Back in the truck, I connected the phone to the speakers again and crept along the bumpy road the rest of the way to the cabin. The various meal-prep noises suddenly grew louder, followed by my step-dad’s booming voice. “Reece! How’s it going? How’d your,uh,what’s that medicine you’re on, now? How’d that go?”
Thank God for Keith.
He was always attentive to Mom’s penchant to worry, and had been a life-saver the last few months in dissolving the tension between us when it began to grate.
My parents divorced when I was ten, as amicably as that sort of thing could be. Mom remarried Keith, a computer programmer who worshipped her and his lawn—in that order—a few years later and moved to Tennessee. She and Dad had decided it was best for me to stay in Idaho with all my friends during the school year, and visit her for a month or so over the summer.
Short and soft-looking, with a round face and a laugh that could be heard a mile away, my mom had gone full Tennessee bleach blonde when they moved, complete with a twang in her voice. She dressed like she was headed for the country club every day.
“Hey, Keith. My infusion went really well. It’s supposed to be highly effective in preventing flare-ups, so crossing my fingers it works.”
Crossing my fingers it works!
Hopefully, this takes care of it for now!
Just gotta keep trucking on!
I really fucking hated every single word that came out of my mouth when I updated family and friends since I’d been diagnosed back in January. Almost five months later, and I still wasn’t sure what I was meant to say. How could I explain the snarling, tangled mess of fear, denial, and anger that simmered every time I thought about it?
I had a potentially life-changing chronic illness that I’d manage for as long as I was alive. I’d already been a grumpy, emotionally unavailable asshole on a good day; now I’d have to explain to anyone I dated that a future with me could be fine, or it could be a slow, sad, painful descent into losing my independence.
A real fucking catch, I was. Not that I was looking, after the way things ended with Josh.
So, I really didn’t know how I felt about the infusions. My neurologist had outlined several treatment options that ranged from low efficacy with minimal risk to high efficacy with increased risk, and asked which I’d prefer.
“You can take a few days to think about it, don’t rush a decision,” she’d said.
In the end, I didn’t need to think about it. Iwasa fucking risk factor. My lottery ticket from Hell had already been cashed in. “Give me the effective stuff,” I’d said, decision-fatigued and weary.
Actually, I knew exactly how I felt about all of it.
Resentful.
I resented that I was forced to accept an increased risk of cancer and an impaired immune system in exchange for the hope my disease progression would slow down.
I resented the appointments and the phone calls and the well-intentioned but invasive as fuck advice from everyone I knew.
I resented that I couldn’t work late into the evening like I used to, when my brain felt most alive, because I was so exhausted I couldn’t keep my eyes open.
I resented the fight with my insurance company, and that I’d had to convince them my doctor and I should be the ones who made decisions formy own health, not some medical-malpractice-ridden gremlin squatting in a windowless office somewhere, hitting thedenybutton over and over.
Most of all, though, I resented that I’d become a resentful person.
So yeah, I was doing more thancrossing my fingersthese infusions were effective in preventing another flare-up any time soon. The only way I could sleep at night was by knowing I was doingsomethingto prevent my eyesight from going wonky again. Sometimes I couldn’t breathe from the overwhelming hope that I’d be one of the lucky ones—or the luckiest of the unlucky—who made it to sixty or seventy without major hindrances to my health and mobility.
Saying all of that out loud made people uncomfortable, though.
Me, especially.
“That’s just fantastic,” Keith said with genuine enthusiasm. “I’m so glad to hear it. Isn’t that good news, Pop?”
My mom’s real name was Paula, but she’d beenPopsince she was a girl. “Of course it is. How will you know it’s working, though? More blood tests?” she asked, her worried tone grating on my last nerve.
I could see the warm light pouring from Dad’s cabin windows up ahead, just visible through the dusk-darkened trees. I pulled around the circular drive in front of the house and parked my truck behind his. “I won’t know if the infusions are working until my next MRI, but she said as long as I don’t get too sick from my suppressed immune system, all should be well.”
“Your next MRI isn’t for another year, though! That’s too long. You should call your doctor. I’m sure she can get you in sooner if you ask.”
I gritted my teeth. “Insurance doesn’t work like that.”
