Chapter 16 - The Life That Mattered

I missed the days of taking the Porter jet between Denver and Aspen. Three hours in the car with two kids wasn’t the highlight of my day.

“Oh …” Mom answered the door to their three-bedroom ranch in Littleton, a suburb of Colorado. “I thought you were coming alone.”

“You said it was important.”

A theatrical smile took over her face as she gazed at three-year-old Franz standing next to me with a backpack full of toys and books and his nine-month-old sister, Anya, asleep in her car seat straining my right arm.

“But I said we should speak alone.”

I pushed my way past her so I could set the car seat down. “I thought that was code for chatting while Dad ate lunch at the diner with his cronies. I have two kids, a working husband, and a business. Today is my day off which means it’s Sue’s day off.”

“Did you check with Lila?” Mom closed the door and helped Franz wiggle his backpack off his back. “Hi, sweetie.” She kissed him on his head.

I chuckled. “No. I didn’t see if the governor’s wife had time to babysit today. I don’t see Lila that much anymore. We chat for maybe ten minutes on the phone each week, and I send her pictures of the kids, but other than that …”

“Life changes.” Mom gave me a knowing, sad smile.

“It does.” I slipped off my shoes and lugged Anya’s car seat into the living room while Franz shuffled down the hallway to the spare bedroom that doubled as a toy room for him.

“Hey, honey.”

I turned toward Dad’s voice as he came around the corner from the kitchen. He handed me a cup of tea.

“You’re here.” I took the tea. “Now, I feel like you’re both ganging up on me. Is this an intervention? I know … I could use a haircut, and my house is a disaster.”

“No intervention.” Dad took a seat on the sofa next to Mom as I sat in the oversized chair with Anya’s seat on the floor next to me, gently rocking her to keep her napping as long as possible.

“What’s up?”

“The cancer is back,” Dad said, reaching over to take Mom’s hand, giving it a squeeze.

I shook my head. “What? No … I mean, how can that be right? Your tests and scans have been clear.”

“That was six months ago.” Mom put on a brave face even though her knuckles were white from clenching Dad’s hand so tightly.

“So …” I focused on Anya. Young and innocent. She represented life. I needed some life in my life at that moment. “Six months. It can’t be that bad. What are we talking? Surgery? Some radiation?”

“It metastasized to my brain. I had some symptoms, but nothing that felt that alarming since everything did seem fine after my last checkup. But honestly, we wonder if they missed something at that checkup.”

“Symptoms?” I asked.

“Headaches that would sometimes make me nauseous. Memory issues that I just attributed to aging. Dizziness that I thought was from the headaches. But last week I had a seizure.”

“What? How am I just now finding out about this?”

“Because once we found out what had caused the seizure and other symptoms, we had some choices to make. And they’re not easy choices.” Mom talked about her cancer like it wasn’t hers. She had always acted like it was happening to someone else. Always so matter-of-fact.

“Treatment choices?”

They nodded.

“So what’s the game plan? I can see if Ling and Victor will come help with the kids so I can be here for your treatments. Have you told Katie yet? She’ll want to fly out and stay for a while too.”

“We’re using money from your dad’s 401k and going to Italy.”

My head jerked back. “Before the treatment? Don’t they want to get started right away?”

Dad gave my mom a quick glance and blew out a slow breath. “Your mom doesn’t want to go through the treatment. It will only help with some of the symptoms. At best, it may give her six extra months. But in exchange, she’ll be sick from the chemo. Even her doctors feel the best option is to enjoy what time she has left with family.”

Emotion burned my eyes.

My mom … she was dying. Yet, my heart broke for my dad. His strength amazed me. How could life be so cruel to allow cancer to take both the women he chose to love in this life?

“What about experimental treatment? I can talk to Graham and—”

“Evelyn.” Mom rolled her lips together and shook her head. “It’s time. And I’m … I’m okay with it. I’ve spent the past week coming to terms with it.”

“Wow … okay, well …” I looked up at the ceiling while tears blurred my vision. “What if I’m not okay with it? What if I can’t come to terms with you giving up? Do my feelings not matter? Katie’s feelings? She won’t be okay with this at all.”

“We told her last night.” Dad leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. “We called her. And she accepted the fact that it’s your mom’s decision. It’s her body. It’s her life.”

I grunted a breath, biting the corner of my lower lip and shaking my head. “I …” My voice cracked. “I don’t know h-how I’m s-supposed to live without you.” I fell apart.

My parents made their way to me, doing what parents did best—offering comfort in the face of grief.

Maybe Katie was okay because she didn’t understand like I did. I was a mom. I knew how special that bond was between a mother and a child. I knew firsthand what it was like to have another human need you for their own survival … their own existence. And I also knew that feeling never really disappeared. We never stopped needing our moms.

After my mind made its way to something resembling acceptance, we took the kids to lunch and the zoo. I needed to get home, but I couldn’t leave her yet, so we stayed for dinner too.

“Oh look!” I held up my phone to show Franz. “It’s Daddy. He’s probably wondering where we are.” I pressed the answer button. “Hey.” I tried to force some enthusiasm into my voice.

“Hey. I see you haven’t left yet. I’m not sure I want you on the road now this late at night.”

“I agree. I think we’re going to crash here tonight and head home after breakfast in the morning.”

“So what was the urgency?”

I closed my eyes and made my way down to my old bedroom, leaving the kids in the living room with my parents. Anya was fed and half asleep in my mom’s arms. After closing the door, I sat on the bed. It creaked underneath me. I couldn’t remember a time it didn’t creak.

“My mom’s cancer is back,” I said it as quickly as I could, feigning bravery in my voice even though tears instantly sprang from my eyes, and my body shook with silent sobs. So much for coming to terms with it. Clearly, it was still very raw and painful. I wasn’t sure “coming to terms” with someone dying, especially your mother or a child, was a real thing. An actual power humans possessed.

“Evelyn … I’m so sorry.”

I nodded and fought past the lump in my throat. Had I tried to say actual words past it, I wouldn’t have been able to keep my sobs silent any longer. So I just sat there, falling apart without making a sound while Ronin waited for a response I couldn’t give him.

“Are you still there?”

I had no choice. He deserved some sort of verbal response.

“Yeah …” I choked out the word.

“Oh, baby … are you crying?”

I responded with sobs—strangled, painful sobs that I couldn’t contain any longer.

“Oh, Evie …” His voice and all the sympathy it carried just made more emotion pour out of me.

“Do you need me tonight? I can drive down tonight. Do you want me to do that?”

I shook my head. If only he could have seen my physical gestures, so I didn’t have to squeak out the answers. “No … I’m … f-fine.” I grabbed a pillow and put it over my face to silence my grief, not only from Ronin, but from my parents and Franz too.

“Are you okay to drive home in the morning?”

“Yep.” Another clipped word made it out, each one clawing past the lump in my throat that had taken on a pulse of its own.

“Okay. Hug our babies and tell them I love them. I wish I was there right now to hug their mommy.”

God!

He wasn’t helping my situation.

“Hug your mom for me too.”

“K. Bye.” I ended the call, hoping he knew it was survival for me and nothing against him.

I held no illusion that my life was somehow exempt from loss and grief. Still … the pain cut deeply. There was no way to guard my heart no matter how hard I tried to see it through my mom’s eyes. We wanted the people we loved to live in our lives forever.

“Mommy …” Franz knocked on the door.

I opened it, hoping in the dim light he wouldn’t question my swollen eyes as I gazed into his innocent blue eyes. He was me. A crazy irony in our family. Franz had blond hair and blue eyes. I think it shocked everyone to see my genes expressed in him. Then Anya came along, the female version of Ronin with the darkest eyes and jet-black hair.

“I tired.” Franz rubbed his eyes.

“Oh … of course you are. It’s been a big day. Let’s wash you up. I think Grandma might have a spare pair of jammies here for you.”

I moved through the motions on autopilot, clinging to bedtime routine as a needed distraction. Franz nestled under the covers where the bed met the wall and wedged pillows filled the space between the two. I laid Anya in the middle of the bed and slid under the sheets beside her.

The door creaked open. “Night, baby.” Mom kissed my head.

I closed my eyes to ward off the tears. “Night, Mom,” I whispered. “I love you.”

“Love you too,” she whispered back, emotion thick in her voice.

I reached over and stroked Franz’s back. He sighed, drifting off to sleep. Then I did the same to Anya.

My world.

Somehow, maybe just the product of sheer emotional fatigue, I managed to close my eyes and find sleep. A reprieve from the day’s events.

I woke up feeling hot and disoriented. It wasn’t anything new. My kids had a gift of navigating toward my body in the middle of the night. But when I cracked open my eyes, they were both still on the other side of the bed, Anya crowding Franz. I was the one who had moved toward the middle of the bed. At that point, I realized the heat was at my back. A body was at my back, and familiar arms wrapped around me.

“Roe …” I whispered, turning toward his chest.

“Evie …” He kissed my forehead.

“You’re here.”

“I’m here.”

“For me …” I whispered over his lips, pressing my palms to his cheeks.

“For you.” He kissed me slowly.

I nestled my face into his neck, no longer caring how much heat our family of four emitted in that room. My Roe had come for me.

“This is our world.” I kissed his neck and ghosted my fingers along his bare back.

“It is.” He slid a leg between mine, probably to keep from falling out of bed.

“My mom is dying.” I would have cried had I not drained the tears earlier. I think by that point I was a little numb.

“Yes. I’m so sorry, Evie.” Ronin buried his nose in my hair.

“I can’t let it shatter our world.”

He inched his head side to side. “It won’t. I’ll hold it together. I’ll hold you together.”