The Story of Our Life

by Shari Low

  I realized my gran had asked me something that I’d missed.

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘You said “I’m”.’

  ‘What?’ I asked, not understanding.

  ‘You said, “I’m thinking of trying IVF”, not we.’

  Wow. She was like the granny division of the CIA – chief interrogator, using the powers of observation, tea and Turkish Delight.

  Her laser-strength perception, as always, cut right through the facts and went straight to the heart of the problem. Colm. Colm, who I loved with all my heart. But who, I’d also learned, had absolutely no capacity to dwell on things that weren’t going well. He didn’t get it. He just didn’t understand my longing, or my monthly disappointment. However, what hurt the most was that, as much as he tried, he couldn’t make it matter to him. It wasn’t on his list of life-wishes, therefore if it didn’t happen that was okay.

  In my world, it wasn’t.

  I tried to condense and minimize all that for my gran.

  ‘Did I? Oh. It’s just that… well, he doesn’t mind so much. It’s different for him. He’s got the boys, he’s happy. There’s no biological clock deafening his ovaries. Sometimes I think he’d be happier if I stopped thinking about it and things just stayed the way they are now.’

  It was true. It was also consistent. He’d had the same point of view since that day in Bali when we’d first discussed it.

  Annie thought about that for a moment. ‘Shauna, if this is important to you then don’t let it go. And if Colm doesn’t see how much it means to you, you’ve got to help him understand it. And no, you’re not being selfish. It’s about time someone else cared about your happiness. God knows those useless lumps of parents never did.’

  She was off again, but thankfully, before she could get into full rant mode, a horn beeped outside.

  ‘That’ll be Vincent,’ I said, grabbing my bag off the floor, then kissing her as I headed to the door. ‘I’ll be back over next week, gran.’

  ‘Great, love. And don’t forget to ask him if he likes older women!’

  I was still shaking my head with amusement when I climbed into the van. It was a new investment, a shiny white Fiesta van with Constant Cravings written in jaunty green letters on the side. It had taken us ages to come up with the company name and we still lived in dread of a letter from K.D. Lang’s copyright lawyers.

  ‘What’s funny?’ Vincent asked, checking his side mirror as he pulled away from the pavement.

  ‘Annie wants to know if you’d consider a fling with an older woman.’

  ‘Only if she takes me to the bingo,’ he retorted.

  We both knew that it was hilarious because it was about as far from the truth as you could get. If Colm was a down-to-earth, grounded bloke, Vincent was his metrosexual opposite. Back in catering college we’d been best mates, a relationship that worked because he was easy-going, uncomplicated, and – mostly – because it was only ever going to be platonic. He wasn’t my type and I definitely wasn’t his. I liked quirky guys and upfront humour, while he paid his way through college by modelling, and only went for the tall, gorgeous girls he worked with, all of whom inevitably fell in love with his chiselled dark looks and gym-buffed body.

  His suggestion to join the two companies together had come over a beer at our annual catch up, and I saw immediately that it made sense. Our collective company revenue had increased tenfold, mainly because his involvement gave me time to focus on marketing and expansion, while his ideas were brilliant, his food was sublime and he was so damn good-looking we were getting tons of repeat business. Sod political correctness – if the objectification of my partner led to more profit for us, it was all right by me.

  The debrief on the job he’d just left took us halfway to Twickenham, and discussing the bookings for the next couple of days took us the rest of the way. We were getting close to home by the time we got onto personal stuff.

  ‘Crap, I’m sorry, I haven’t even asked you how things went with Carole today.’

  Carole. Vincent’s girlfriend. Lingerie model. They’d had a lunch-time meeting that day to discuss their future and he hadn’t had a chance to give me the update.

  ‘Ah, it could have gone better.’

  I smiled.

  ‘Why? What happened?’

  ‘She says she wants a commitment.’

  ‘Ouch.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘And what do you want?’

  ‘Am I being too shallow if I say the love of a good woman and incredible sex?’

  ‘Not if you do it in that order.’

  ‘Then that’ll do me,’ he laughed, but I could see the tension around his eyes.

  ‘So what’s the problem?’ I probed, gently.

  Without pretension or thought, he ran his fingers through his dark hair, then over his two-day stubble.

  ‘I’m not there yet. Not ready to go to the next level,’ he said, then rolled his eyes, ruefully as we stopped at a set of traffic lights on the outskirts of Richmond.

  ‘She says I have commitment issues. It’s not exactly a newsflash, is it?’

  I instinctively railed against the picture he was painting of himself. This wasn’t some flighty guy who messed people around. He was solid. Reliable. Decent. And if he wasn’t ready, then it wasn’t because he had issues, it was because he was being honest. ‘Don’t be hard on yourself. Sometimes it takes one person a little longer to get to the right place.’

  ‘I don’t seem to remember that happening with you and Colm.’

  I laughed. ‘Touché. But we were young. Crazy.’

  ‘I remember,’ he said, smiling.

  ‘So what’s missing?’ I asked him. ‘Love?’

  He shook his head. ‘No, I definitely love her, I just don’t know if it’s enough. You know, that thing you had with Colm, where you couldn’t live a day without him? I’m not feeling that. God, I sound like a girl. Can you check if my testicles are still attached?’

  I punched his arm. ‘Eh, avoid the sexism please.’

  ‘Sorry,’ he grinned. ‘I’m much better with cars, sport or the pricing structure of a finger buffet.’

  ‘You’ll die a sad and lonely old man,’ I teased. ‘Watching rugby on the TV with a fridge full of sausage rolls.’

  ‘Don’t mock. There are worse ways to go than death by sausage roll.’

  As we reached the centre of town, the Richmond streets were still busy. I decided it was too early to call it a night. Colm was away and I wasn’t ready to go home to an empty house. Besides, Vincent didn’t often open up about stuff, and I wanted to know more while I had him on a roll.

  I had a quick look at the clock on the dashboard. ‘Do you want to go for a quick drink?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ he replied, needing no persuasion whatsoever. ‘Do you want to phone Colm and see if he wants to come meet us?’

  ‘No, he’s in Manchester with Dan tonight – group training session tomorrow – so I’m home alone. That sounds like a good title for a Joe Pesci movie.’

  Vincent shook his head. ‘Your jokes are beyond lame.’

  ‘They are,’ I agreed. ‘That’s what makes me adorable.’

  ‘Indeed. So where to?’

  ‘Why don’t we just head to the bridge and choose when we get there.’

  Instead of turning into my street, he kept going straight, over Richmond Bridge and then slipping into a free parking space just as we turned onto Hill Street.

  Jumping out, I gestured to the Pitcher and Piano.

  ‘Let’s go there. Haven’t been in for years. That’s where I met Colm, you know.’

  ‘If you’re going to get all dewy-eyed about Mr Wonderful, I’m not coming in.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll get dewy-eyed about your relationship issues instead. How does that sound?’

  ‘A tad sad, but acceptable.’

  He put his hand on the small of my back as we crossed the road, always so gentlemanly. Colm’s level of chivalry was to shout, ‘Run!’, and hope we
made it to the other side.

  The pub was still busy, despite the fact that it was ten o’clock on a Sunday night.

  One of my favourite songs, Stevie Wonder’s ‘Superstition’, was playing on the sound system as we made our way through the crowd to the bar. I’d forgotten how much I loved this place. It represented so much that was special to me: my twenty- something youth, a thousand nights out with Lulu and Rosie, meeting Colm.

  ‘What would you like?’ Vincent raised his voice over the sound of the music.

  ‘Gin and tonic, please. And crisps!’ I hadn’t eaten all day except from Annie’s home-made scones and Turkish Delight.

  While he ordered, my attention flickered to the open doors that led out on to the balcony, to the exact spot that I’d been standing in when I met Colm seven years before. Seven years – yet it felt like we’d been together our whole lives. What would have happened if I hadn’t gone out that night? Or if I’d left five minutes earlier as I’d been planning to do? It horrified me to think we could have gone through this life without meeting. Or perhaps that wasn’t how it worked. Maybe in any life we’d have found each other and…

  I lost my train of thought, distracted by what I was seeing now through those same doors. The image wasn’t computing. How could that be?

  ‘Shauna,’ Vincent said pointedly, interrupting my thoughts and taking my attention. ‘Here!’ He thrust a drink into my hand, then asked, puzzled, ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘No. Look.’

  I gestured to the open doors, but he was at a different angle from me and struggled to get an adequate view. ‘Can’t see their faces, but do you mean the couple kissing?’

  I nodded, wearily.

  ‘So what’s the problem?’

  ‘The problem is that’s my friend. And the guy she’s with isn’t her husband.’

  21

  2015

  The Prognosis

  ‘Do you need some help there?’ Shauna asked, as she watched me search through the wardrobe for my jacket. It was there last week. Or was it yesterday? It was definitely bloody there.

  ‘No, it’s fine.’ I know I snapped at her. Didn’t mean it. But it was just so… aaargh, where the fuck was my jacket?

  I saw her back off and turned to say something, when I spotted the jacket, hanging on the hook on the back of the bedroom door. Shit. I was sure I’d already looked there.

  I pulled it on and headed downstairs.

  ‘Ready, honey?’ she asked brightly, like I hadn’t bit her head off two minutes before. How did she do that? She just let everything bounce off her like she was made of Teflon.

  ‘Shauna, I’m sorry, I…’

  ‘It’s fine. Come on, let’s go. Traffic might be heavy on the way there.’

  Out in the driveway, I was halfway round the car when I remembered, and doubled back, climbing into the passenger side instead. I didn’t drive any more. Just one more kick in the nuts to add to the others. According to the DVLA I’d be banned from going behind the wheel for at least a year, possibly longer, depending on the results of the meeting today.

  I didn’t even want to think about what that would mean for my work or my day-to-day existence. Couldn’t drive to meetings. Couldn’t jump in the car and pop to the shops. Couldn’t nip to the school to pick up Beth. On the scale of things, it wasn’t life or death, but it was bloody inconvenient.

  Life or death.

  That’s what today was all about, but I already knew the answer. It was all going to be fine. Benign. I was already feeling much better than before the op. A few pills, a bit of recovery time, a couple of inches of hair growth and I’d be on the road back to normal life – even if it was on the bus.

  ‘You okay?’ Shauna asked me for the 3423rd time.

  ‘Yeah, I’m fine.’ It was like a role reversal. All these years, she’d answered ‘I’m fine’ to questions when she clearly wasn’t, yet now I was doing the same. And, just like I used to do, she was pretending to accept it.

  I knew I was being rough on her but I just needed to get today over with. Turn the corner. Put all this behind us.

  It was two weeks since the op and the wrap-around bandages were off my head now, but that left me with the physical version of a split personality. From the front I looked like a normal guy with a bad haircut, but when I turned round the back I looked like a man who’d lost out in a fight with an axe.

  I’d kept the dressing on the wound and pulled a hat on so I didn’t scare kids. Thankfully, Beth hadn’t been phased at all. Made of the same strong stuff as her mother.

  We drove most of the way in silence. There had been a lot of that this week. Shauna had wanted to talk stuff through, discuss how I was feeling, the treatment, the changes to our lives but I wasn’t having it. What was the point? Let’s deal with things as they happen. Get the facts, sort them, move on. What was the point of thinking about the potential downsides when they weren’t going to happen? And anyway, how many times did I have to tell everyone it was going to be fine? I’d never understand the whole obsession with thinking through potential scenarios or preparing for the worst. Sod that. Stay positive, don’t worry about a thing, it’ll all turn out for the best.

  When we parked up, she put her hand on top of mine. ‘It’s going to be fine,’ she said, her grin wide and gorgeous. See, she was coming round to my way of thinking.

  ‘It is, don’t worry,’ I agreed. ‘Although I’m definitely suing them for this haircut.’

  Her hand was on the door handle when she stopped, turned back to me. ‘Colm, I love you.’

  I’d heard that a million times before but for some reason the way she said it just caught me at the back of my throat.

  ‘I love you too, m’darlin.’

  ‘I know.’

  The waiting room in the neurology department was just as busy as when we’d gone there the first visit, but this time it was different. This time, I realized, I was one of them, one of the sick people. A fortnight ago, I hadn’t given a second thought to the fact that this world existed and yet now I was living in it, using words like radiotherapy and chemo and prognosis. As we crossed the room, I saw eyes glance towards me, registering the hair, the dressing. Too late, I wished I’d kept the hat on instead of stuffing it in my pocket when we entered the building.

  An hour later, fifty minutes past the time of our appointment, we were still sitting there, eyes trained on the corridor that led to the consulting rooms.

  ‘Do you think I should go ask at reception, double-check they know we’re here?’ Shauna asked, biting her bottom lip, her hand holding on to mine so tightly her knuckles were turning white.

  ‘They know,’ I told her. ‘They’ll come for us soon.’

  Just as I said it, I saw a couple come from the corridor, a tall guy, his eyes red-rimmed, his wife sobbing, only the elaborate headscarf she wore giving away which one of them was undergoing treatment. They both looked weary, worn, his arm around her waist, supporting her as if her legs could give way at any moment.

  Beside me, Shauna took a sharp breath. She’d seen them too, their devastation playing out for the whole waiting room to see.

  ‘Poor buggers,’ I whispered, so only Shauna could hear me.

  ‘Mr O’Flynn?’ I saw Jenny, the liaison nurse scanning the room, then nodding as she spotted us.

  She waited until we reached her before starting down the corridor. ‘How are you? You’re looking great,’ she told me, while I searched her face for clues. She must know. She must have full information on what we were going in here to be told, yet she was giving away nothing. That must mean everything was going to be fine. I knew it.

  Inside the stark pale greens walls of the room, Mr Miller was waiting, sitting next to a guy I hadn’t met before. He introduced himself as Mr Johns. Oncologist. So what did that mean? Why was he here? Out of nowhere, tiny tingles of anxiety started in my chest. Oncologist. The specialist who dealt with radiotherapy and chemo for cancer. Didn’t necessarily mean he was here to speak to me tho
ugh. Perhaps he just sat in on the clinic all day. I was one of dozens of people Mr Miller would be seeing today, all of them in different stages of treatment, with different tumours, so maybe he was there to consult only for those who needed him – like those poor souls who’d been in before us.

  No, he wasn’t here for me. I was fine. Fine.

  Introductions over, Mr Miller lifted his pen. ‘So Colm, tell me how you’ve been since the operation? Further vision issues? Headaches?’

  No, no, no, no. That wasn’t how today should work. I was here for answers not questions. Just tell me. Tell me I’m okay and then I’ll answer questions for a fortnight. For ever.

  But none of that came out of my mouth. Instead I said, ‘Just a few headaches, but I think they’re more to do with the wound. Mr Miller, please don’t think I’m being rude, but can we please get to the point and tell us about the tumour? I’m fine, right?’

  He put his pen down on the desk and turned so that he was facing us straight on. I’m not sure if it was me or Shauna who was holding on tighter, but I could no longer feel my hand.

  ‘Colm, we’ve had the results back from the lab and I’m afraid they’re not what we hoped. The analysis shows that your tumour is what we call a grade 4 glioblastoma.’

  Gliobastoma.

  Oh fuck.

  I remembered that word. I’d seen it weeks ago, when Shauna had been researching brain tumours. It was cancer. Not benign. Cancer.

  I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t make my lungs work. Couldn’t understand what he was saying. Everything was shutting down and all I could hear was white noise. Chaos. The thudding of my heart pumping out blood.

  ‘I’m sorry. I know this isn’t what you wanted to hear. Do you need a moment or shall I carry on?’

  ‘Carry on.’ It was Shauna’s voice, not mine, and it was a choked whisper.

  ‘Okay. I’m suggesting we implement a treatment plan immediately. We removed as much of the tumour as we could see, but as I said post-op, that doesn’t guarantee there were no cancer cells left behind. We need to start a six-week programme of radiotherapy, followed by a chemotherapy regime. That’s why Mr Johns is here. He’ll talk you through the plan.’