Notes from the Dog (11 page)

“This is nice,” Dad said. “You know, I didn’t realize I was always at the library and never home. I like not rushing from work to class or study groups all the time. Sitting out here in the evenings with you is”—he draped an arm across my shoulders and looked around—“the best part of my day.”

The night before the triathlon Johanna had a party.

When I saw all the food in the kitchen, I wondered if her family made hot dishes and dips on some sort of assembly line and then froze them in a huge walk-in freezer. They always seemed to have party food ready to go.

The house was loud and hot and crowded. I couldn’t hear anything Matthew said because the music was so loud it was making my back teeth jiggle.

“Matthew, isn’t this the best party you’ve ever been to?” I hollered in his ear.

“Finn, this is only the second party you’ve
ever
been to.”

“And just think: all I wanted to do this summer was avoid people, and yet here I am.”

“Yeah, talking to people just like you were normal or something.”

I hadn’t seen her come in, but all of a sudden Karla was next to me. She slipped her hand into mine. For a few seconds that thing where I couldn’t think or breathe happened again. Only, in a good way, a really good way.

She’d brought some friends from school and I saw Matthew make this really smooth move where he cut Kari away from the pack and got her alone to talk to.

The music stopped abruptly and Johanna waved for everyone’s attention. Someone had printed up dozens of pink
TEAM JOHANNA—SWIM/BIKE/RUN FIND A CURE
T-shirts so Johanna’s cheering section would all match. Everyone pulled theirs on and it was like a bubble-gum factory had exploded in Johanna’s house.

“Hey,” Johanna called as we were all tugging shirts over our heads, “I want to thank everyone for, well, for …” I’d never seen Johanna run out of words. The room got quiet and Johanna’s mom was suddenly real interested in straightening the food table and other people needed to get another glass of wine or piece of cheese.

“Does anyone have an ax?”

I dropped a huge hunk of Auntie Bean’s cake. Dylan caught it on the way down, swallowed and looked for more.

“Or a chain saw? A chain saw might be better.” Some big guy was speaking.

“Chuckie,” Johanna said, “what do you need an ax and a chain saw for?”

“Those bushes?” He pointed out her side window to the lilac bushes that separate our yards. “Did you know there’s a garden on the other side? I could trim the bushes and then I bet you could see those roses from your bedroom window.”

“They’re not my bushes and we have to leave them where they are.”

“They’re
my
bushes,” I said, finding my voice. “If Chuckie hacks away at them from
our
side, then, really, that will be okay.”

I would have said anything at that point. Someone wanted to look at my garden. Someone thought
my garden
was worth hacking down a bunch of lilacs to see. I’d have let him burn down my house.

“I have an ax in the garage,” Dad said.

“Lead the way.” Chuckie was rubbing his hands together as he followed Dad outside. A few minutes later Chuckie had cut about four feet of lilac bush down to nubbins.

And Johanna could see the rosebushes from her bedroom.

Later, I was taking about the twenty-eighth bag of garbage to the curb when Johanna motioned to me. She and Matthew were standing in the space where the lilac bushes had been, and I had to admit: Chuckie had done a really nice job.

She held two wrapped packages in her hands.

“I wanted to get you something to thank you for being such a help with the fund-raising this summer.”

We ripped the paper off and saw that she had gotten us each a notebook exactly like the one she’d asked us to sign on the day we met.

“I know you don’t keep journals, but I hope you at least take time every day to write down the best thing that happened to you.”

She pulled us into a tight hug and I knew that even though it would probably be the only word we did write, Matthew and I would definitely put her name in our books.

That was probably one of the greatest days of my life.

That night, however, was probably the worst night of my life.

Everyone had left by midnight, wanting to be at the race start by seven the next morning. Matthew and I were too amped on sugar to sleep so we stayed to clean up.

We were washing the dishes when we heard Dylan yip from the hallway.

We found him pacing outside the bathroom. When he saw us, he put his shoulder against the closed door and tried to shove it open. We could hear Johanna being sick.

Matthew rapped on the door. “Hey—how ya doin’ in there?” She didn’t answer. We stood looking at each other. Dylan whined.

Finally, Johanna opened the door. She looked gray. Her hands were shaking.

“I trained so hard,” she said. “I pushed to get ready for the race tomorrow, but … Don’t … don’t call my mother; I don’t want to make a fuss. I had chemo a few days ago, I knew the timing was wrong, but I hoped … Can you … would you stay awhile?”

Matthew and I led her to her room and helped her get into bed. Dylan curled up next to her.

None of us said anything. There wasn’t anything to say.

We tucked her in and she fell asleep. But she tossed and turned and called out.

I was watching her and I said to Matthew, “Even though we probably should, I’m not going to call her mother. Or my father.”

“We can handle it.” Matthew’s voice was thick.

I glanced over at him and was shocked to see tears in his eyes.

And then it hit me.

Hit me for the very first time. Hit me like the grenade that cancer is.

Oh, my god, I thought, Johanna is sick.

Really sick.

Until that very minute, her cancer had never felt … real. Had never been threatening.

We’d never talked about it. Not really. All those hours together working in the garden and making the
stepping stones and hanging out here in her house, she’d never once complained. She’d never acted scared or angry.

And so it had never occurred to me that Johanna wouldn’t get better.

I’d honestly believed that it was only a matter of time until the chemo worked and she didn’t need the wig she always wore and she gained some weight. Lots of people beat cancer. It happens all the time.

It had never once crossed my mind that she might not see the garden, our garden, her garden, when it was finished.

But Matthew had known. That was why he’d dropped the plate, why he’d thrown the binder at me when I started to tease Johanna about her wish on the lucky penny.

I was freezing cold to my bones and yet numb all over. My mouth tasted like copper—the taste of fear. I felt like I might throw up, too, and my eyes stung so bad I could hardly see.

How could I have been so surprised and why hadn’t Matthew told me? Because, I could see, looking at his face across her bed, this information was new only to me.

“You okay?” he asked.

“No. Are you?”

“Not even a little bit.”

I was all of a sudden so tired that when I looked at
the bed, there were two Johannas and only half a Dylan.

I thought morning would never come.

Finally, around five, Matthew yawned and mumbled, “We need coffee. Go make coffee.”

“I didn’t know you drank coffee.”

“No time like the present to start. My mother comes downstairs every morning saying something about feeling like the walking dead. She has a couple cups and she starts to act like herself again.”

I puttered around in the kitchen, throwing in a couple extra scoops. We’d need the extra buzz. When the coffee was done, I put the pot, two mugs and spoons, milk and sugar on a tray.

In Johanna’s room, Matthew and I poured enough milk into our cups to make the coffee a light brown and dumped in sugar. I tasted it.

“This is awful.”

“Don’t talk. Just drink. My mother doesn’t start to make sense until midway through her third cup.”

“Three might kill me.”

“I’ll
kill you if you don’t let me drink my coffee in peace.”

“Are you always so crabby in the morning, Matthew?” Johanna’s voice surprised us.

We looked over at her.

“Were you guys here all night?”

It’s still night, I thought. “No big deal,” I said.

“How do you feel?” Matthew asked.

“How do I look?”

Like roadkill, I thought. “Like you could use a little more rest,” I said.

“I’m not the only one.”

We stared out the window and watched the sky turn from black to purple and then to orange and pink.

Even though he’d had two cups of coffee, Matthew fell asleep just as the sun came up. That was when we found out that he could sleep sitting up and, I swear, with his eyes open.

I felt jittery and buzzy and wide awake. I looked over and saw that Johanna was watching me.

“I don’t know how to thank you,” she whispered.

“You don’t have to.” I moved closer so our conversation wouldn’t wake Matthew.

“Weird way to spend your summer vacation.”

I thought for a minute. “In a way, it’s the least weird thing I’ve ever done.” She bit her lip, listening to me. “I know that’s a funny thing to say, but it … it was really … nice … to … to be …”

“Needed.”

“Yeah. You know what I mean, then?”

“Yeah, Finn, I know what you mean.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“But, Johanna?”

“Yeah?”

“I am a terrible, awful, horrible gardener.”

She smiled.

“Johanna?”

“Yeah?”

“Matthew and I will compete in your place in the triathlon today; we want to be your proxies instead of the friends you set up. Matthew will swim and run. I’ll bike. Slowly.”

She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against her pillow. “Finn, I’ve been waiting for someone like you my whole life.”

As soon as Johanna’s folks arrived, we told them about her rough night. They tried to talk her out of even going to the race, but Johanna said, “I wouldn’t miss this for anything. I’ll even sit in the damn wheelchair, but I am going.”

Pat and Dick exchanged a look over her head and agreed.

Matthew and I were halfway out the door on the way to register when she called, “Hey!”

We turned.

“I wanted to wait to tell you on the day of the race: Team Johanna raised eleven thousand, one hundred and sixty dollars and thirty-eight cents.”

It was the sun in my face that made my eyes water.

While Matthew grabbed his running shoes and swim trunks, I dashed over to my house to tell Dad that
Matthew and I were filling in for Johanna. We jumped on our bikes and zipped over to Centennial Beach.

The crowd was huge—thousands. I’d had no idea so many people would show up. Nearly everyone in the park had pink ribbons pinned to their shirts or painted on their cheeks. I was glad we were wearing our Team Johanna shirts.

We checked in and were inked on our thighs and upper arms and calves with Johanna’s entry number. As a volunteer pinned the numbered bibs to our backs, she said, “You’ve got white bibs; the pink bibs signify a survivor. You know this is a super-sprint triathlon, right? The swim portion is a quarter-mile, the biking is six point two miles, and the last leg, running, is one and a half miles.”