“What do you mean, it could be a number of things?” She was suddenly totally confused by what he was saying. It was as though all of a sudden she couldn't hear him. Why was there a mass deep inside her breast? What was it and how did it get there?
“There are several possibilities, but a mass of this size, at this depth, in this particular area, is never a good thing, Alex. We think you have a tumor.”
“Oh Jesus.” No wonder he didn't want to tell her on the phone, and insisted that Liz interrupt her. “What does that mean? What happens now?” Her voice was thin and her face pale, and for a moment she thought she might faint, but she forced herself not to.
“You need a biopsy, as quickly as possible. Within the next week ideally.”
“I'm going into trial in two days. I can't until after the trial is over.” It was as though she hoped it would go away by then, but they both knew it wouldn't.
“You can't do that.”
“I can't let my client down. Are you telling me a few days will make that much difference?” She was horrified. What was he saying to her? That she was dying? The thought and the terror of it made her tremble.
“A few days won't necessarily make that much difference,” he admitted cautiously, “but you can't afford to drag your heels on this. You need to choose a surgeon and get the biopsy done as soon as possible, and then you'll have to see what he recommends, based on the pathologist's findings.” Oh God. It was all so complicated and frightening, and so ugly.
“Can't you do the biopsy?” She sounded suddenly desperate and very frightened. She felt as vulnerable as she had feared she would when she went to the mammography lab and began to panic. And now, the worst had happened, or almost. It was happening. It was rolling out in front of her like a terrifying movie.
“I don't do biopsies. You need a surgeon.” He picked up a piece of paper from his desk then, and she noticed that she had already been there for half an hour, but suddenly her whole life had changed, and she wasn't ready to leave yet. “I wrote down the names of a few very good people, a woman and two men. You should talk to them, and see who you like best. They're all excellent surgeons.” Surgeons!
“I don't have time for this.” She started to cry in spite of herself, it was all so horrifying, and she felt uncharacteristically overwhelmed and astonishingly helpless. She was torn between anger and terror. “I don't have time to go shopping for a doctor. I have a trial, I can't suddenly back out of it. I have responsibilities.” She sounded hysterical even to her own ears, but she couldn't help it. And then she looked up at him in genuine terror. “Do you think it's malignant?”
“Possibly.” He wanted to be honest with her. On the film, it didn't look good. “It could very well be. Or it could be fooling us into thinking it is. We won't know till you get the biopsy, but it's important that you do that quickly, so you can decide on a plan of action.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that if the biopsy is positive, you'll have to make some decisions about the course of treatment. Your surgeon will advise you, of course, but some of the decisions will have to be yours.”
“You mean like whether or not to take my breast off?” She looked appalled and her voice was shrill as she asked him.
“Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. We don't know anything yet, do we?” He was trying to be gentle with her, but it was making it worse. She wanted to face it now, she wanted him to swear to her it wouldn't be malignant. But he couldn't do that.
“We know I have a mass deep in my breast, and you're worried about it. That could mean I'll lose a breast, couldn't it?” She had him on the witness stand and she was relentless.
“Yes, it could,” he said quietly. He was deeply sorry for her. He had always liked her, and this was a terrible blow for any woman.
“And then what? That's it? The breast is off, no more problems?”
“Possibly, but not necessarily. It's not as simple as all that. I wish it were, but it isn't. It will depend on the type of tumor you have, the extent of its malignancy, if there is any, and the nature of the involvement. It will depend on whether or not your lymph nodes are involved, how many, and whether or not it has spread to other parts of your body. Alex, there are no simple answers. You may need extensive surgery, you may need a lumpectomy, you could need a course of chemotherapy, or radiation. I just don't know. I can't tell you anything until you have a biopsy. And I don't care how busy you are, make time to talk to these surgeons. You have to.”
“How soon?”
“Do your trial if you have to, if it's really only a week or two, but plan to have the biopsy in two weeks, no matter what. And we'll take it from there after you do that.”
“Who do you like best on this list?” She handed it back to him, and he glanced at it, and then handed it back to her quietly.
“They're all excellent, but I like Peter Herman. He's a very good man, and a nice one. He cares about more than just surgery and biopsies. He's a human being, for a surgeon.”
“Fine,” she nodded, still looking stunned. “I'll call him tomorrow.”
“Why not this afternoon?” He was pushing her, but he wanted to, he didn't want her to use her work as an excuse, or get caught up in denial.
“I'll call him later.” And then she had a sobering thought, as she glanced at him again. She felt as though she had a ten-thousand-pound weight on her shoulders. “What if I got pregnant this weekend? What if I'm pregnant and have a malignant tumor?”
“We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. You'll know if you're pregnant around the same time you have the biopsy.”
“What if I have cancer and I'm pregnant?” Her voice was nervous and strident. What if she had gotten pregnant and she had to sacrifice her baby?
“We'll have to establish priorities, you're the most important.”
“Oh God.” She dropped her face in her hands, and then looked up at him again a moment later. “Do you think the hormones I'm taking have anything to do with this?” The thought of it terrified her even more. What if she had killed herself trying to get pregnant?
“I honestly don't think so. Call Peter Herman. See him as soon as possible, talk to him, and let's do the biopsy as soon as you can, within reason.” It seemed a reasonable course of action. And now she had to go home and tell Sam there was a mass on her mammogram. She still couldn't believe it. But it was there. She could see it on the film, and in the expression in John Anderson's eyes. He looked devastated, as she stood up and looked at him. She had been with him for almost an hour.
“I'm so sorry, Alex. If there's anything I can do right now, don't hesitate to call me. Tell me which surgeon you settle on, and I'll take it from there.”
“I'll start with Peter Herman.”
He handed her the films from the mammogram, so she could show them to whichever surgeon she chose. Just the word “surgeon” seemed ominous, and as she walked out into the October air, she felt as though she'd just been hit with a two-by-four to her stomach. She couldn't believe what she'd heard, or what had happened.
She picked up her arm and hailed a cab, trying not to remember everything she'd ever heard about mastectomies and lumpectomies, and women who could no longer raise their arms, and other women who had died of cancer. Everything he had said to her was suddenly jumbled in her head, and as she rode back to the office, she didn't even cry. She just sat and stared straight ahead, unable to believe what he had told her.
And when she got back to her office, the whole team was sitting there, Liz and Brock, the law clerk, and the two paralegals. They were waiting for her, and Liz had ordered her turkey sandwich on whole wheat bread, but she just couldn't eat it. She stood and stared at them, and Brock noticed that her face was deadly white, but no one said anything. They went straight to work, and went right through to six o'clock. It was only after that, when they were summing up, after everyone had left, that Brock even dared to ask her.
“Are you all right?” he asked cautiously. She
had looked terrible to him all day, and her face had been deathly pale ever since she came back from the doctor's. And more than once, he had noticed that her hands were shaking when she passed him papers.
“I'm fine. Why?” She tried to look nonchalant, but she failed dismally. He was smarter than that, but he didn't want to press her.
“You look tired. Maybe you're burning the candle at too many ends, Mrs. Parker. What did the doctor say?”
“Oh, nothing. It was a waste of time. He just needed to give me the results of some tests, and they never do it over the phone. It was ridiculous really. He could have mailed it to me, and saved us all time.” He didn't believe a word she said, but it seemed to be important to her to say it. He just hoped it was nothing serious. If it was, going to trial in two days certainly wasn't going to help her. He would do all he could for her, but she was still the attorney of record and had to take all the heat and the pressure, and do all the arguing and much of the preparation. He didn't dare ask her if she was up to doing the case, he knew that she would have taken the question as an insult.
“Are you going home?” He hoped for her sake that she was. He still had work to do for her, for the trial, but he could see a pile of files on her desk too and that didn't bode well for an early evening.
“I've still got a few things to do, for other clients.” She had managed to return all her phone calls late that afternoon, but she hadn't had time to call Peter Herman, or so she told herself when she thought of it. She was planning to call him the following morning.
“Can I do anything to help? You ought to go home and get some rest,” he urged, but she was determined to stay and finish.
He went back to his own office after that, and she called Annabelle at home, who was upset that Alex hadn't called her at lunchtime.
“You said you would,” she said, making Alex feel instantly guilty. She had completely forgotten after her unexpected trip to the doctor.
“I know, sweetheart. I meant to, but I got stuck in a meeting with a lot of people and I couldn't call.”
“That's okay, Mommy.” She went on to tell her then everything she'd done that afternoon with Carmen. And listening to her excited little tales made Alex feel almost jealous. She hated even more having to tell her she was going to work late. Suddenly, not being with her seemed all the more poignant.
“Can I wait up for you?” Annabelle said hopefully, as Alex sighed, praying that the shadows in her breast would not turn out to be cancer.
“I'll be too late. But I'll kiss you. I promise. And I'll wake you up tomorrow morning. This is just for this week and next, and then we'll be back to having lunch and dinner together.”
“Are you taking me to ballet this week?” Annabelle was really putting it to her, and Alex was wondering where Sam was.
“I can't. Remember? We talked about it. I'm going to be talking to the judge this week and next. I can't come to ballet.”
“Can't you ask the judge to let you come?”
“No, sweetheart. I wish I could. Where's Daddy? Is he home yet?”
“He's asleep.”
“At this hour?” It was seven o'clock. How could he be asleep?
“He was watching TV and he fell asleep. Carmen says she'll wait for you.”
“Let me talk to her. And Annabelle …” Her eyes suddenly filled with tears as she thought of her, that incredible little pixie face with the big green eyes and the freckles and the red hair. What if Alex died? What if Annabelle lost her mother? The thought of it choked her so badly she couldn't speak for a moment and then she whispered the words. “I love you, Annabelle …”
“I love you too, Mommy. See you later.”
“Sweet dreams.” And then Carmen came on the phone, and Alex told her that she could leave as soon as Annabelle was in bed. All she had to do was wake Sam and tell him she was going.
“I feel bad waking him, Mrs. Parker. I stay till you come home.”
“I won't be home for hours, Carmen. Honestly, just tell him when you want to go. He'll wake up.”
“Okay, okay. When you comin' home?”
“Probably not till around ten o'clock. I have a lot to do in the office.” But when she hung up, she just sat staring at the phone, thinking of all of them, feeling as though she had already lost them. It was as though a shadow had come between her and them today. They were alive, and she might be dying. It wasn't impossible. It was incredible. She still believed there had to be a mistake. She wasn't sick, she didn't have a lump. All she had was a gray shadow on an X ray. But a gray shadow that John Anderson had admitted could kill her, if it was malignant. It was unbelievable. Yesterday she had been trying to get pregnant, and today her own life was in danger. And the hormones she had taken the week before made it all the more difficult now to maintain her composure. They made everything seem more upsetting, and more alarming, and she tried to tell herself that the terror she was feeling wasn't real, it was just the hormones.
Brock checked back with her at nine o'clock, and he noticed that she still hadn't eaten the sandwich that had been on her desk since lunchtime. She had been drinking coffee all day, and now she was drinking a big glass of water.
“You're going to get sick if you don't eat,” he scolded her with a look of concern. She looked even worse than she had before. She was almost gray now.
“I wasn't hungry …actually, I just forgot to eat. I was too busy.”
“That's a lousy excuse. You're not going to do Jack Schultz any good if you get sick before his trial date, or in the middle of it.”
“Yeah, that's a thought,” she said vaguely, and then she looked up at him with worried eyes, “I guess you could take over for me, Brock, if you had to.”
“I wouldn't think of it. You're the attorney they want. You're what he's paid for.” It was exactly what she had said to her doctor that afternoon, when she said she couldn't do the biopsy until after the trial. People were depending on her …and then she thought of Annabelle and Sam and had to fight back tears again. Her engine was running low, and she was suddenly overwhelmed by everything that had happened. The mammogram films were in an envelope on her desk, but what she had seen there was emblazoned in her mind forever.
“Why don't you go home?” he asked gently. “I'll finish up. You've got everything a lot more in control than you think. Trust me.” He was gentle and kind, and half an hour later, she decided to go home. She was just too tired to make sense anymore, or do intelligent work. She felt as though she'd been run over by a semi. And for the first time in years, she didn't even take her briefcase. Brock noticed it, but he didn't remind her. And as he watched her go, he felt sorry for her. It was obvious that something was wrong. She had never looked worse, but he didn't know her well enough to ask her, or offer to help her.
She laid her head back against the seat of the cab, and she felt as though it were a bowling ball, and it was just too heavy to hold up anymore. She just couldn't do it. And when she got home, she paid the cab, and walked into the building, feeling like a thousand-year-old woman. She rode up in the elevator, wondering what she was going to say to Sam. This would be terrible news for him too, for all of them. A bad mammogram was nothing to take lightly, and statistics about breast cancer kept leaping into her head, and none of them were good news. She couldn't even begin to imagine how she would tell him.
He was watching TV in the living room when she walked in, and he looked up at her with a smile when he saw her. He was wearing jeans and his white shirt from work. His tie was still lying on the table.
“Hi, how was your day?” he asked cheerfully, reaching out to her, and she sat down heavily on the couch beside him. She suddenly had to fight back tears again, just seeing him had brought all the terror back to her. She just couldn't bear it. “Wow …looks like a rough day …” And then he remembered the hormones she'd been taking. “Oh poor baby, those damn pills making you emotional again? Maybe you shouldn't take them.” Between that and the trial, she really had a lot to cope with. He pull
ed her into his arms, and she clung to him as though she were drowning.
“You look worn out,” he said sympathetically when she looked up at him and dried her eyes. He was right. The pills were making this even harder than it should be. Or were they? “You must be going crazy before the trial.”
“I am. It was a hellish day,” she admitted, as she lay back on the couch next to him, exhausted.
“I hate to say it, but you look it. Did you eat?”
She shook her head. “I wasn't hungry.”
“Great. How do you think you're going to get pregnant if you starve yourself. Come on.” He pulled her to her feet, or tried to, “I'll make you an omelet.”
“I couldn't eat. Honest. I'm beat. Why don't we just go to bed?” That was all she wanted. She wanted to see Annabelle, and he next to him, for as long as she could. Forever.
“Something wrong?” He suddenly wondered why she looked the way she did. She looked worse than usual, even before a trial, and she didn't answer him as she tiptoed into Annabelle's bedroom. She stood there for a long time, watching her, and then knelt down next to her, and kissed her. And then she walked into their own room. He was watching her, concerned, and she started undressing, and left her clothes on the chair as she put on her nightgown. She didn't even have the energy to take a shower or brush her hair. She brushed her teeth, and climbed into bed and lay there with her eyes closed, knowing she had to tell him.
“Baby,” he tried again, as he lay down next to her, “what's wrong? Did something happen at the office?” She took her work very seriously, and if she'd done something that had injured a client she would have tormented herself just as she seemed to be doing now. But she was quick to shake her head and deny it.
“Anderson called me again today,” she said in a low voice, and he watched her.
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