“So far so good. It was scary as hell though.” She didn't know him well enough to tell him she'd cried, that she'd been to hell and back, waiting for the injection to kill her.
“You're a good kid,” he said, “do you want a cup of coffee?”
“I'd love one.”
He was back in five minutes and they worked for an hour, and she left promptly at five o'clock, so she could go home to Annabelle. It had been a pretty good day, but a tiring one, all things considered.
“Thanks for all the help,” she said to Brock before she left. They were starting a case together for a small employer who was being sued in a bogus discrimination case. This time the woman had cancer, and claimed she was passed over for a promotion. Her employer had done everything he possibly could to help her. He even had set up a room for the employee at work, so she could rest as much as she needed to, and he had given her three days a week off while she was having chemo, and held her job for her. But she was still suing. She claimed she wasn't promoted because of her cancer. What the woman wanted was to make some money, sit at home, and be able to pay for all her treatments and then some with what she made on the lawsuit. The cancer appeared to have been cured, and she didn't even want to work anymore. But she still had a lot of leftover debts from her treatments. And there was no doubt, Alex had discovered herself, that most insurance plans paid only minimum amounts for cancer treatment. If you couldn't afford the very expensive treatments that saved lives, you were in big trouble. Alex's own insurance was picking up very little of her expenses. But still, the plaintiff in her case had no right to take that out on her ex-employer. He had even offered to help her, a fact that she had later denied, and that he had no proof of. As usual, Alex felt very sorry for the defendant. She hated the injustice of people who thought they ought to clean up just because someone else had money and they didn't. And it was also a good time for her to be taking the case, because she had a lot of very useful firsthand information about cancer.
“I'll see you tomorrow, Brock,” she said as she got ready to leave.
“Take care of yourself. Bundle up. And eat a good dinner.”
“Yes, Mom,” she teased, but they were all things Liz had told her too. She had to keep warm, and make sure she kept her strength up. She wasn't looking forward to the weight Dr. Webber said she might gain. She hated being overweight, although she seldom was, and she knew Sam hated heavy women.
“Thanks again.” She left, and went home, thinking of how nice they all were, and how relieved she was that her first treatment was over. It had been even more traumatic than she'd expected, and she'd been even more undone by it, and yet it had gone pretty smoothly. She wasn't looking forward to going back in a week, but maybe it would be better this time, and after that she had a three-week break before the next one. Liz had filled her prescription for the pills, and she had them in her handbag. It was like being on the pill again, which she hadn't been in years. You couldn't allow yourself to forget them.
Annabelle was in the bathtub when she got home, and she and Carmen were singing. It was a song from Sesame Street, and Alex joined them as she put her briefcase down and walked into the bathroom.
“And how was your day?” Alex asked as she bent down to kiss her after the song was over.
“Okay. How did you hurt your hand?”
“I didn't … oh, that.” It was her Band-Aid from the chemo. “At the office.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Nope.”
“I got a Snoopy Band-Aid at school,” Annabelle said proudly, and Carmen told Alex that Sam had called and said he wouldn't be home for dinner. Alex hadn't heard from him all day and she assumed that he was still furious about the night before. But now she couldn't even tell him that the chemo had gone smoothly. She thought of calling him at work, but after all the ugliness they'd exchanged the night before, she thought it was better to wait until she saw him. She noticed too that he was going out a lot more with clients at night than he used to. Maybe it was another one of his ways of avoiding dealing with her, and it was certainly working. She felt as though she never saw him.
She had dinner with Annabelle, and decided to try and wait up for him. But she was so exhausted that she fell asleep at nine o'clock, in bed, with the light on. It had been the hardest day of her life, harder even than the surgery, and she was totally exhausted.
And as she slept, Sam was having a quiet dinner with Daphne, in a small restaurant in the East Sixties.
He looked agonized and she was sympathetic as she listened. She never made demands on him, never pressed him, never reproached him for what he didn't give her.
“I don't know what's happening to me,” he said, his steak untouched and getting cold, as she held his hand and listened. “I feel so sorry for her, I know what kind of need she's in, but all I ever feel for her anymore is anger. Rage at what's happened to our life. It seems like it's all her fault, except I know it isn't. But it's not my fault either. It's just rotten luck, and now she's starting chemotherapy and I just can't face it. I can't look at her anymore, I don't want to see what's happening to her. It's terrifying to look at, and I'm just not good with things like that. My God,” he was near tears, “I feel like a monster.”
“Of course you're not,” Daphne said gently, still holding his hand, “you're only human. Those things are terribly upsetting. You're not a nurse, for heaven's sake. Surely she can't expect you to take care of her … or even to be able to stomach …” she groped for words, “…looking at it. It must be quite awful.”
“It is,” he said honestly. “It's barbaric. It's like they just took a knife and sliced it off. It made me cry the first time I saw it.”
“How awful for you, Sam,” Daphne said warmly, thinking entirely of him and not Alex. “Don't you think she understood? She's an intelligent woman. She can't possibly expect it not to affect you.”
“She expects me to be there for her, to hold her hand, to go to treatments with her, and talk about it with our little girl. I just can't stand it. I want my life back.”
“You have a right to it,” Daphne said soothingly, she was the most understanding, least demanding woman he'd ever met. All she wanted was to be with him, under any circumstances, in spite of all the limitations he'd imposed on their relationship. He'd finally agreed to have dinner alone with her occasionally, as long as she understood he couldn't sleep with her. He couldn't do that to Alex. He'd never been unfaithful to her, and he didn't want to start now, no matter how great the temptation, although everyone in the office already thought he was having an affair with Daphne. And Daphne had made it very clear to him that she was so in love with him she would accept any conditions, as long as he just saw her.
“I love you so much,” she said softly, as he looked at her, consumed with conflicting emotions.
“I love you too …that's the craziness of all this … I love you, and I love her too. I love both of you. I want you but my obligations are to her. But all we have left now are obligations.”
“It's not much of a life for you, Sam,” Daphne said sadly.
“I know. Maybe this thing will resolve itself eventually. It can't be happy for her either. Eventually she's going to hate me. I think she does already.”
“Then she's a fool. You're the kindest man that ever lived,” Daphne said staunchly, but Sam knew better, and so did Alex.
“I'm the fool here,” he said, smiling at her. “I should grab you and run before you come to your senses, and find someone your own age with a less complicated life.” He'd never been as smitten with anyone since his boyhood, maybe not even with Alex.
“Where would you rim to?” she asked innocently, as they finally both began eating their dinner. Whenever they were together, they talked for hours and forgot everything around them.
“Maybe Brazil … or an island near Tahiti …someplace hot and sensual where I could have you all to myself, with tropical flowers and smells,” and as he described it, he felt her hand go to him under the t
able. It made him smile, and her fingers were deft and artful. “You're a bad girl, Daphne Belrose.”
“Perhaps you ought to prove that to yourself one of these days. I'm beginning to feel like a virgin,” she teased him, and he actually blushed.
“I'm sorry.” He wasn't making life easy for anyone, but he felt so guilty.
“Don't be sorry,” she said seriously. “It'll make it all the more worthwhile when you finally do work it out.” She was certain he would, it was just a question of time. But she could wait. He was well worth waiting for. He was one of the most desirable men in New York, and one of the most successful. Even here, in an out-of-the-way restaurant, people recognized him, and nodded recognition, and the headwaiter had considered it a real coup when he saw them. Sam Parker was one of the biggest fish on Wall Street.
“Why are you so patient with me?” he asked, as they ordered dessert and he ordered the restaurant's only bottle of Chateau d'Yquem at two hundred and fifty dollars a bottle.
“I told you,” she lowered her voice conspiratori-ally, “because I love you.”
“You're crazy,” he said, as he leaned over and kissed her. And then he toasted her with the Yquem. “To Simon's little cousin,” he said harmlessly, but what he wanted to say was “To the love of my life,” but he didn't. It would have been too disloyal to Alex. How could this happen to him? How could Alex get cancer and he fall in love with someone else all at once? It never dawned on him that the two events were related.
“I'm going to be very grateful to Simon one day,” he said conspiratorially, and she laughed.
“Or very angry. That's the bad thing about all this foreplay. You're building up an awful lot of expectations about me. I might turn out to be very disappointing.”
“Not likely,” he said confidently, aching to make love to her right then. Every moment they spent together was a tantalizing caress that tortured his body.
He walked her all the way home afterwards, but as always, he refused to go upstairs with her. They lingered forever, kissing on the doorstep, with her caressing him, and his hands covering every inch of her body.
“We might as well go upstairs, you know,” she tried to entice him with her lips and her hands, and he was about to burst with desire. “I think it might be a great relief to the neighbors.”
“It would be a great relief to me, I can promise you. I'm not sure how much longer I can stand this,” he said, kissing her again in desperation.
“Not long, I hope, sweet Sam,” she whispered in his ear, as her hands gripped his buttocks and pressed him to her. His body found her hot and throbbing against him, and he shuddered with desire when he realized she wasn't wearing any underwear, even in the cold November wind of a New York winter. It took all the strength he had to resist her.
“You're killing me,” he said, laughing hoarsely with the delicious agony of it. “And you'll catch pneumo-ma.
“Then you'd better keep me warm, Sam.”
“Oh God, how I want to.” He closed his eyes and pressed her against him.
He finally managed to tear himself away from her, though with ever greater difficulty, and he walked the twenty-five blocks home to regain his senses. It was nearly midnight by then, and Alex was dead to the world with the light on. He stood looking at her for a long time, silently apologizing to her, but his heart longed for Daphne, not Alex. He quietly turned off the light, and went to bed. And it was six o'clock in the morning when he woke to a strange grating sound. It was rasping and mechanical, and it went on and on and on, and no attempt to ignore it would keep him asleep. At first he thought it was a machine, and then he thought it might be the alarm, and then some crazy sense told him the elevator might be broken. But no matter what, the sound wouldn't stop, and when he finally woke up and turned over, he realized that it was Alex, vomiting and retching uncontrollably in the bathroom.
He lay there for a little while, not sure if he should bother her or not, and then finally, he got up, and stood in the doorway.
“Are you all right?” For a long time she didn't answer, and then finally, she nodded.
“Great, thanks.” She hadn't lost her sense of humor, but she still couldn't stop retching.
“Is it something you ate?” Even now, he still had denial.
“I think it's the chemo.”
“Call the doctor.”
She nodded and went on vomiting, and he went to shower in the guest bathroom. He came back half an hour later, and she had stopped and was lying on the bathroom floor with a cold cloth on her head, and her eyes closed.
“You're not pregnant, are you?”
She kept her eyes closed and shook her head. She didn't even have the energy to insult him. She had gotten her period before the surgery. Another “blue day” had come and gone since, and he wasn't even speaking to her, let alone making babies. How did he think she could be pregnant? And she was having chemotherapy. How could he be so stupid? For a smart guy, he was a real jerk when it came to cancer.
She finally got enough energy to crawl across the bedroom on her hands and knees and call Dr. Webber. The answering service put her through immediately, and the doctor told her that it wasn't an unusual reaction to the first treatment, though she w&s sorry to hear it. She suggested that she eat carefully, but a little food might actually help to settle her stomach, and she had to take her pill today, no matter how sick she felt, or how much she vomited. She could not miss it. She also offered her additional medication for the vomiting, which might help, but Alex was afraid to put any more chemicals into her system, and the additional medications had their own side effects as well.
“Thank you,” Alex rasped, and went to vomit again, but this time it was all over in a few minutes. There was nothing left but bile anyway. Her whole body felt as though it had been turned inside out. It took her forever to dress and she was green by the time she went to the kitchen to watch Sam and Annabelle having breakfast. He had helped her dress, and had kept her away from Alex.
“Are you sick, Mommy?” Annabelle asked, looking worried.
“Sort of. Remember the medicine I told you about? Well, I took some yesterday and it made me kind of sick.”
“It must be very bad medicine,” Annabelle said loyally.
“It's going to make me better,” Alex said firmly, and forced herself to nibble a piece of toast, in spite of all her inclinations not to touch it. She noticed then that Sam was looking over his paper at her in acute annoyance. It was bad enough to wake him up vomiting, but she knew how he hated her explanations to Annabelle. “Sorry,” she said pointedly at him, in less than pleasant tones, and he went back to his paper.
She hung back while he left to take Annabelle to school, and he made no further mention of her vomiting that morning. But as soon as they were gone, Alex threw up again, and thought about not going to the office. She sat down on her bed, and cried, and decided to call Liz, and then something made her stop. She wasn't going to give in. She was going to go to work if it killed her.
She washed her face again, and brushed her teeth, and put another cold cloth on her head, and then with a look of determination she put on her coat and picked up her briefcase. She had to sit down in the hall again, and her stomach turned, but she made it to the elevator and down to the street, and felt better. The cold air helped, but the cab ride didn't. She felt desperately sick again by the time she got to work, and she barely made it to the ladies' room, where she was violently sick again. She looked awful by the time she got to her office, where Brock and Liz happened to be talking. She was almost a shiny green, which really shocked them. They both followed her inside and looked at her with obvious concern, as Alex collapsed into her desk chair with a look of exhaustion.
“Are you all right?” Liz asked worriedly as Brock stared at her, frowning.
“Not really. It's been a rough morning.” She closed her eyes, as she felt a wave of nausea come over her again, but she refused to give in to it, and it passed. She opened her eyes again to see Brock a
nd not Liz. He looked very worried.
“She went to get you a cup of tea. Do you want to lie down?”
“I don't think I'd ever get up again,” she said honestly. “Why don't we get to work,” she said bravely.
“Are you up to it?”
“Don't ask,” she said grimly, and shaking his head, he went to get his papers. As always, he was working in his shirtsleeves, with his horn-rims pushed high on his head when he didn't need them. He had pencils in his pocket, a pen in his teeth, and a foot-high stack of papers when he came back to her office, with a box of Saltines for Alex.
“Try these.” He dropped them on her desk, and sat down with the work they were sharing. And as they made their way through it, he watched her carefully. She looked awful, but she seemed to feel a little better while she was working. It distracted her from her miseries. And Liz kept her well supplied with tea, and she nibbled at the crackers Brock had brought her.
“Why don't you lie down for a while during lunch?” he suggested, but she shook her head, she didn't want to break their momentum. They were doing some very detailed work on one of her new cases. And they ordered chicken sandwiches instead, which Alex actually felt well enough to eat by lunchtime.
It was fully an hour later when the food caught up with her, and suddenly she looked panicked, as she felt it rising. She had a tiny bathroom adjacent to her office, and without a word to Brock, she disappeared, and vomited horribly and then retched for half an hour while he couldn't help but hear it. It was agonizing listening to her, and after a while he went out, and came back with a cold damp cloth, an ice pack, and a pillow. Without knocking or saying anything, he opened the door, which she hadn't locked fortunately, and she suddenly felt his strong arms behind her, as she knelt huddled over the bowl, and slumped against the wall. For a moment, he was afraid she had fainted but she hadn't.
“Lean against me, Alex,” he said quietly, “just let yourself go.” She didn't argue, she didn't say a word, she was just too sick and too grateful for the help, from any quarter. She slumped back into his arms, as he sat on the floor holding her, the bathroom was barely big enough for both of them with their long legs, but they just made it. He put the ice pack on the back of her neck, and the wet cloth on her forehead. And for an instant, she opened her eyes and looked up at him, but she didn't speak. She couldn't.
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