The Time Capsule

by Lurlene McDaniel

  Adam was restricted to the house. He was to go to the hospital for outpatient lab workups weekly, with the understanding that if his doctors didn’t like what they saw, he would be re-admitted. Alexis assumed that her brother would chafe against the confinement, but Adam was too weak, too sick to do much more than remain in bed.

  Eleanor put a bell on Adam’s bedside table, telling him, “If you want anything, ring it. I’m just downstairs.”

  “Just until you get your strength back,” his father told him.

  “We can always put a hospital bed in the living room if you’d like to be downstairs,” Eleanor suggested.

  Adam looked horrified. “I want to stay in my room. I’ll feel like I’m on display in the living room.” He stopped and glanced up at Eleanor, looking contrite. “Course, that means you’ll have to run up the stairs all day long.”

  “I don’t mind. It’ll keep me fit.”

  Without daily visits to the hospital, Alexis had assumed that her time would be freer. She was wrong. With a full class load, she faced tests and papers she’d put off all year. In March, Mrs. Wiley stepped up debate rehearsals to three afternoons a week because their team had barely squeaked out a win at the last tournament before state. “We’re going in as top seed,” she kept saying if anyone complained. “Only a few more weeks, so hang in there. We can win the whole enchilada. I know we can.”

  With so much of her time and energy going to home and school, Alexis had little time for other things. Especially for Sawyer.

  With only a week remaining before she was to leave for Tallahassee, he stopped by the house. He looked grimy from soccer practice, and she figured he’d come straight from the field. “Mom’s at the store, and Adam’s asleep,” she said. “Come up to my room and we’ll talk.”

  “I never see you anymore,” he said, looking unhappy and getting right to the point once they were upstairs.

  “We see each other. I’m at school every day.”

  “With your face in a book. How about showing up at a few of my soccer games?” His season was in full swing. The team played once a week after school, but she rarely went.

  “You know I have a ton of work. Mrs. Wiley is smelling that championship, and she’s like a dog with a bone. I have to do my best; there will be a ton of college recruiters there. You should understand about that. Don’t coaches come watch you play? Aren’t you trying for a soccer scholarship?”

  “You know I am, but I don’t want to sacrifice you and me.”

  “Are you saying I do?”

  They had squared off and were standing in the middle of her room facing each other.

  “I’m just asking for a little more time with my girl. I get the stuff about school and debate, even though it never used to string you out like this. But why don’t we ever have any extra time with each other? Not even on weekends?”

  “You know I tutor Adam,” Alexis said. “He’s having a hard time getting his strength up.”

  “He’s on the homebound program. He has teachers.”

  “He does, but if he’s going to graduate in June with our class, he needs a lot more help than he’s getting. He’s sick almost every day, so the window on working with him is short.”

  Sawyer looked exasperated. “Why are you putting this on yourself, Ally? You’re not responsible for whether or not he graduates in June.”

  “I want to walk with my brother. We started first grade together. I want us to finish high school together. What’s so hard to understand about that?” She was becoming impatient with Sawyer.

  “Don’t turn me into some insensitive clod just because I want to spend time with you.”

  “And don’t you turn me into a uncaring pain because I have more on my mind than you.”

  “Well, gee, Ally, forgive me for being so narrow-minded and thoughtless. Don’t you think I get it? I know how important Adam is to you. But what about us? Where is the us in the picture these days?”

  “Don’t make me choose, Sawyer.”

  He grabbed his jacket, which he’d tossed on her bed. “You already have,” he said.

  Totally stunned by Sawyer’s vehemence, Alexis watched him go, heard him bound down the stairs and heard the front door shut hard behind him. After the heat of the fight, the air grew quiet until all she heard was her own breathing. A moment later, Adam’s bell rang. She went to his room quickly. “Do you need something?” Her voice quavered.

  “Did I just hear you and Sawyer going at it?”

  “Sorry if we woke you.”

  “I don’t care about that. I wasn’t eavesdropping, but it didn’t sound like the two of you were hugging and kissing.”

  “We had a fight because he doesn’t think I’m spending enough time with him.” She edged into a chair. “I told him to take a number and get in line.”

  “Don’t do that to him, Ally. He’s crazy about you.”

  “What’s the use? We’re going off to separate colleges, so we’ll have to break up sooner or later anyway. Why put off the inevitable?”

  “Listen to me—you should put off the inevitable as long as you can. Take it from someone who knows.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I’ve just spent the last few months putting off the inevitable, but I can’t do it much longer.”

  She felt as if he’d stabbed her. “Don’t talk about—”

  “What? Dying? Why can’t anybody use that word around here? Am I the only one who can say it out loud?”

  “Stop it.” She stood, irritated that he’d needle her this way. “You’re not going to die.”

  He closed his eyes, waited a minute. When he opened his eyes, he said quietly, “My liver’s failing. I go every week for tests, and that’s what the tests show. The meds they gave me have destroyed my liver. They can’t fix it.”

  She wanted to put her hand across his mouth to stop the flow of his terrible words. “What are you saying? How could they give you drugs that hurt you?”

  “Because they’d given me everything else and nothing worked. I knew the new drugs were risky—they told me so from my first consultation in the hospital. I took the risk anyway because it was also my only chance. I thought you knew.”

  “No one told me about the risks.”

  “Look, I—I didn’t mean for you to not know. It wasn’t a secret. I thought Mom and Dad explained it to you.”

  “No one told me,” she repeated, feeling as if he’d hammered her with powerful body blows. Why hadn’t she known? Why hadn’t someone told her the truth? “That’s not right. . . .” She couldn’t decide which of the two was worse for her, the not knowing about the true potential of the drugs to harm him, or the fact that no one had been open and honest with her about his chances of survival.

  “I wore a heart monitor,” Adam said gently. “I was constantly tested. What did you think was going on?”

  “You were sick the last time you were treated. All the chemo made you sick. I thought this was the same thing.” Her voice had faded to a whisper, and her face felt hot.

  “I relapsed twice. Medical science was all out of options. And now, so am I.”

  She couldn’t see his face clearly for the tears in her eyes.

  “Hey, hey, don’t cry for me. I’m okay with this. We all have to die sometime. Someone has to go first, big sister.”

  “Don’t say that to me! You’re doing your schoolwork. You’re going to graduate with me.”

  He reached out his hand, but she wouldn’t take it. “I’m doing everything I can to keep that date with you. I want to make it. I really do. I just can’t promise you I will.”

  She couldn’t speak. She couldn’t even feel. She was numb all over. She left Adam’s room without a word, easing the door shut behind her.

  “Why are you sitting alone in the dark?” Eleanor asked, coming into the living room.

  Alexis was curled into a fetal position on the sofa, and she didn’t answer.

  Her mother set a bag of groceries on the
coffee table. “Honey, what is it?” Alexis heard her breath catch. “Adam—?”

  “He’s asleep,” Alexis said.

  Eleanor leaned over, turned on a lamp, then sat on the edge of the sofa. She stroked Alexis’s shoulder, but Alexis recoiled. “Don’t touch me.”

  “Honey, what’s wrong?”

  “Adam’s going to die and nobody saw fit to tell me.” She aimed her words like darts. “The drugs that were supposed to save him are killing him.”

  Her mother blew out a full breath of air in one long weary sigh. “Cancer’s killing him,” she corrected Alexis. “We were out of options. We talked it over. He wanted to go with the experimental treatments.”

  “Why didn’t someone ask me? Aren’t I a part of this family? Don’t I get a say?”

  “What would you have said, Ally?”

  She was struck dumb, because she knew she would have made the same choice they had. Every day of life Adam had earned from the experimental drugs had been a gift to all of them. Every single day.

  Her mother said, “We didn’t keep it from you on purpose. I—I guess I thought you’d figure it out.”

  “Figure it out?” Alexis sat up, unable to believe her mother was saying such a stupid thing to her. “How should I have gone about figuring out that my brother was dying right in front of me?”

  Eleanor pressed her thumb and forefinger against her eyes, rocked back and forth. “Maybe I could have sat you down for a heart-to-heart talk. But frankly, your optimism, your irrepressible sense of hope, your projects, your energy were infectious. It kept us all going.”

  “Don’t you mean my stupidity?”

  Eleanor eased off the sofa. “Can I show you something?” She went over to the bookcase, pulled out a book and returned. “Do you know what this is?”

  No answer.

  “It’s your and Adam’s baby book. I want to tell you some things, and I want you to listen, not just with your ears, but with your heart.”

  EIGHTEEN

  Alexis moved over, but she was careful not to let her mother touch her. She was angry and she was hurt, and she didn’t feel like pretending otherwise. She wasn’t going to be patient and understanding. Not this time. Still, her gaze was drawn to the oversized book her mother held. It was bound between covers of padded moiré satin in a soft shade of yellow. The title, It’s Twins! was printed in blue in a fancy typeface that looked like ribbon unfurling.

  “I did a good job of keeping this up,” Eleanor said. “Until the two of you were about three. Then . . . well, you kept me pretty busy and I put it aside. I found it again right after Thanksgiving, and I spent hours going over every page.”

  She opened the book and Alexis saw two hospital bracelets: one pink, with the words FEMALE CHAPPEL written on it, the other blue, bearing MALE CHAPPEL. On the facing page, she read her own and Adam’s names, birth weights and vital statistics written in their mother’s neat hand. She refused to speak.

  “I was shocked when my doctor told me I was having twins,” Eleanor said. “During the last six weeks of my pregnancy, I was confined to bed because you two wanted out prematurely. I wanted you out too, but once you got out, your father and I thought we’d lose our minds.” Eleanor gave a little laugh. “We had the nursery all fixed up with two of everything—two cribs, two dressers, two diaper pails—the list goes on. But every time we put you in separate cribs, you screamed your heads off. Adam was worse than you. He was inconsolable and could cry for hours. Your father and I took turns sleeping and walking the floors with you, trying to make you happy. Then one night, in desperation, I put Adam in your crib facing you, and he stopped crying.

  “Your father and I slept that night like we hadn’t slept in weeks. When we got up the next morning, the two of you were asleep and your arms were around each other. I think that’s all either of you wanted, just to be together. You shared the same crib until you were three months old. Then we put the cribs side by side, so that you could see each other last thing at night and first thing when you woke up in the morning.”

  Alexis didn’t need her mother to tell her how close she and Adam had been as children. She had memories of her own, just not ones that went that far back.

  Eleanor flipped through the pages of the baby book filled with Alexis and Adam’s shared history. “You always had the magic touch with him, Ally. You seemed to know what he wanted when he cried. When the two of you were toddlers and he’d cry, you’d get up, waddle over to the toy box and bring him just the thing that would make him stop crying. If I tried to guess what he wanted, he’d throw whatever I gave him on the floor and yell louder.”

  “But then he got sick.” Alexis finally broke her silence.

  “Yes. And I all but lived at the hospital with him, while you and your father fended for yourselves.”

  “I missed you both.” Feelings of loss bubbled up within her. She remembered the ache as clearly as if it had all happened yesterday.

  “I know. So did your father. But I felt so responsible for keeping Adam alive. I was afraid that if I let down my guard for a minute, he would die.”

  “But he got better.”

  “And then he relapsed and got better again. His doctors told us that if he passed the five-year mark, the odds were that he’d completely recover. After that second remission, year one passed, and his checkups were good. Then year two. I thought, ‘Thank heavens, it’s over.’ I discovered that if I stayed busy enough, I didn’t have time to think about losing my son. That’s why I became a realtor and why I worked for Larry. I stayed as busy as I could. But when Adam relapsed this time, I knew it wasn’t over. I realized Adam was on loan to us—all children are on loan, you know. You give birth to them, you take care of them, you raise them, but eventually, they leave you. One way or the other.”

  “College—” Alexis started.

  “Or a job, or getting married. That’s the natural order of things. Adam’s leaving is unnatural. But we can’t stop it.”

  Alexis felt tears sliding down her cheeks. Unnatural . . . Her mother had it right.

  Eleanor lifted an age-yellowed envelope from between the pages of the baby book. She opened it and removed two thick clusters of light brown hair, one tied with a pink ribbon, the other with a blue one. “These are from your first haircuts. Touch them. Feel how soft.”

  Mesmerized, Alexis took the hair clippings and cradled them in her palm. They were as soft as down, and in the lamp’s light, they shone.

  “I love you both so much,” Eleanor said, her voice catching. In the silence of the room, a clock ticked. “I know this is crazy, Ally, but the first time Adam got sick, it almost broke our family apart. This time, his illness has brought us back together. Believe it or not, you are responsible for this togetherness, in part. And for that, I will always be grateful.”

  Tessa wept when Alexis told her what was happening to Adam. They were standing in the parking lot after school. The sky was the color of cornflowers and was decorated with plumes of billowing white clouds. A tropical breeze danced around them. “And he knows?” Tessa asked, wiping her teary eyes.

  “He knows.”

  “So any day now—?”

  “Yes. It can happen at any time.” Alexis held herself rigid, afraid she’d break down if she didn’t.

  “Can I . . . Do you think I can visit him more often?”

  “I’ll ask.”

  When Alexis asked, Adam shrugged. “I don’t know why she’d want to.”

  “Because she cares,” Alexis told him.

  “Speaking of caring, I don’t see much of Sawyer hanging around here.”

  “He’s busy with soccer.”

  Adam eyed her skeptically. “Is that all?”

  Truthfully, they had never made up after their fight. Alexis figured it was better that way. She missed him, but she didn’t have the energy to continually butt heads with him. “As soon as soccer season’s over, we’ll be tripping over each other,” she said. “Just you wait and see.” She handed Adam a part
y bag splashed with the words GET WELL. “By the way . . . Tessa and I made this for you.”

  He pulled away the tissue and lifted out a dark brown teddy bear. The stuffed toy wore a baseball cap and held a bat emblazoned with the word SLUGGER. It wore a tiny T-shirt marked with the insignia of their school baseball team. On the back of the shirt was a large #1. Adam grinned. “He’s cool. Thanks.”

  “We thought you deserved a bear of your own.”

  “I should call Tessa up and thank her.”

  “You should call her up and invite her over and tell her goodbye.”

  Adam’s gaze searched his sister’s for a long time. At last he said, “I should have picked her instead of Kelly.”

  “Yes . . . I’ve always thought so too. Which is something else you can tell her.”

  “It’s too late now.”

  “It’s never too late, Adam. Not as long as you have breath to say the words.”

  He reached up his hand. “You’re a great sister.”

  She laced her fingers through his. “And you love me, right?”

  “And I love you,” he echoed.

  Alexis stood outside the door of Mrs. Wiley’s room, taking deep breaths to steady her nerves. The halls were empty. She’d waited in the library until the buses had left and the parking lot was devoid of student cars so that she could see Mrs. Wiley privately. She rapped gently on the door.

  Mrs. Wiley glanced up from the paperwork spread across her desk. “Alexis!” She smiled broadly. “Come on in. Sit.”

  “I—I’m sorry to bother you.”

  “It’s never a bother to see one of my favorite students and captain of the best debate team I’ve ever coached.”

  Alexis groaned inwardly. Mrs. Wiley wasn’t making this easy. She took another deep breath. “I have to tell you something.”

  Mrs. Wiley looked expectant.

  “Mrs. Wiley, I’m not going to state with you.”

  The smile faded from the teacher’s face. “What?” The team was to leave on Thursday for Tallahassee.

  “I—I can’t leave,” Alexis said. “Adam’s too sick. If something happens to him while I’m gone, I won’t be able to live with myself.”