On the morning chemotherapy began, Allison woke before the alarm.
It was 4:52.
I knew because I was already awake.
She lay beside me staring into the darkness.
Mateo slept in the bassinet.
For once, neither of us pretended we might fall asleep again.
At five fifteen, Allison whispered, "I want to shower."
"Okay."
She sat up slowly.
Her surgical pain had improved, but sudden movement still reminded her that recovery was unfinished.
I did not offer help until she stood.
She made it to the bathroom alone.
Ten minutes later, I heard crying.
Not a fall.
Not pain.
Crying.
I stood outside the bathroom.
"Allison?"
"I'm fine."
The phrase meant nothing anymore.
"Do you want me to come in?"
Silence.
Then, "Yes."
She sat on the closed toilet lid wearing a robe.
Her short hair was wet.
In her hand was the breast pump.
"I pumped almost nothing."
I sat on the floor.
She looked furious.
"I've been doing this every three hours."
"I know."
"I set alarms."
"I know."
"I drank water. I ate everything they told me."
"I know."
"And this is all I got."
A small amount of milk sat in the bottle.
She held it up as though it were evidence against her.
"That's not nothing."
"Don't."
I stopped.
She cried.
"I wanted enough for weeks."
I waited.
"I wanted him to still have something from me while poison is going into me."
There was no useful correction to that sentence.
Chemotherapy was medicine.
It was also toxic enough that she had been told not to breastfeed during treatment.
Both truths could exist.
"I hate my body."
She said it quietly.
I moved closer.
She looked at me.
"I know I'm supposed to be grateful."
"No."
"For what?"
"For anything."
I shook my head.
"You don't owe gratitude because treatment exists."
She stared at me.
"Marcus?"
"Maybe."
"He is useful."
"Unfortunately."
She laughed through tears.
I held out my hand.
She gave me the pump.
"What are you doing?"
"Washing it."
"Why?"
"Because you pumped."
"There isn't enough."
"Allison."
She looked at me.
"You said it mattered."
Her face crumpled again.
I washed the parts.
She labeled the small bottle.
Date.
Time.
Less than two ounces.
Then she put it into the freezer beside the others.
By six thirty, Teresa arrived to stay with Mateo.
She stood at the doorway until Allison invited her in.
That ritual had become normal.
"How are you?" Teresa asked.
Allison gave her a look.
"Terrible question."
Teresa nodded.
"Fair."
She tried again.
"Do you want coffee?"
"Better."
Rachel arrived ten minutes later.
She carried the same overnight bag she had brought the first day she returned.
"Why do you have luggage?" Allison asked.
"In case treatment goes badly."
"Optimistic."
"Experienced."
We drove to the infusion center together.
Rachel sat in the back.
Allison held my hand across the console.
At a red light, she said, "I want to turn around."
I remembered the gas station before surgery.
"We can pull over."
"No."
She tightened her grip.
"If I stop, I might not start again."
So I kept driving.
The infusion center looked nothing like the dramatic hospital rooms I had imagined.
Recliners.
Blankets.
Televisions.
IV poles.
People reading books.
A man asleep beneath a baseball cap.
An older woman doing a crossword puzzle while clear medication dripped into her arm.
Ordinary life happening beside dangerous medicine.
A nurse named Carmen introduced herself.
She reviewed Allison's medications and explained the sequence.
Pre-medications first.
Then chemotherapy.
Hydration.
Monitoring.
Questions.
Side effects.
Call immediately for fever.
Allison listened.
I took notes.
Then I noticed her watching me.
I closed the notebook.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"No, what?"
She smiled faintly.
"You noticed."
"I am capable of learning."
"Occasionally."
Carmen inserted the IV.
Allison looked away.
Rachel watched.
I watched Allison.
When the first chemotherapy bag appeared, Allison's breathing changed.
Carmen checked her identity twice.
Medication.
Dose.
Date of birth.
Safety rituals.
Then she connected the line.
Allison stared at the clear tubing.
"That's it?"
Carmen nodded.
"That's it."
Allison began crying.
Carmen handed her tissues.
"I'm sorry."
"No apology needed."
"I thought it would look different."
"Most people do."
The medication began dripping.
Allison looked at me.
"There's chemotherapy going into me."
"Yes."
"I have cancer."
"Yes."
Even after weeks of appointments, she still seemed surprised by the sentence.
Maybe we both were.
Rachel sat on her other side.
For the first hour, things were uneventful.
Allison drank water.
We talked about television.
Rachel told a story about accidentally setting off her apartment fire alarm while cooking.
I made fun of the bagels she had brought the previous week.
Normal conversation.
Then Allison became nauseated.
Carmen adjusted medication.
The nausea eased.
Later came a headache.
Then exhaustion.
Not ordinary tiredness.
Her entire body seemed to become heavier.
By the time the infusion ended, she looked gray.
"Can you walk?" I asked.
Her eyes sharpened.
I heard it.
Wrong question.
I corrected.
"Wheelchair or walking?"
"Wheelchair."
No pride.
No argument.
Progress.
I got one.
On the drive home, Allison barely spoke.
Rachel sat beside her in the back because she had started feeling sick again.
I focused on the road.
At home, Teresa opened the door.
Mateo was in her arms.
The moment Allison saw him, she began crying.
"I can't hold him."
Teresa stopped.
"You can if you feel steady."
"No."
Allison looked at her hands.
"What if there's chemo on me?"
Rachel answered gently.
"You aren't radioactive."
"I know."
"But you don't feel safe."
"No."
Teresa held Mateo closer.
"I'll keep him right here."
Allison went upstairs.
I followed.
She sat on the edge of the bed.
"I thought I'd come home and hold him."
"You still can later."
"What if I can't?"
"Then tomorrow."
"What if tomorrow is worse?"
I sat beside her.
"Then the next day."
She turned on me.
"You keep having answers."
The accusation surprised me.
"I'm trying to help."
"I don't want help."
I felt defensiveness rise.
Then shame.
Then fear.
She doesn't appreciate anything.
There it was.
The old pattern.
I breathed.
"Okay."
She stared.
"I'll stop."
"Stop what?"
"Trying to fix the next five minutes."
Her shoulders lowered.
"I feel horrible."
"I know."
"I don't want a solution."
"Okay."
"I just want to say I feel horrible."
"Then say it."
She lay back.
"I feel horrible."
I sat beside her.
"That sucks."
She laughed weakly.
"Better."
Ten minutes later, she vomited.
I held the basin.
Then cleaned it.
Then brought water.
No speeches.
No promises.
That evening, fever became our fear.
We checked her temperature every time she felt warm.
Normal.
Normal.
Normal.
At eleven, Mateo began screaming downstairs.
Teresa had gone home.
Rachel was asleep on the couch.
I picked him up.
He did not settle.
Bottle.
No.
Diaper.
Clean.
Burping.
Nothing.
His cries became sharper.
Allison heard him.
"I want him."
I carried him upstairs.
She held out her arms.
"Are you sure?"
Her face hardened.
I corrected immediately.
"Sorry."
I placed Mateo against her.
He stopped crying within seconds.
The silence was almost comical.
Allison looked at me.
"Traitor."
I whispered to him.
She smiled.
Then she started crying.
"What?"
"He knows me."
"Of course he knows you."
"I was afraid he wouldn't."
She pressed her face against his hair.
For twenty minutes, she held him.
Then her arms began trembling.
She looked ashamed.
I did not wait for her to ask.
I held out my arms.
She gave him to me.
"Thank you."
"No problem."
She lay down.
At midnight, her temperature was normal.
At one, normal.
At two, she slept.
I took Mateo downstairs.
Rachel was awake.
"How is she?"
"Bad."
"Normal bad?"
"I think so."
Rachel nodded.
"First few days can be rough."
I sat across from her.
"I keep wanting to do something."
"You are doing something."
"Cleaning vomit isn't fighting cancer."
Rachel looked at me.
"That's exactly the kind of thing caregivers say before they burn themselves out."
I frowned.
"What?"
"You think only dramatic things count."
I remembered Marcus.
Projects.
Visible accomplishments.
Rachel continued.
"Treatment is mostly ordinary misery."
She gestured toward the stairs.
"Food. Water. Medication. Laundry. Driving. Sitting there."
I looked down at Mateo.
"That doesn't feel like enough."
"It isn't supposed to feel heroic."
That sentence stayed with me.
The next morning, Allison woke feeling worse.
Her bones ached.
Food tasted strange.
The smell of coffee made her nauseated.
She cried because toothpaste tasted metallic.
She cried again because she was crying about toothpaste.
I made toast.
She ate half a slice.
I did not praise her.
I had learned that too.
At noon, Teresa brought soup.
She left it at the door because Allison did not want company.
No guilt.
No dramatic text.
Just soup.
By afternoon, Allison could sit downstairs.
Mateo slept against my chest.
She watched us.
"You're good with him."
The compliment made me uncomfortable.
"I'm getting better."
"No."
She looked at me.
"You're good with him."
I let myself accept it.
"Thank you."
She stared at the floor.
"I'm jealous."
"Of me?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"You get to be healthy with him."
I had no answer.
She continued.
"You get to pick him up without wondering whether your blood counts are okay."
Her eyes filled.
"You get to plan next month."
I moved closer.
"I wish you had that."
"So do I."
No false equivalence.
My fear was not her illness.
My exhaustion was not chemotherapy.
Loving someone through suffering did not mean claiming equal suffering.
That evening, Allison's temperature reached 100.3.
We stared at the thermometer.
The oncology instructions said call at 100.4.
We checked again.
100.4.
I called immediately.
The nurse told us to come to the emergency department.
Allison closed her eyes.
"No."
"We have to go."
"I know."
Rachel grabbed the hospital bag.
Teresa came for Mateo.
Within twenty minutes, we were back in the car.
Allison shivered despite a blanket.
At the hospital entrance, she looked at me.
"I can't keep doing this."
I heard the despair beneath the sentence.
I did not tell her she could.
I did not tell her she was strong.
I took her hand.
"You don't have to do all of it tonight."
She looked at me.
"Just this part."
She nodded.
We went inside.
Blood was drawn.
Cultures taken.
Hours passed.
Her fever climbed slightly.
The doctors worried about infection but said her white count had not yet dropped dangerously.
They started antibiotics as a precaution.
At three in the morning, Allison lay under hospital blankets staring at me.
"This was infusion one."
"I know."
"How am I supposed to do two more?"
I remembered Rachel's words.
Not every day is awful.
But this day was.
So I did not ask Allison to imagine the good ones.
"We'll decide about infusion two when it's time."
"What if I quit?"
The question frightened me.
I let it.
"Then you talk to Dr. Mehta about what that means."
She stared.
"You wouldn't be angry?"
"I'd be terrified."
"That's not what I asked."
"No."
I took a breath.
"I wouldn't punish you for being the person who has to live inside the treatment."
Her eyes filled.
"I don't want to quit."
"I know."
"I just want to be allowed to want to."
"You are."
She reached for my hand.
Outside the room, a cart rattled down the corridor.
Inside, Allison's fever slowly began falling.
Nothing about the first infusion had been heroic.
There had been vomit, fear, tears over toothpaste, a screaming baby, and another emergency-room visit.
But sometime before dawn, I understood what Rachel had meant.
Care was not proven by defeating helplessness.
Sometimes it was proven by staying useful while helplessness remained.
Click here to continue reading: PART 16: A Photograph From the Worst Night of Treatment Showed Allison What Daniel Had Changed, Just Before Her Marriage Faced Its First Real Test
Four Hours After Bringing My Wife Home, One Careless Question Revealed What I Had Refused to See
Part 15 of 35
