A Woman Ignored (A Woman Lost Book 2)

by T. B. Markinson

  “Would you like me to drive you home?” I offered. “Does he still live on Quentin?” It wasn’t until I asked the question that I realized how ridiculous it sounded. I didn’t know where my brother lived, and he didn’t know where I lived. God, we were a fucked up family! How did I think I would ever get some type of closure?

  “No, he moved after…” It didn’t seem like she’d run out of words, just that she was defeated. She had run out of desire. “I should help Sarah.” She hopped up, shaking her head from either standing too quickly or from the copious amount of wine she had consumed. My money was on the wine.

  “How you doing?” asked Sarah on the drive back to Fort Collins.

  I shook my head and gripped the steering wheel. “What an awful afternoon.”

  We drove in silence for a few minutes. Then I broke it. “I feel terrible for Tiffany. Is it all an act?”

  “I think so. She’s so young, and Peter…”

  “Why does my family chew everyone up and spit them out?”

  Speechless, Sarah patted my leg.

  “And to watch my mom dig her claws into Tiffany. At first I was thrilled I wasn’t the target, but shit, this is worse. I can at least stand up to her. Do you think Peter ever felt this way? Conflicted about not being the target, but feeling bad for me?”

  She avoided answering, instead saying, “What do you think?”

  “Not a chance in hell. Peter’s too much like them, or like my mother at least. To be honest, Sarah, this whole experience is showing me just how much I don’t know my father. The man is either mute or not present. How does he feel? Mom is bitter. Beyond bitter. But is he? For the life of me, I can’t figure out why they never divorced. For as long as I remember, they’ve always been like that, always combative. What kind of life is that?”

  * * *

  Two days later, I received an email from my father requesting my presence at dinner. The message didn’t say much, but I formed the impression it would be just the two of us. We met at the same restaurant.

  Once again, I found my father sitting in the dark, stylish bar in an overstuffed leather chair. He swirled a bourbon, but didn’t seem to be drinking. I watched him briefly as he stared blankly out of the window. He didn’t move, speak, drink, or anything. It was the saddest I had ever seen him.

  “Hello,” I said, taking a seat across from him.

  He nodded and motioned for the waitress to approach.

  “What’ll ya have, darling?” Her bouncy attitude didn’t fit my father’s somber mood.

  “Gin and tonic. Double please.”

  I had prepared ahead of time, so that Sarah and Maddie were in a different restaurant nearby, waiting to take me home. No one said it out loud, but I think we all sensed what was about to happen.

  Mom’s chemo treatment had ended abruptly. Just yesterday, when I arrived to pick her up, she announced that she wasn’t going. Not that day. Not ever. And with that, she’d shooed me away.

  “Lizzie…” My father sipped his bourbon. “Your mom has decided to stop her treatment. The last test revealed that it wasn’t working and—”

  “Here ya go.” The bubbly waitress appeared. “One G and T, heavy on the G.” She plopped the drink down and rushed off, smiling.

  I held the glass, watching condensation slide down onto my fingers before dripping onto the arm of the chair. “I see,” I finally said.

  “We knew that it was a long shot. It was caught so late…”

  A long shot. It seemed cruel to refer to someone’s life as a long shot, but oddly fitting, too. Mom was always playing games. Until recently, it looked like she’d win by playing dirty. Cancer—the great equalizer. Rich, poor, happy, or sad, it didn’t matter. Cancer struck and left death and destruction in its wake.

  I let out a long breath and swallowed a mouthful of my drink in an attempt to force my emotions back. I needed to hold on. There would be time for me to fall apart—later, not now. I had to be strong.

  Neither of us spoke.

  “Another round?” The waitress came by again. My father and I nodded gravely. Our mood finally seeped into hers, and she hurried away less cheerfully this time.

  “Is there anything that can be done to make her more comfortable?” I asked.

  “I’ve called Hospice. They’ll work with your mom’s nurse, make sure she has OxyContin and morphine to ease the pain. She wants everything to be on her terms, like normal.” For the first time, I saw a slight smile cross his lips.

  “What was she like, when you met her?” The question popped out of my mouth before I could stop it; even I was floored by it.

  Dad cradled his tumbler with both hands and stared into his lap. “Strong, determined, not as harsh. The more successful we became, the more her fear took over. She never wanted to return to where we started. Power. She craved power. I loved your mother once, Lizzie.” He lifted his haggard face to gaze into my eyes. “Until she stopped letting me.”

  Dad excused himself, and ambled to the bathroom, looking like an old man. I sat in my chair, stunned, unable to think of what I should do or say.

  When he returned, my father asked, “Do you have a ride home?”

  “Yeah.” I nodded to ensure my meaning got across. I wasn’t sure he had heard me; my voice felt stuck in the back of my throat.

  He placed a hand on my shoulder. “She would like you to continue visiting,” he said, and then he was gone. I guess he had opted not to have dinner, and I wasn’t hungry now either.

  I flagged the waitress, cancelled the second round, and asked her to settle the bill.

  She waved me off. “I’ll just put it on Mr. Petrie’s tab, honey.”

  My drink was still two-thirds full. It took me more than an hour to finish it. Tempted to order another, I fished my phone out before I slipped into a miasma I couldn’t recover from. Maddie and Sarah rushed inside to retrieve me.

  I gazed into Sarah’s eyes and whispered, “He loved her‌…‌in another lifetime.”

  Past tense. Soon, she would always be in the past tense. It was over. The drill sergeant had lost this battle, and consequently, the war.

  Cancer was unforgiving. It didn’t care about power. It crushed Mom like a bug smashed into a windshield, only not as quickly. It teased her with the hope of beating it.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sarah and I sat in the doctor’s consultation room to discuss our future test-tube baby—a phrase Sarah forbade me from uttering out loud. She preferred the clinical in vitro fertilization or IVF. Personally, when I heard it put that way, I started to freak out.

  The room wasn’t overly clinical. A vase with fresh daisies sat on the far table. The wall behind displayed photos of smiling babies and cooing parents. The colors were soothing. Everything seemed purposefully cheerful, except for the schematic of the IVF process; it reminded me of those silly cartoons they showed in elementary school, explaining how a bill was turned into a law. The drawing in the office wasn’t very cheerful either. It depicted a female form with a red spot marking her reproductive parts and an arrow pointing to a laboratory dish. I stopped inspecting it even before it detailed two other steps in the process.

  I always cringed whenever I saw or thought of a Petri dish. Having the surname Petrie didn’t help. I felt like a science experiment, akin to Harry Harlow’s experiments on baby monkeys raised by unfeeling mothers.

  I took a deep breath in an attempt to calm myself. It didn’t work. I was certain Sarah could see my heart pumping inside my chest, so hard I thought for sure it was heaving up and down like an overwrought piston about to explode.

  The doctor sat in a chair behind the desk. She had a kind face and appeared to be in her late forties. She in no way resembled a mad scientist, much to my chagrin.

  “So, Sarah and Lizzie, I understand you would like to extract eggs from Lizzie, and then you, Sarah, will carry the baby. Is that correct?” Her soft voice matched her caring appearance.

  E
xtract—the word made me shudder.

  “That’s correct,” said Sarah, our unofficial spokesperson.

  The doctor jotted something on a notepad before stating, “Wonderful. The process has really advanced since it was first accomplished in 1978.”

  My brain focused on the year. I hadn’t considered researching the history of test-tube babies.

  Realizing the woman was still speaking, I checked back into the conversation. “We’ll need to chart Lizzie’s cycle, and then stimulate her ovulatory process and remove ova, or eggs, from her ovaries. We’ll then add sperm to fertilize them in a laboratory. The zygote…” She paused and looked directly at me. I didn’t like her assumption that I was clueless about the process, even though I was. “The fertilized egg is cultured for two to six days, and then we’ll implant it into Sarah’s uterus.”

  All the words: ovulatory, ova, zygote, sperm, and uterus bounced around in my head like an out-of-control Ping-Pong ball. The woman was a mad scientist after all. But she was even scarier for looking so unassuming.

  Sarah reached for my hand. “How do you extract Lizzie’s eggs?”

  I could have done without that question. Ignorance is bliss.

  Dr. Frankenstein gazed at me sweetly, and replied, “We use a transvaginal technique called transvaginal oocyte retrieval.”

  I wanted to say, “Come again.”

  She must have sensed that all I heard was jibberish. “Basically, it involves using a needle to pierce the vaginal wall to get to your ovaries.”

  I honed in on two words: needle and pierce.

  Sarah squeezed my hand tighter. I would have squeezed back if I wasn’t mortified by this sweet woman calmly talking about torturing me with modern-day medicine.

  The nut job continued. “Lizzie will be given drugs that will stimulate her ovaries, with the hope that she’ll produce several eggs.”

  I no longer liked the term test-tube baby. And I wasn’t fond of IVF either. The cheerful consultation room suddenly felt like a prison, and I felt like a prisoner undergoing outrageous and painful medical tortures, all for the glory of a mad scientist.

  If Sarah hadn’t had a vise-like grip on my hand, I would have bolted.

  “However, quality eggs are still the goal, not necessarily quantity.”

  So, I wasn’t exactly a factory egg producer but more of a free-range chicken.

  I didn’t look at Sarah or the doctor so my true feelings would remain undetected.

  Panic.

  I was panicking. All of this was becoming real to me. Soon, I’d be taking egg-inducing drugs and then this crazy woman was going to insert a needle into me to suck them out.

  What the fucking hell?

  Who in the fuck thought of this?

  Any desire I had to research test-tube babies oozed out of me. I imagined seeing a puddle of fear forming around my feet.

  By some miracle, I managed to remain quiet for the rest of the appointment. The doctor kept asking Sarah all the questions, like what would we do with the extra eggs: freeze them, or donate them?

  The longer we stayed, the more determined I became to never eat another egg in all my life. This whole stealing of eggs was barbaric.

  Dates were discussed. Soon, Sarah was standing and shaking the loon’s hand saying, “Thank you so much for meeting us. You have been so reassuring, and I know I speak for both of us when I say we are thrilled to be starting this process.”

  The doctor smiled. I reached down deep inside to yank a smile out. I imagined I was pulling a string connected to the sun on the other side of the earth and forcing its warmth and radiance to appear hours before the dawn.

  We made it to the parking lot before Sarah noticed my dazed look. When she plucked the keys out of my hand, I didn’t even protest. Our appointment was early in the day, so Sarah had taken the rest of the day off.

  It wasn’t until we’d been driving for well over forty minutes that I realized we weren’t heading home. Instead, we were driving through Estes Park, a small town outside the entrance of Rocky Mountain National Park.

  “Are we going hiking?” I asked.

  “Not really. We’re meeting Maddie and Doug for lunch, and then hopefully we’ll explore a bit. Do you know what season this is?”

  “Fall,” I said with no confidence it was the correct answer.

  “True, and it’s elk-rutting season.”

  I rubbed my eyes and swallowed. “What are you talking about?”

  “Large numbers of elk gather together and you can hear the sounds of the bulls bugling. Rocky Mountain National Park has more elk than Yellowstone.”

  “Why?”

  “Fewer wolves and grizzly bears,” she said matter-of-factly as she pulled off the main street to park the car in the public lot.

  We met Maddie and Doug at a small sandwich shop that had a view of Main Street. The place was atypical for Sarah and Maddie. The plastic chairs and cheap tables covered with red-and-white checkered tablecloths made me question why we were eating here.

  I must have looked rattled, because Maddie was on her best behavior for once. She didn’t crack any jokes at my expense. Normally, I would have minded being handled with kid gloves, but I didn’t think I could handle too much joviality today.

  “This place has the best meatball subs,” said Doug.

  It was Doug’s place; that explained the décor.

  “So Lizzie,” he continued, “are you ready to hear the elk bugling? They say it’s one of the most unique sounds in nature, like the howl of a wolf.”

  “Sounds great,” I replied not so enthusiastically.

  Maddie offered Doug a sweet smile. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. I think Lizzie’s still in shock from her appointment.”

  Doug nodded sympathetically.

  Sarah’s warm hand slipped onto my thigh. “The poor thing had to sit there and listen to words like zygote, sperm, and ova—” Sarah burst into laughter.

  “Hey! They’re going to stick a needle in me and suck my eggs out,” I pouted.

  “And Sarah’s going to carry the baby and then go through this thing called birth.” Maddie arched her eyebrows, clearly curious as to how I would respond.

  I didn’t.

  Just then, I saw a person bolt past the window. Followed by two more. They didn’t seem like they were running to catch a bus or something. They were sprinting for their lives. I pointed out the window, speechless.

  Everyone looked in time to see a massive elk charging after the runners.

  Then I heard the sound. The bull screamed.

  “Shit,” muttered Doug. “I wish people would respect elk more, especially during rutting season. Those people probably called out to get a better photo or something.” He shook his head in dismay.

  I had been to Estes countless times, but I had never seen elk roaming through the town. It was like a mini elk apocalypse outside, and we had front-row seats.

  “Shall I order the meatball subs?” asked Maddie. Without waiting for our answers, she headed for the cash register.

  “This is insane.” Sarah’s mouth was slightly agape as she watched the madness outside.

  Doug agreed. “The males are very combative right now.” He turned to me. “Do you know that their urethras point upward, so when they piss it shoots onto their hide? The females are attracted to the scent.”

  Maddie returned just in time to hear his disgusting tidbit. “You see, Lizzie. You thought you had it bad. At least you don’t have to pee on yourself.”

  Everyone got a kick out of that, and I had to admit that, for the first time that day, I felt relieved. Despite all the mayhem taking place outside, sitting inside with Sarah and our friends and sharing lunch had turned it into a normal day—for me, at least, if not for the people being chased.

  “So, tell me, who came up with this idea for today?” I stared directly at Maddie.

  Her guilty smile answered me.

  “Her first suggestion w
as taking you to eat Rocky Mountain oysters,” said Doug.

  My mouth fell open. “Fried cow balls. You wanted me to eat fried cow balls?”

  She shrugged. “I thought it was kinda fitting, considering.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh.

  Chapter Fourteen

  At the start of November, Sarah surprised me by taking me to Breckenridge for a weekend. The winter tourists hadn’t yet arrived in full force. We were sitting in a restaurant next to a roaring fire, Sarah looking radiant in a Norwegian ski sweater she had purchased specifically for the getaway. Neither of us planned to ski because there wasn’t much snow to speak of and I had never skied in my life, but Sarah hardly ever missed a chance to shop.

  “You’re quiet over there,” she said, washing the words away with a sip of water, cautious doe eyes gazing at me over the rim.

  I smiled awkwardly. “I’m sorry. You take me away on a romantic getaway, and here I am ruminating.”

  “This doesn’t have to be a romantic getaway, Lizzie. I just thought it’d be good for you to get away from everything for a couple of days. Relax, have a little fun, eat some good food.” She motioned to the steak that sat untouched on my plate.

  Usually, I inhaled every meal that was placed before me. Today, not even a steak could tempt me.

  “I’m worried about you.” Her voice was soft, supportive. “I don’t know how I would handle my mother dying, and your situation has added layers of difficulty.”

  “‘Added layers of difficulty,’” I repeated. “That’s an understatement.” I sliced off a small piece of steak—for her benefit, not because I was hungry. “I’ve been reading, I think we should go organic, for the baby’s sake.”

  Sarah set down her water glass, taken aback by the sudden change of topic. Her eyebrows shot up.

  “I just think fewer pesticides and other chemicals would be better for us, and for the baby,” I continued. “I’ve been living with an illness that many people believe has environmental causes. And cancer‌…‌well‌…‌I just think it would be better. Safer.” I looked away, feeling foolish. I wasn’t the type to support organic food or to change my diet because it was trendy.