We’d put a movie in and five minutes in we ended up naked and panting. Now, curled beneath the sheets, we remain naked and have no clue what the movie is even about.
He seems lost. Though he is doing his best to pull it off.
“You do know everything is going be okay tomorrow, don’t you?”
I notice the shift in his eyes. The lost look from moments ago returning, as he floats off into some unknown place. “You don’t know that.”
“I may not know, but I won’t allow myself to believe anything beyond that, I can’t. Your father will beat this.”
He stares at me, and I refuse to look away. There is so much riding on tomorrow. I know that both he and his mother are tense and scared. I’m sure Mr. Armstrong is terrified, though he won’t allow his family to know that. I wish I could protect them all from the anxiety I know they are feeling.
“You are all going to go to this appointment and things are going to be okay. No matter what, things will be okay,” I tell him as he leans in and buries his face into my shoulder. Breathing me in, we remain like this until we are both fast asleep.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Finn
The three ofus remain seated in the office of my father’s oncologist waiting for her to join us. He had his scans several days ago, he’s been poked and prodded, and now here we are.
All three sitting side by side, each lost in our own thoughts.
I’m focusing on Sophie’s words, doing everything I can to channel the positive thinking she has been carrying for days.
I wish I could be like that. I wish I could think of the good, but with the year we’ve had, I’m terrified to let go of the negative thoughts. Like letting go of them will only set me up for failure. Almost like allowing myself to accept a good outcome is only making me a target for something bad.
It is crazy I know, but it doesn’t change the scary thoughts having an ongoing war in my head.
“Good afternoon.” My body lurches in surprise to the sound of the doctor’s voice as she enters the room. “I am so sorry to keep you all waiting.”
“It okay,” my father tells her as she rounds her desk and sits down, pulling out her iPad.
Tapping away on the screen she lifts her gaze to meet my father and holds his stare. My stomach grows tight, my hands shake and I fist them at my sides, trying to stay calm.
“How are you feeling, William?” she asks him with complete and total seriousness.
“I’m doing all right,” he assures her but I can sense he is growing impatient. Frankly so am I. It feels like a lifetime, though I know it’s been only months of this battle. The world seems to go on, yet ours feels like it stopped. Here we are again sitting in a room as if we are frozen in time, hanging on a ledge, waiting to be rescued or to fall.
“These are your scans when we started this journey.” She turns the iPad around and it can’t be mistaken that there is a growth. “Unfortunately due to the positioning of the mass, surgery was not an option,” the doctor continues and I close my eyes, willing her to just tell us what we so desperately needed to know.
“And these are your scans now.”
I open my eyes just as she flips the screen and again we all stare. Unsure of what we are seeing, what I do know is the images appear to be significantly different. What was a blurred spot in the center is now much smaller, and the dark areas seem more widespread.
“What are you saying?” I ask, suddenly feeling as though I’ve been kicked in the stomach, the uncomfortable pain there is making it hard to breathe evenly.
“What I’m saying is that the treatment worked.”
My mother’s cry escapes her and she quickly muffles the sound. Like she’d been holding in her pain for months and everything came rushing out of her in one big swoosh. An uncontrollable relief like she can finally breathe again.
“Of course we will need to monitor and repeat scans every few months. Continue on with your daily medication. But at this point I believe the treatment is working, has worked.” She smiles and looks at each of us.
I watch my father register her words. He holds her stare, gives her a gentle nod, once, twice and then his throat bobs as he swallows. He nods again, just before he bows his head.
I didn’t think I could break any more than I already had, but seeing my father cry proved me wrong. He wasn’t sad, he wasn’t hurting, he was letting go. He was accepting that all this time, holding it all in, doing everything he could to remain strong for his family, paid off. He could now cry, knowing that he has so many more tomorrows ahead of him.
“This is great news,” the doctor adds with a bright smile. “In this job, I don’t get to share great news often. I’m forced to give the worst possible outcomes to people on a daily basis. I sit here with families and I am the one that gets to tell them they may not have another week with their loved ones, or worse. So this, I cherish these moments, because unfortunately we don’t get enough of them.”
“Thank you,” I tell her, staring back at her through the tears that pool in my eyes.
