The Last Days of Us

by Caroline Finnerty

  ‘How can you think it’s not?’ he blazed. His earlier smiley demeanour was rapidly slipping away. ‘I just don’t get you.’ He shook his head.

  ‘What about her quality of life for the time she has left? Is that not important to you?’

  ‘She can’t walk, she can barely talk – where is the quality of life in that?’

  ‘I just want what’s best for Robyn. I’m sorry, JP, I can’t do it to her – it’s too big a risk and, besides, she hates hospitals.’

  ‘So, you think that leaving her to die is what’s best for her?’ he burst out. ‘You’re not going to fight for her?’

  ‘When are you going to realise that it’s false hope? Dr Sharma would have told us if there was any realistic chance of saving her!’ I thought of what he said to us at our last appointment: ‘Take her home and cherish the time you have left together.’

  ‘Doctors get it wrong all the time. Dr Sharma is old-school and narrow-minded. Just because it’s a relatively new treatment doesn’t mean it isn’t worth pursuing. Doctors from around the world are travelling to the clinic to learn more – they wouldn’t do that if they weren’t impressed by the results the doctors are achieving there.’

  ‘You’re deluding yourself; you only have to read the stories of the other children they have treated there – it doesn’t work, JP! Robyn doesn’t need any more hospitals; she just needs to be at home surrounded by the people who love her.’

  ‘I don’t understand you, Sarah. The whole country is behind me, I’m getting wishes from people I don’t even know, there are people from all over the place saying prayers and novenas for me. If everyone else can see this is the right thing to do – people who don’t even know our daughter – how can you, as her mother, not see it?’

  ‘I am doing it out of love.’

  ‘Give her a chance, Sarah, I’m begging you, please, even if it’s miniscule, it’s still a chance – it’s more than we’ve got right now. Remember the month Harry was conceived, the clinic told us that the transfer was unlikely to be successful and we weren’t going to risk it, but then we thought, let’s just try… and lo and behold, just when we had given up hope, we discovered you were pregnant. Miracles happen when you least expect them. Give her a chance. Don’t make her pay for what’s happened between us.’

  It was as if someone had placed a hot poker on my skin and now white rage was burning through my body. He actually thought that the decision not to let Robyn go to Arizona was my way of trying to get revenge on him. Could he be any more self-obsessed?

  ‘You think that’s what this is about? You think I’m doing this to get back at you?’

  ‘Well, aren’t you?’

  I shook my head at his audacity. ‘That’s low, even coming from you. I would never, ever play roulette with my daughter’s life just to get back at you. You might have broken my heart, but you didn’t break me, JP! I love that child beyond anything in this world.’

  How could he think like that? Surely, he knew me well enough to know that from the moment my children had been born, they had been my sun, moon and stars. Every breath I took was for them.

  ‘Do you remember the day Robyn was born?’ His tone was softer now and I wondered where he was leading me.

  ‘Of course I do!’ I said, feeling irritated by his change of tack.

  ‘Well, when she was placed into my arms that day, she looked up at me with inky dark eyes, blinking at me full of curiosity. Those eyes – I’ll never forget them – she looked like an old soul, as though she had been here before, and as I held my tiny miracle daughter, I made a promise to her, Sarah. I swore I would do everything in my power to protect her. So, if you’re not going to fight for her, then I have to do it.’

  ‘JP, sometimes loving someone means letting them go,’ I whispered, shaking my head sadly.

  ‘Not in my book it doesn’t. I will do whatever it takes to save her. I will travel across the world – nothing is going to stop me – not money, not doctors, not even you. I’m not going to rest until my daughter is on that plane to the States.’

  28

  JP was standing opposite me and the ground was separating along a fault line between us, Robyn was stuck in the middle and she was going to fall in between the cracks unless one of us pulled her across to our side. The gap was growing, and we needed to act quickly, but my arms wouldn’t work as I tried to pull her back. ‘You can save her, Sarah – if you want to,’ JP was saying. ‘Just take the step.’ But I was paralysed. ‘Just take the step,’ he repeated.

  I woke up sweating. The words were ringing in my ears. Just take the step. But no, I couldn’t… How could I do it to her? And yet everyone else seemed to think I was crazy. That I couldn’t possibly love her if I wasn’t willing to at least try the treatment in Arizona. But they only had JP’s version of events, nobody seemed willing to hear the truth that nothing was going to save our precious child.

  The dream played on my mind for the rest of the morning. Just take the step, echoed through my brain.

  ‘You look exhausted,’ Fiona said later that morning as she came through the door with bracelets jangling on her arm. It was as if she couldn’t decide which one to wear in the morning so she threw the lot on so none of them would feel left out. ‘Did you not sleep again?’

  ‘I spend so long lying awake at night wondering how I’m going to get through all of this and then, when I eventually do sleep, I’m tormented by nightmares. So, I don’t know which is better – to lie awake and think about my real nightmare or be haunted by imaginary ones.’

  She followed me into the kitchen where Robyn was sitting at the table.

  ‘Come up and see your Auntie Fi,’ she said, lifting Robyn up. ‘I brought some glitter and I thought we might make a snow globe today, what do you reckon?’

  Robyn did her best to nod her head.

  We lined up bottles of food colourings for her to choose one to dilute through the water. She used her right hand to point to the yellow. She pointed to a figurine of Olaf from Frozen that Fiona had brought too that we were going to stick inside the lid of an old jam jar and then we were going to fill it with the coloured water mixed with glitter.

  I thought of last night’s nightmare again and felt a shiver. Robyn trusted me to get this right, I had to make the right decision.

  Suddenly Fiona upended the pot of glitter all over my head and I was brought back to the moment as it rained down all around us, some of it landing like freckles upon Robyn’s face. Robyn smiled but only the right side of her mouth moved now.

  ‘Let’s get a selfie,’ Fiona said. She angled her phone and we stuck our glitter-covered heads in beside Robyn’s. Fiona pouted with duck-lips while Robyn and I grinned at the camera. All these little memories were so precious. How I wished I could take them from my head and store them in a glass box to keep them safe.

  Just then the doorbell rang, and I went to answer it. I pulled back the door to see the postman.

  ‘I need you to sign for this,’ he said, handing me a plush cream envelope.

  I signed my name where he indicated, mildly curious about what it might contain, and shut the door after him. I tore my index finger down beneath the gummed seal and unfolded the letter printed on thick cream paper inside. The logo at the top read:

  Simon Jones & Company Solicitors

  My heart stopped as I read it. I stood in the hallway stunned. At first, I thought it must be some kind of mistake, that the letter had been sent to the wrong person. I was about to run after the postman and tell him that there had been a mix-up, but when I checked it once more to make sure my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me, it was definitely my name that was at the top of it. Words flew up at me from the page: ‘summons’, ‘court’, ‘respondent’. My legs were weak, and I knew they might give way. I had to place my hand on the bannister to steady myself. I felt sick to the pit of my stomach.

  ‘Fiona?’ I called.

  ‘What is it? What’s wrong?’ she said, joining me in the hall.


  ‘This is insane. How dare he?’ The words tumbled out of my mouth. ‘JP – he’s filed legal proceedings – he wants to take me to court to force me to take Robyn to Arizona for the treatment.’

  ‘What the hell?’ she said, grabbing the piece of paper from my hands and reading it. She slapped it down against her thigh when she had finished. ‘He’s crazy! What on earth is he thinking? Initiating a court case at a time like this? This is the last thing either of you need!’

  ‘I just can’t believe he would do this,’ I said, shaking my head. ‘I mean I knew he wasn’t going to back down easily, but I never thought he would resort to taking me to court.’ I was incredulous that he could even think of doing something like this.

  ‘You’ve got to fight him, there’s no way a judge would ever agree with him!’

  My head was spinning, and I was struggling to process what this meant for us.

  We went back into the kitchen and sat down at the table. I noticed Robyn was watching us, and I could see worry shading her eyes. I knew she was wondering what was going on. The guilt crawled its way inside me, sludging through my body. I needed to keep calm in front of her. Did I want her last days tainted with an upset mother?

  Fiona and I looked at one another and we both fell quiet.

  What the hell was going to happen now? Why would he do this? Was I meant to put time and energy into finding a solicitor to represent me? Time was my most precious commodity, but it was rapidly running out on me and I didn’t want to have to use what little I had left in that way. And what if the judge agreed with him, what then? I would have no choice but do it to my little girl.

  I was scared. I didn’t want to be dragged into a legal battle, but as Robyn’s mother, I knew had to fight JP every step of the way to protect her. My world was spinning out of control and I didn’t know how to make it stop. I was already climbing the biggest mountain by facing the death of my daughter, but now it seemed there were more mountains to be climbed and I was tired, I couldn’t see how I would ever surmount them.

  Later that day, JP collected Harry from school and when I saw his car pull up in the driveway, I went out to meet them clutching the letter tightly. It was a warm June day, but I still shivered. I felt cold all the time lately. I told Harry to go inside and I’d follow him in in a minute. I didn’t want him to hear what I was about to say.

  ‘Okay, Mam,’ he sang. Over the last few days, I was relieved that Harry seemed to be much happier in himself going to school since the incident with Jamie O’Connor had been dealt with. The teacher had spoken to the class and educated them on the facts about cancer. Jamie hadn’t mentioned Robyn’s cancer again and whatever Belinda had said to her son had obviously worked.

  ‘What the hell are you playing at?’ I said, waving the letter at JP as soon as Harry had closed the door behind him. I now understood what people meant when they said they were seeing red because in that moment as the blood pounded through my veins and pulsed in my ears, it was the only colour I could see.

  Instantly, JP looked sheepish. ‘I’m sorry, Sarah, I don’t want to go down the legal route any more than you do – but I have to fight for her. We have the funds raised – we’re ready to go.’

  I shook my head. ‘I never thought you would stoop so low. Don’t you think we’ve enough on our plate right now without bringing solicitors and judges into it too?’

  ‘We’re being tossed a lifeline, why won’t you take it?’ he begged. ‘I know you love those kids just as much as I do so I don’t get why this is difficult for you. We owe it to her to at least try!’

  ‘I won’t consent to her being taken to the US, JP. You heard the prognosis the same as I did, she is going to die – no matter what we do – it’s out of our hands. She’s too weak – the flight alone would be too much for her!’

  ‘You’re leaving me with no choice, Sarah!’ he threatened. ‘Why can’t you see it’s our only hope?’

  ‘Why can’t you see that it won’t work. We’re losing her, JP, and you need to accept it.’ Why didn’t he get this? He was hell-bent on trying to save her, I was beginning to wonder if it was some kind of misplaced attempt to make up for his sister’s death all those years ago, but he was trying to regain control of something that was uncontrollable.

  ‘I will never, ever accept it, Sarah!’ He stormed down the driveway before turning back to me. ‘How can you possibly say you love her if you won’t fight to save her?’ Then he climbed into his car, slammed the door behind him and reversed out of the driveway.

  29

  I pulled the car up outside an elegant three-story-over-basement Georgian townhouse in leafy Ballsbridge where the offices of Geraldine Horan, who was now apparently engaged as my solicitor, were located. I didn’t have my own solicitor, so Linda had suggested that I contact a woman she knew from her tennis club and had arranged the meeting for me to discuss it all. As my eyes took in the imposing red-bricked building with clematis bursting from the façade, I couldn’t help but shudder – if this was where Geraldine had chosen to locate her practice, I hated to think what her fees might be.

  I climbed the granite steps leading to the front door and walked over thick wool carpet as I made my way into the reception area. After a few minutes waiting, I was shown into her office.

  I looked around the room where heavy leather-bound tomes sat in an antique mahogany case and certificates calligraphed in Latin decorated the walls. Files were piled up on the desk before me and even on the floor around the desk like miniature tower blocks.

  As I sat down in the chair where Geraldine had told me to take a seat, I felt shell-shocked. How had I ended up here? What had we become? Was this really my life? It felt like I was living in a movie with a cast of actors.

  After JP had left us, I thought that his affair was the worst thing he could ever do to me, but this betrayal was so much worse. I hated that this was stealing precious time both mentally and physically from me. I didn’t want to engage in fighting, I just wanted to spend as much time as possible with my daughter.

  ‘Do you understand me, Sarah?’ Geraldine was saying as she twiddled her pen between her fingers.

  I nodded even though I hadn’t heard a word she said. She was talking to me in alien legal terms. She threw out words like ‘applicant’, ‘respondent’, ‘proceedings’, ‘high court’ with wild abandon, forgetting that this was my life, my daughter, we were fighting over.

  ‘The burden of proof will fall with JP’s team and if a judge finds that it is in Robyn’s best interest to receive this treatment and that there is a significant chance she can beat it, he or she may rule in favour of JP. This case all hinges on his team’s medical evidence.’

  ‘Dr Sharma said that nobody has ever beaten it, not anywhere in the world. It doesn’t get more clear-cut than that.’

  ‘Okay, Sarah, that is good.’ She began to write something in her notebook before pausing as she realised her mistake. ‘I mean, it’s not good for you or your daughter obviously… but it’s good for our case…’ She looked mildly embarrassed.

  I groaned internally. It all boiled down to legal point-scoring, nobody cared about the terminally ill child at the heart of it all.

  She continued, ‘We will need a report from Robyn’s doctor… this… em… Dr Sharma you mentioned. Do you think he would be willing to testify for us as an expert medical witness?’

  ‘I – eh – I’m not sure…’ I admitted. I thought of Dr Sharma busy on the ward saving lives. He wouldn’t want to be dragged into this mess. Even I didn’t want to be dragged into this mess.

  ‘JP will need to have expert medical witnesses too and if the treatment is as experimental as you describe, then finding a credible one will be his biggest challenge,’ she continued. ‘Of course, the judge may request an independent witness also, to make a recommendation to the court.’

  I nodded and made monosyllabic replies as required. I just wanted to run away. I would have rather stuck my head under a duvet and never come out again t
han deal with all of it, but to give her credit, Geraldine Horan was proving efficient and to the point.

  ‘If we can get evidence from Dr Sharma supporting our position then we will have a really strong case.’

  ‘And if we don’t?’

  She paused. ‘Let’s just cross that bridge when we come to it, Sarah…’

  I nodded because I didn’t want to let my mind go there either; the scenario that JP might win this and force me to allow Robyn to travel to the States was unbearable – it would rip what little was left of our family apart.

  ‘It’s also worth bearing in mind that a case like this will naturally attract a lot of media attention. Although it will be held in camera as Robyn is a minor, there will be media coverage. This type of case, especially when it is between two parents, will be fodder for journalists, so you need to be prepared for the impact of that on your life.’

  I gulped. Although JP had already stoked the media fire with his television appearance, I hadn’t even considered that our story might be inked across the tabloids too. I hated the thought of our innermost battles being pored over by the press. Would people think I was an uncaring, or worse still, a neglectful mother?

  ‘Now, Sarah,’ Geraldine cleared her throat before continuing, ‘we also have to discuss the matter of costs, as you know legal battles can be expensive and in a case like this…’ she paused, ‘if the judge rules against you… your costs could be substantial. Is this something you are prepared for?’

  I shook my head in disbelief at the injustice of it all. ‘But I didn’t ask for any of this!’ I cried. ‘JP started it all!’ Anger sparked within me. This seemed so wrong. Where the hell was I supposed to get that kind of money? I didn’t have savings. I knew Fiona would help me out if I asked, but it wasn’t fair to drag her into this. And it wasn’t just the money, it was the time he was stealing from me too. This meeting was only just the beginning, there would be more meetings, and then the court hearing itself. I had to stop my head reminding me that every hour spent apart from Robyn was one less spent with her and it was all JP’s fault.