Hannah's Gift (6 page)

“
MOMMY, WHY AM I NOT GOING TO HAVE A BIRTHDAY
after four?”

We had gone to the grocery store. Hannah’s question dropped into the car just as I turned into our driveway. Memories of her third birthday and our conversation about whether children ever die were as fresh in me as the scar from her surgery. She sounded perplexed but certain; as if she knew it was true, but didn’t quite understand why.

I pulled the car into the garage, shifted the gear into park, and turned off the ignition. I looked in the rearview mirror; Hannah was watching the back of my head. I took a deep breath and turned to face her.

“I’m not sure that’s true, Hannah,” I offered, hating the exaggerated cheerfulness in my voice. “After your fourth birthday, you’ll have your fifth birthday.”

She looked at me suspiciously. I suddenly felt self-conscious.

“Are you sure?” she asked.

“Well …” I hesitated. “The doctors are doing everything they can to help your body get better so you can have lot
s
more birthdays.”

She cocked her head and smiled at me sympathetically.

“Well, I’m not going to,” she said; not challenging me, simply telling me.

As I reached over to unbuckle her car seat, I knew she was already so far ahead of me, I could only pray to keep up. I couldn’t help wondering, too, what else she knew.

HANNAH AND I WERE SCRUNCHED INTO A CURTAINED
dressing room at the Y. I was trying not to hurry, but I also didn’t want to keep Claude and Will waiting any longer than necessary. She and I were both naked, having just peeled wet bathing suits off our bodies. Hannah was giggling because the towel I had wrapped around her head like a turban kept sliding over her eyes. She was sitting on a wooden bench against the wall. I was kneeling in a puddle on the floor in front of her. Next to her, on the bench, was a scattered collection of medical paraphernalia in sterile bubble packs.

As part of her treatment protocol, a Broviac catheter had been implanted in Hannah’s chest to give doctors a direct line into her bloodstream. Its tubes needed to be flushed several times a day and the site kept as clean and sterile as possible.

Dr. Kamalaker had designated me the sole person responsible for handling and maintaining the Broviac and its site; even nurses and residents were given instructions not to touch it. He explained that the risk of complications
was greatly reduced if the Broviac was handled exclusively by one person; his decision had also validated me as a respected member of the medical team. That wasn’t the only unusual step he had been willing to take; the fact that Hannah and I were dripping wet and giggling in the dressing room of the Y was a testament to his humanity and imagination.

There was almost nothing Hannah loved more than swimming. She would stand at the edge of the pool, bend her knees, swing her arms back and forth, count “one, two, three, GO!” and leap into Claude’s waiting arms. The bigger the splash the better. She’d bob to the surface with the help of the bright orange bubble strapped to her back, paddle to the side, squirm over the edge, and do it again. We would tire of the game long before she did. “Just one more time, Daddy,” she’d plead.

That’s what we had told Dr. Kamalaker when we insisted that Hannah had to be able to swim. Dr. Kamalaker had considerable doubts; without question, the public pool was a breeding ground for germs. I had explained to him that I didn’t want to expose Hannah to unnecessary risks, but I wasn’t willing to postpone her joy, either. It seemed a greater risk to think she might never swim again than it did to think she might get an infection from it.

Dr. Kamalaker listened quietly and then stared out the window. Finally he stood up, opened the door to the supply cabinet, and rummaged around. Thirty seconds later he emerged with a satisfied grin and a box of waterproof patches.

“You can use these,” he said. “Also, clean and flush her caps, tube, and site before and after she swims. We’ll try it a few times, and if she manages to do it without getting an infection, you can continue indefinitely with my blessing.”

Now I pulled the disposable rubber gloves over my hands with a loud snap. Hannah grabbed another one and handed it to me.

“Make me a bunny, Mom,” she begged.

“Okay, just one,” I agreed. I scrunched the wrist of the glove between my thumb and forefinger, held it to my mouth, and blew. The powdery latex tasted bitter on my lips. The glove’s fingers and thumb swelled up, and then the rest of it did, too. Now came the part that separated the experts from the novices: I clamped my thumb and finger together to keep the air from escaping and wrestled a knot into the remaining latex. Hannah squealed and kissed me.

“Thanks, Mom!”

“You’re welcome, Missy.” I smiled. “Now, let’s get this Broviac flushed.”

While I filled two syringes, one with heparin, one with saline, Hannah tore open four packages of alcohol wipes and set them carefully on the bench. Then she lifted the tubes of the Broviac, keeping her hands clear of the ends. I rubbed the end caps with alcohol and reached for the first syringe. Raising it above my head in order to see it in a brighter light, I flicked the syringe with my finger to force any air bubbles into the tip. Then, just as I depressed the plunger to expel the excess air, the curtain slid open.

A woman in a blue-flowered bathing suit held the edge
of the curtain in her hand. Her eyes widened and moved slowly, from the sight of the gauze pads and vials on the bench, to Hannah and her Broviac, to my rubber gloves and the syringe in my hand. Without a word, she slid the curtain shut. We saw her daisy-trimmed flip-flops take a step back and pause. Then they turned and slapped across the floor, until they reached the door. I heard it open and shut. I turned to Hannah.

She was grinning mischievously.

“Mommy,” Hannah said, “that lady was really surprised! Do you think it’s because she never saw naked people before?”

I WROTE ONE LINE IN MY JOURNAL.

“A dark day.”

The tumor was back. The doctors had seen it on a routine X-ray. Despite eight weeks of chemotherapy, microscopic cells from the original mass had migrated and multiplied into a dark spot on Hannah’s lower left lung. The scar from her surgery had barely healed.

Claude and I were faced with an agonizing decision. If we did nothing, Hannah might be dead before Christmas. We weren’t ready. Using Dr. Markoff’s rule, we scheduled a second surgery to remove the tumor, and made plans for Hannah to undergo an autologous bone marrow transplant. Although there were other experimental therapies available, most of them would almost certainly require Hannah to spend whatever time she had left in a hospital. We weren’t willing to subject her to that. We decided that the transplant offered a balance between risk and hope that we could live with. We also decided that if Hannah relapsed again, we’d have to let her go.

The release forms Claude and I had to sign stated the paradox perfectly: The treatment she was about to undergo could not be expected to cure her, and it might kill her. Even if by some miracle she were to live into adolescence, she’d be unable to enter puberty without medical intervention, and she would never bear children.

One doctor we consulted had summed it up in a sentence: “If I were you, I’d pray she stays healthy long enough for these things to be a problem.”

The day before her surgery, as Hannah and I walked to the park, I wasn’t thinking about any of this. It was a sweater-weather kind of day: warm afternoon sun, crisp autumn breeze, and a golden maple underfoot crunch. I felt the warmth of her fingers wrapped around mine and heard the lilt and pitch of her voice as she made plans to wear a princess costume to the hospital. The purple pompom on her woolen cap bobbed up and down as she walked.

I inhaled the moment, savoring everything in it. There was nothing to do, or say, or wish for. I was lucky to be alive, and luckier still that Hannah was. I held my breath as long as I could, hoping that some feather of joy from this moment might lodge in my lungs today so it could drift lightly and unexpectedly into one of the dark moments I knew was ahead.

A WEEK AFTER HANNAH’S SECOND SURGERY, WE RETURNED
home. Hannah performed two somersaults in the middle of the living room floor to celebrate. Too surprised to stop her, I had closed my eyes and winced.

Now, three days later, even
I
felt a million miles away from doctors, treatments, and cancer. Claude and I were splayed like rag dolls on upholstered chairs, grateful for the air-conditioning. Our luggage was a tumbled pile of leather and nylon on one of the double beds. Will and Hannah had wriggled their bodies through a split in the curtains and pressed their noses against the fourteenth-floor window.

“Look, Will,” Hannah screamed. “I can see Cinderella’s castle! I hope she’s home!”

“Of course she’s not home, Hannah; she’s not real,” Will explained, somewhat impatiently.

“She is too, Will. You’ll see.” Hannah sniffed.

“Come on, Mom and Dad,” Will said. “We can’t wait.”

Claude and I looked at each other and laughed. The
alarm clock had buzzed us awake at four-thirty
A.M.
in New Jersey. A stretch limousine had picked us up half an hour later and deposited us at the airline terminal before six. Will and Hannah had slept through the flight to Orlando. A friendly couple had met us at the gate, walked us to our rental car, and pinned a badge on Hannah that identified her as a Make-A-Wish kid. We had checked into our hotel before noon.

Hannah’s relapse had officially qualified her for an all-expenses-paid trip to Walt Disney World. The vacation was a welcome and generous respite, but any relief we felt was temporary: Hannah’s bone marrow aspiration had already been scheduled for the following week.

Claude and I hauled our bodies into standing position.

“Yippee!” Will and Hannah cried.

We rode the monorail to the Magic Kingdom. Cinderella’s castle was our first stop. As we crossed the moat, walked beneath the turreted entrance, and stepped into the shade of the tiled mosaic reception hall, I felt drawn into the magic of happily-ever-after. My mind knew it wasn’t real, but my heart was grateful. I could hear the hum of excited voices and clatter of pewter dishes spilling out of the doors of the banquet hall at the other end. Most of the people around us headed there, including Claude, who wanted to see if we could get a table without reservations. Will and Hannah hung back, staring transfixed at the suits of armor and crests lining the walls. Suddenly, Hannah froze. A slight figure in a long blue gown with a twist of
golden hair looped behind a jeweled tiara had stepped quietly out of an alcove in front of her. Will’s jaw dropped.

“Cinderella,” he whispered.

Cinderella kneeled in front of Hannah.

“Hello, I’m Cinderella,” she said softly. “What’s your name?”

Hannah hadn’t moved. Her eyes traveled from the crown on Cinderella’s head, over her smiling face, down her billowing skirt to the clear glasslike slipper just visible beneath the hem.

“My name’s Hannah,” she said finally. “And that’s my brother, Will,” she added, pointing to him. She paused, leaned toward Cinderella, and in a loud whisper said, “He didn’t know you were real, but
I
did.”

Will squirmed and rolled his eyes. Cinderella gave him a wink.

“That’s okay, Will,” Cinderella said. He smiled bashfully, clearly relieved.

Cinderella turned her attention back to Hannah.

“How are you, Hannah?” she asked.

“I just had surgery,” Hannah said quietly. “Do you want to see my scar?”

I suspected Cinderella had already noticed Hannah’s Make-A-Wish button.

“Okay,” she said softly.

Hannah slowly raised her dress. Cinderella looked at Hannah’s belly and then, without a word, opened her arms. Hannah threw herself into Cinderella’s embrace. As she
held Hannah, the young woman looked at me over Hannah’s shoulder, her eyes full of tears.

“Thank you for sharing that with me, Hannah,” she whispered.

Hannah loosened her grip and gave her a kiss.

“You’re welcome,” Hannah said.

Cinderella stood up, dabbed a finger under her mascaraed lashes, and straightened her skirt. Will stepped forward and extended his hand.

“It’s nice to meet you, Cinderella,” he said.

“It’s nice to meet
you
, Will,” Cinderella said, shaking his hand.

Hannah skipped breathlessly around the two of them.

“You see, Will,” she cried, “I
told
you she was real.”

“Yep, Hannah,” he said, winking at Cinderella, “you were right.”

As the three of us headed toward the banquet hall, I was grinning from ear to ear. It didn’t matter that Cinderella was a girl from Iowa in a beautiful costume. The joy we had experienced in the meeting was real, and that was magic enough for me.

WE HAD TAKEN A BREAK FROM THE AFTERNOON SUN AND
the crush of sunburned tourists. Will and Hannah sat cross-legged on the floor, watching Disney cartoons. Claude’s eyes were already closed. Stretched out next to him, exhausted but content, I ran my hand over my belly. There was new life in me. The day before we left for Florida, I had seen the white pad on the pregnancy test stick split in two by a thin line that deepened from robin’s-egg to deep-sea blue. Claude and I had embraced and cried. It felt good and different from any of my previous pregnancies. There was no wild elation; only a quiet contentment and surrender. This pregnancy, I knew, was up to God; it wasn’t up to me.

We had decided not to tell anyone, not even the kids. If I was still pregnant at Christmas, having passed the critical eight-week mark, we would share the news then.

I closed my eyes and was almost asleep when I felt a small hand shaking my shoulder.

“Mommy,” Hannah whispered loudly in my ear, “are you awake?”

I lifted my heavy eyelids and blinked a few times.

“Yes, Missy. What is it?”

“Mommy, I want to tell you something about the baby who died,” she answered.

“Which baby?” I asked, sliding over and motioning for her to join me on the bed.

Hannah snuggled close, nestling her head under my chin.

“You know, the baby that was in your tummy; the one who wasn’t strong enough to be born,” she said. I nodded.

“Well,” she said excitedly, placing one hand on my stomach and looking into my eyes. “you don’t have to feel sad about it, because God’s already making us a
new
baby.”

I opened and closed my mouth; I didn’t know what to say. Either she was guessing, in which case I would have to lie to keep from spilling the beans, or she knew, in which case I wouldn’t know what to say anyway.

I decided, as she sat there grinning at me, that I would have to let it go; it was simply one more thing that I would never know.