by Nina Lane
“Hey, you okay?” she asks.
“I’m fine.” I turn away to carry the tray to the wait station. “Are we still on for Friday night?”
“Sure.” Kelsey seems to hesitate for a second before she picks up her purse. “Thanks for everything, Liv.”
“No problem.” I put the dishes into the bin. “Let me know how it turns out.”
Her heels click on the stairs as she leaves. I watch through the window as she crosses the street to where Archer is sitting on his bike, holding his helmet and clearly waiting for her.
Kelsey stops in front of him, putting her hands on her hips as she says something to him. He grins, reaching out to cup his palm around the back of her neck. He pulls her toward him for a quick, hot kiss that has Kelsey curling her fingers into the sleeves of his leather jacket.
When they part, I can almost see the heat shimmering between them. Archer runs his hand over her hair before she steps onto the sidewalk. He starts his bike and pushes away from the curb, heading off down the street.
I turn away from the window, hoping with everything in me they’ll get married one day. Whether science, magic, or some combination of both, what Kelsey and Archer have is too rare and precious not to secure with vows.
An ache of longing winds through my heart.
“Dean, I love you… And I would love to be your wife.”
As I flew, spinning, into his kiss, I knew everything in my life had been leading up to that moment when Dean West and I promised each other a sweet, hot forever.
Chapter 14
Olivia
December 5
“A nanny?” I stare at Dean across the table. “I don’t want the kids to have a nanny.”
He twists a loop of string around his fingers, his expression grave.
“Neither do I,” he admits. “But with midterms coming up, I can’t cancel classes or ask my grad students to substitute too often. I’m not going to miss your doctors’ appointments either. The university has a policy for faculty absences if family members are ill, but I need to apply in advance. And I’m going to want to take as much time off as possible the next few months.”
My stomach hurts. I haven’t yet thought about how this will affect Dean’s work. I don’t want to think about that.
“We can just make the appointments around the kids’ schedules,” I suggest.
“We already know how difficult it is to schedule doctors’ appointments, so we can’t expect to be able to do that,” he says. “A nanny makes sense.”
I stare down at my cup of tea. After Nicholas was born, my good friend Marianne had been an invaluable help to us before she moved out of town. And when Dean and I lived in Paris, we had an au pair for Nicholas and Bella. Marie-Laure was a lovely young woman who fit easily into our family, stayed with us when Dean had to travel, and helped me in ways I will never be able to measure.
Both Marianne and Marie-Laure had been our friends and nannies through a choice that Dean and I made. I appreciated the help, and he felt better about traveling because he knew someone was with me and the children.
But this? Now we might need a nanny because I’m facing surgery and treatments that could make it difficult for me to do anything.
“Mommy, look!” Bella spreads her arms out and tiptoes along a line of grout on the tile floor. “I’m a typerope walker.”
I smile weakly and give her a hollow, “Great, honey,” response. Already and even with Dean’s help, it feels like it takes more effort than usual to get the kids ready for school. The rational part of me knows a nanny would be helpful.
Tears push at my eyes. I blink them back, telling myself I’m being silly. For heaven’s sake, I should be grateful we can afford a nanny. And I am. I just wish we didn’t need one.
“All right.” I swallow my pride, the taste bitter and cold going down my throat. “A lot of experienced nannies post their information on the bulletin boards at the café. I’ll get some names.”
“I’ll check with the university childcare department too,” Dean says.
“Shouldn’t we tell people before we hire a nanny?” I ask. “I mean, we’ll have to tell her what’s going on. And we have to tell Nicholas and Bella.”
“We will.” The string snaps out of Dean’s fingers. “After we decide on a doctor and have a plan in place.”
My jaw tightens with the effort of biting back a petty, unnecessary comment that I’m the one who has to choose the doctor, and the doctor is the one who will come up with a plan. Because I know—better than anyone, better even than Dean himself—that this action-driven approach is my husband’s way of coping.
I have to let him do what he needs to do. And I have to keep our lives peaceful and calm, both for our sake and that of our children.
We will not live in a place where anger and fear can fester. Dean and I fought too hard for each other, for our children, for our life together. Nothing will change what we have.
Not even this.
“I can’t wait to see what Archer has up his sleeve.” I finish watering the peace lily and check the other potted plants Florence Wickham has around her house. “Whatever it is, it’s throwing Kelsey completely off her game.”
When Dean doesn’t respond, I glance at him. He’s standing by the door waiting for me, his attention fixed on his phone.
“Dean?”
He looks up. “What?”
“You weren’t listening to anything I was just saying.”
“Sorry.” He scratches his head and turns his attention back to his phone. “I got an email from a doctor at the Mayo Clinic about drug trials. Looks like there are a number of them starting early next year.”
“I don’t want to look into trials before I even have a doctor or a treatment plan.”
“We still need to keep our options open,” he replies, glancing at his watch. “And we should get going.”
“I’m almost done.”
I put the watering can back in the kitchen and text Florence that everything is fine and I hope she’s enjoying her warm Florida winter.
“Florence told me in her last email that she and Mr. Jenkins just saw that new movie about Houdini,” I call to Dean. “They really liked it. We should see it this weekend.”
He doesn’t respond. I return to the living room, where he’s busy on his phone again.
“Dean.”
He glances up, his forehead creased with concentration. I sigh.
“Please don’t run yourself into the ground with research,” I say. “I’m not going to the Mayo Clinic or any other fancy institution.”
“You don’t necessarily have to travel to participate in trials and treatment,” he replies, returning his attention to his phone.
“Well, can you please wait until I choose a doctor here first? Until we get a professional medical opinion? Then we can discuss all of this with him or her rather than speculating about what I should or shouldn’t do.”
Though I try to keep my voice calm and reasonable, my insides are twisting with anxiety. This diagnosis is a massive blow to me, to our family, but it can’t encroach on every single part of our lives. It can’t take my husband away from me, blocking him behind a wall of angry frustration and single-minded research.
After locking up Florence’s house, we drive to Dr. Christopher Anderson’s office in Rainwood. He’s young, in his mid-forties, with an open, kind face and a straightforward manner.
“There’s an overwhelming amount of information and options,” Dr. Anderson tells us. “It’s my job to help you weed through it all, but you need to be fully knowledgeable and comfortable with our plan.”
Our plan. That makes me feel a bit better, knowing he’s part of it. He’s one of the less experienced doctors we’re meeting with, but I like that he is entirely unhurried, that he looks me in the eye when he talks to me, and he doesn’t act like he knows what’s best for me.
Somewhat illogically, I also like the fact that he has pictures of his family—pretty wife and three
children—on the bookshelf behind his desk.
Dr. Anderson lays out all the options and suggests that I recruit my “team” now, to ensure I’m comfortable with all the doctors who will participate in the course of my treatment.
“I’m also going to refer you to a geneticist to consult about getting tested for a mutation of the BRCA gene, which leads to a higher inherited risk of breast and ovarian cancers,” Dr. Anderson says. “Because you’re young and because you have a daughter, it’s important information to have.”
A daughter. My daughter.
Icy shivers erupt over my skin. I’ve known we need to tell Nicholas and Bella, but not until now have I realized this diagnosis will affect Bella in an entirely different way when she grows up. It will change her for the rest of her life.
My heart starts to race. When doctors one day ask Bella if she has a “family history of breast cancer,” she’ll know the answer. And they might be asking her because—
The cold invades my blood. I clutch the arms of the chair, trying to pull a breath into my tight lungs.
Dean reaches over and settles his hand on my knee. He’s saying something to Dr. Anderson, but his voice sounds very far away. His hand tightens on my knee, like he’s trying to secure me with his grip alone.
I force my fingers to unclench from the chair. An image of Bella rises past the terror. I concentrate on her perfect, round face and brown eyes. I think about holding her as she sleeps, the weight of her body against mine, her head pillowed just beneath my chin.
The tension in my chest eases. I take a full breath and put my hand over Dean’s.
“Are you all right, Olivia?” Dr. Anderson asks.
He’s standing beside my chair, holding out a glass of water.
I take the glass. “I’m okay. Please, call me Liv.”
“Liv, you might not have the mutation.” Rather than going back behind his desk, he sits in a chair closer to us. “But if you do, the knowledge will help you and your family make well-informed decisions, both right now and in the future.”
It’s not exactly reassuring, but it does make sense. I nod and take a sip of water. Dean writes in his notebook and starts asking questions about the test itself and implications.
As the meeting wraps up, Dr. Anderson walks us to the door and extends his hand to me.
“I don’t pretend to know everything, Liv,” he says. “But I can promise you, I’ll do everything in my power to ensure you live a long and healthy life.”
I thank him, and Dean and I leave the office. As we get into the car, I say, “I want him to be my doctor.”
Dean flips through the pages of his notebook. “There are still two we haven’t met with yet.”
“I don’t want to meet anyone else.” I pull on my seatbelt. “I want to get started with treatment, and I really like Dr. Anderson.”
“He’s been in practice for the least amount of time, compared to the others,” Dean says.
“I’m going with Dr. Anderson.” I throw him an irritated glance. “Did you not like him?”
“I liked him, sure. But Dr. Lincoln has twenty more years of experience.”
“Dr. Lincoln also spent most of our meeting talking to you rather than me.”
“Dr. Mitchell is the director of the oncology board,” Dean says. “Dr. Graves does breast surgeries every week, and she’s worked on numerous clinical trials.”
“I don’t want a doctor whose last name is Graves.”
“Liv.” Dean pushes the key into the ignition and turns to face me. Lines of stress bracket his mouth. “You can’t reject a doctor based on her name.”
My jaw tightens. “I can reject or choose a doctor based on whatever criteria I want. I’m the one with the goddamned tumor.”
He holds up his hands. “Okay. If you’re comfortable with Dr. Anderson, that’s fine.”
“I’m not asking for your approval.”
“I wasn’t—” Dean stops, turning his attention to backing out of the parking space.
We’re both silent the entire drive home. We stop to pick up Bella from preschool, though for the first time ever the sight of our daughter doesn’t soothe my prickliness.
I hug her tightly, rubbing my cheek against her silky hair. I can’t stop what’s happening to me, but I can pray that the effect on this beautiful girl is minimal.
“Did you have a good day?” I ask.
She nods, pointing to her purple butterfly backpack. “Matthew is having birthday.”
“Really? Lucky Matthew.”
Bella digs into her backpack and produces a crumpled invitation, which spells out the details of Matthew’s party at the children’s museum. Even something so simple makes my stomach tighten with anxiety, as I think of Nicholas and Bella’s many birthdays to come.
The three of us head home together. Nicholas is going to his friend Henry’s house after school, so Dean sits at the sunroom table to draw with Bella while I get dinner started. I try to channel my irritability into cooking, flipping through my cookbooks to concoct a menu of crispy pork and roasted vegetables.
I could die.
The thought simmers beneath everything I do, an underground river of fire. I dump the washed carrots onto the cutting board and start to slice them.
Though no day is promised to anyone, I’d expected—certainly hoped—to live a long time. And despite reassurances and statistics, the stark fact is that I am suddenly facing an illness that kills people, young and old, all the time.
All the fucking time.
A sharp pain shoots through my hand. I gasp and drop the knife. Blood swells from a cut on my finger.
Dean is at my side in an instant, reaching out to grasp my wrist and guide me over to the sink.
“Doesn’t look too bad.” He examines the cut and grabs a paper towel to press against it. “You okay?”
I laugh, a shrill, unnatural sound.
“Sure,” I say. “I’m just fine.”
A shadow darkens his expression. He concentrates on pressing the towel to my finger until the bleeding stops.
“Liv, what…” His throat works with a swallow. He tightens his grip on my wrist. “What do you need me to do? You know I’ll do anything.”
We look at each other. His gold-flecked brown eyes. His familiar, beautiful face. His thick, dark hair.
Pain fills my chest.
I’ve depended on Dean for so much over the years. I was so happy to simply be his wife, until I realized I also wanted to be more. That I could be more.
I’ve had to learn to stand on my own, and then to understand that I can be independent and still ask for his help. I’ve had to accept that being in control and fixing things is part of who Dean is, and that needing him is part of who I am.
And I know that my need for him, and his desire to take care of me, is important to both of us. It’s intrinsic to our dynamic, our relationship, our love.
Which is exactly why everything inside me aches when I realize that only in the blackest moments of our relationship has Dean been forced to ask what he should do when something goes wrong.
Otherwise he just knows. He does whatever it takes. And his certainty and assurance have kept the ground solid beneath our feet.
A cold, icy ball tightens in my throat, but I force the words out, the stark truth that slithers inside me like a worm.
“Dean, aside from just being here, I…I don’t think there’s anything you can do,” I say, hating the admission, hating the black pain that descends over him, the darkness that extinguishes the light in his eyes.
“Daddy, come back,” Bella calls from her seat at the table.
Dean slides his hand over my hair and turns to go into the sunroom. I get back to slicing carrots.
Later that night, when I climb into bed, Dean isn’t there to wrap his arms around me. A heavy loneliness falls over me as I think of him in his tower, burying himself in books and articles. If I called him right now—if I sent him a sexy, suggestive text or a provocative selfie, w
ould he drop everything and come join me in bed like he always has before?
I look at the shadowed ceiling for a long time, acutely conscious of my naked breasts underneath the cotton of my nightgown. I think about how long it took me to become comfortable with my body, to enjoy the pleasures of being a woman, to feel strong and confident inside my own skin. So much of that happened because of Dean.
I wonder if I will ever again feel the same way about myself. And if I don’t…will that change the way I feel about Dean or the way he feels about me? About us?
The question is no longer “What are we going to do?” The question is now “What is going to happen to us?”
Chapter 15
Olivia
December 7
Professor Albus Dumbledore is the one who finally helps me realize I need to say the word aloud. When everyone else in the Harry Potter books is calling the evil wizard “He Who Must Not Be Named” or “You Know Who,” Dumbledore is unafraid to say his name.
“Call him Voldemort, Harry,” he says. “Always use the proper name for things. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.”
So to prevent it from having that kind of power over me, I whisper the word to myself one morning in the shower, working up the courage to use it in a conversation with Dean. I find him making coffee in the kitchen, dressed in track pants and a T-shirt, sweaty from a run.
“Morning, beauty.” He wraps his arm around me and presses his lips against my forehead.
I hug him around the waist and move away to pick up the cup of tea he put on the counter for me.
“You want eggs or cereal?” he asks, rummaging in the fridge.
“I’ll get something a little later.”
My chest tightens. I have to say it. Now that I’ve chosen a surgeon and an oncologist, we need to make a decision about the type of surgery—either a lumpectomy to remove the tumor or a mastectomy to remove my breast.
I take a breath. “So last night I was reviewing all the information about c—”
