I caressed her hair as she held me tightly.

Her call had come a half hour earlier.

“Ean, please come over. I have cancer.”

I quickly closed my Chemistry book and bolted downstairs and out the front door. There was a torrential rain, but I didn’t bother grabbing my umbrella.

The contents of her message and its tone were so dense that I felt numb. The umbrella would do nothing other than to weigh down my strides.

By the time I had bridged the two miles separating us, not a single thought had crossed my mind.

I rang her buzzer and she emerged moments later; a blank look scrawled across her face. She trudged up a flight of stairs and I quickly followed, only stopping to peel off my clothing and drop them in the stairway outside her apartment.

I followed her into the bedroom, where she sat on the bed, emotionless. I sat down beside her. She buried her face in my chest and began to cry.

I caressed her hair as she held me tightly.

—–

On the previous Sunday evening, while laying in bed, I had run my hands through her hair and down her neck. My hand encountered something new and I paused as I felt it beneath my fingers again: a hard marble-sized ball resting at the base of the left side of her neck.

She teasingly slapped my hand away. I didn’t dare feel it again. Terrible thoughts began racing through my head.

But I gave her a sly grin to distract her from my concern. We turned off the lights and readied for bed.

 

I caressed her hair as she held me tightly.

—–

When we awoke the next morning, I cautiously suggested she should go see her doctor first thing. A light-hearted soul who always smiled, she flashed her own sly grin at me.

I followed her smile with a look which revealed my overwhelming concern. “Please. For me.”

An uncommonly serious look came across her face and she promised to go immediately.

The doctor performed a biopsy of the lymph node and summoned her for the results three days later. She had Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, the same diagnosis her mother had received five years earlier.

—–

At the time, our relationship was still in its hot and fast stage, having been together for less than a year. On one fateful day, I had summoned the courage to give her my number. We had been nearly inseparable since.

We were scheduled to leave for Prague in only a few weeks. But on that night, as the rain streamed down her windows and her tears streamed down my chest, time seemed to stand still; the uncertainty of life reverberating through every one of her cries.

A few days before our trip, she dropped me off at home and as I paused to kiss her good-bye, she took a deep breath. It was as if she was sneaking some of the life out of me, knowing what lay in store for her.

Then she whispered words I could not believe. She said she was willing to undergo this battle on her own. If I wanted to end our relationship after our trip, she would understand.

I froze in shock and climbed back into the car.

 

I caressed her hair as she held me tightly.

—–

The next six months were a cauldron of emotion, marked by fear, anxiety, and sadness… for both her and I. Feeling overwhelmed by the magnitude of the situation, I did my best to be strong and caring for her.

I often failed.

Though universally beloved, she was an intensely private woman. She was able to tell only a select few co-workers and friends about the diagnosis because her treatment would “only” be every-other-Friday. And she told them only in case something turned for the worse.

Outside of work, she was active in coaching, a natural gift that made her a pied piper to the college kids. Her treatment would likely leave her ill and weak on the weekends, so she took a semester hiatus. Being away from the game and people she loved was agonizing for her.

In preparation for what was deemed inevitable, she used my hair trimmers and cut her locks short. For Christmas I bought her two trendy hats I thought would make her feel cute. But she never got around to wearing them; perhaps because she received so many compliments about her new look.

—–

Unlike her, I told everyone.

I had to. I was overwhelmed with uncertainty. I could feel the stress percolating in my body. I wanted to be Superman for her.

Her privacy kept her from allowing anyone else who loved her from coming and sitting with her at chemotherapy. Only I was allowed to see her in such a vulnerable state.

On those Fridays, as the clock neared 10AM, I would catch a cab from across town, and arrive as the infusion was beginning.

We would play cards and talk about what we would do over the weekend. She would declare with pride to the nurses that I was studying to be a doctor. And that she was my patient.

When the session was over, we would drive back to her apartment, sit down in front of the TV, and wait for the nausea to come.

She would run to the bathroom, return a few minutes later, give me a sly grin, and start chewing some gum.

Then she would lay down across the couch and rest her head in my lap.

 

I caressed her hair as she held me tightly.

—–

Her athletic frame and wide smile prevented most people from noticing the side effects of chemotherapy, even those whom she had been comfortable telling about her illness.

But they were awful. At night, she would vacillate between hot flashes and cold night sweats, often tearing clothes from her body only to hurriedly put them back on a few moments later.

In the middle of the night, her dry mouth left her gasping for water.

She craved physical intimacy, but the pain was unbearable.

I would awake to her crying and could not console her.

 

I caressed her hair as she held me tightly.

—-

After six months of treatment, she was free of cancer, with many people in her life none-the-wiser to everything she endured.

When nearly two years later I asked her to attend a cancer survivors event put on by the hospital where I was working, she shook her head no.

I don’t think she wanted to be reminded of those days.

—–

The end of her treatment and my birthday occurred within a week of each other in the summer of 2006. She reluctantly agreed to have a birthday/post-chemo celebration at her apartment. Friends from all of our walks of life stopped in, shared a drink, and made her feel special.

At the end of night she and I shared one last private drink and crawled into her bed, happy to have it all behind us. She looked relieved and smiled at me.

I caressed her hair as she held me tightly.