suddenly have the nagging suspicion that he’s cheating on Amanda. Or maybe that gold-digging, botoxed bitch is cheating on him. To be honest, I secretly hope he is cheating on her, because I never liked her. I pray they had a prenup. Thankfully, my dad looks at me and continues.

  “But I do hope you two can work it out because of the boys. It’s not easy being a single mother, Gracie. I know you girls would have been better off living with your mother and me. I’m not claiming any awards for being a good father, but I know that having two parents is always better than one.”

  Now I reach over and grab his hand across the table. “You and Mom did the best you could. And I think Eva and I turned out pretty well,” I say, smiling.

  “Exceedingly well,” he says, and we start our first courses that the waiter has just brought.

  “These shrimp are huge!” I say.

  “Enjoy,” he says, offering me an oyster. “Are you still volunteering at the boys’ school?” he asks.

  As we eat, I tell him about my adventures in reentering the workforce.

  “Well, did you fight for the job when that Nicole told you she was offering it to someone else?” he asks, eye contact in full penetration mode.

  “No. I guess I just accepted that she had chosen someone else.”

  “You’ve got to fight for yourself, Gracie. I know you’ll be surprised to hear this because professionally I am very aggressive, but I haven’t been too great at fighting for myself in my personal life over the years, and I see a little of that in you,” he says, gesturing with an empty oyster shell.

  Again, my thoughts go straight to his and Amanda’s relationship, and I wonder what’s going on.

  “What do you mean?” I ask innocently. “I do fight for myself. I honk like crazy when a car swerves in front of me on the highway, and I do a lot of exaggerated weight-shifting and loud tsk-tsking when someone cuts in front of me in a line.”

  “That’s not what I mean,” he says, laughing. “I just don’t want you to spend your life letting people get away with not choosing you.”

  And now I’m thoroughly confused. “You mean that Darren’s cheating showed he wasn’t choosing me and not getting the job showe
d she wasn’t choosing me?”

  “Yes, both in a way. But I understand why you don’t fight for yourself. You’re kindhearted and you don’t want to be confrontational. You just need to advocate for yourself, too. You need to make sure that your needs are being met, not just those of everyone around you.”

  I sit back, and take a sip of my wine and think for a moment about what my dad is saying. I’m a little confused, baffled actually, by what he means about this relating to his own life. But he does have a point about how it relates to mine. And it ties into what my mom and Eva were trying to tell me in L.A. I’ve always been concerned about how things are supposed to go and what I’m supposed to do at the expense of really figuring out what I want and going full-throttle in that direction. Although, in my little fling with Jake, I did the latter, and look where that got me.

  What I think my family is trying to tell me is that I should stop being so careful and just go for it, whatever “it” may be at that particular moment. I should “go” for my marriage and make Darren realize that we need to be together. I should “go” for a job and wholeheartedly find something that’s going to fulfill me intellectually. I should “go” for making sure that my life is filled mostly with want to’s and get to’s instead of have to’s and must do’s.

  We spend the rest of the dinner talking about NPR and L.A. restaurants and other neutral subjects. My main takeaway from our dinner is that I’m pleasantly surprised by how much easier our relationship is becoming now that I’m an adult. I think my dad is uneasy with people needing him. I’m assuming, although I’ve never learned the exact reasons for their disconnect, that’s the reason that he and my mom broke up. Maybe she was too intense emotionally. And I think, as a kid, I must have been, too.

  Now that I’m an adult and my needs are being met by my own nuclear family, I think it makes my dad feel like he’s a bit off the hook. Still doesn’t explain how he deals with Amanda and what’s going on there. But I guess most of her self-esteem needs are dealt with by a certain plastics doctor in L.A. On the train ride home, I think about Darren and whether he’ll be waiting up for me in our bed or asleep in the guest room.