Storm in a B Cup - A Breast Cancer Tale (31 page)

*****

Two-hours
later, the event is over. Lani and I are sitting in the middle of the shop
floor with our shoes off, giving each other a foot massage. The room is silent
apart from our occasional groans of agonised pleasure. Around us, the shop is
strewn with empty champagne glasses, soiled napkins and not one item of stock
is in the place it was when we started.

Lani taps my
ankle, signalling it’s time to stop and I let out a small whimper of sadness.

“Well, I think
that went extremely well,” she says, kicking her shoes towards the base of the
counter and standing. She begins to collect the empty glasses and stack them in
the catering box. “We’ve signed about twenty girls up for immediate rentals and
the waiting list for each bag is huge.”

I pull myself
to my feet and stretch my arms over my head. Making so many sales and taking
addresses of potential customers for our email list has been an exhausting
process but one that was worth it. Lani and I have set ourselves up. We need to
continue the momentum. I turn and head for the window, where a line of glasses
has been left along the sill. “I think we were a staggering success.”

“Agreed.”

“So let’s get
this mess cleaned up and get home. I’m knackered.”

“Me too.
Knackered but happy.”

We buzz around,
finishing the cleaning and putting the stock back in its rightful spot. Lani
turns off the computer while I gather the lists we’ve made tonight and put them
out the back to be entered into the data base. When I return, the massive
bouquet, is standing proudly on the counter, like it’s watching over us,
congratulating us for a job well done. I still feel slightly freaked out by it.

“What should I
do about these flowers, Lan?” I say.

“What do you
mean?”

“Is it
appropriate to ring and say thank you?”

“Of course, it
is.”

“But I don’t
have his phone number. If I ring Angela and get it, he might think I’m stalking
him.”

“Oh for Pete’s
sake! No he won’t.”

“But isn’t it
weird to have my plastic surgeon on speed dial?”

“Only if you
ring his number and then hang up after he says hello. That would be weird.
Anyway, he started this. He sent the flowers.”

I bite my lip.
“I guess so.”

“Go on, do it.
Do it. Do it,” Lani chants.

I duck into the
kitchen and get my phone from my handbag. This is so strange, I feel like a
teenager ringing a boy for the first time. I send Angela a text asking for
Jared’s number. I can’t bring myself to call her face to face, not when I know
the teasing I’ll get, especially when it was her intention to set us up from
the start. I can see her, sitting on her sofa with a glass of wine, crowing that
her scheme worked. She’ll never stop gloating.

Now, I’m
standing with the phone in my hand. I’m staring at the text Angela has sent,
the one with Jared’s number. Can I do it? This is taking the relationship from
acquaintances to friends, isn’t it? Are we allowed to be friends? Does he even
want to?

“Hello?”

As soon as I
hear the familiar voice, I want to hang up. My heart is in my throat and it’s
beating so hard, it’s blocking my circulation. I can’t hang up, though. He’s
seen my number. It’s not blocked. He can easily ring me back.

“Uh, hi.
Jared?”

“Yes?” His tone
is more a question than an answer.

“It’s Sophie.
Sophie Molloy. I hope you don’t mind, I asked Angela for your number.” Suddenly,
I feel extremely anxious, like I should not be doing this. “I’m not being
stalker-ish,” I rush on. “I wanted to ring and say thank you for the flowers.
They’re beautiful.”

There’s a quiet
buzzing from the other end of the connection and I think, yep, I’ve done it
this time. I’ve overstepped the boundary, whatever the hell our boundary is.

“That’s great,
Sophie,” Jared replies. His voice is easy and genuine. “It’s not the least bit
stalker-ish. Doing drive-bys of my house or sending me mix CD’s in the mail
might be cause for alarm. So if you were thinking of going down that route, I’d
probably stop now.”

“Damn,” I
laugh, amazed at how he’s able to make me feel so comfortable, even over the
phone. “You’ve totally ruined the surprise.”

“I’d hope, by now,
we’d consider ourselves friends. We are ‘dating’.” He releases an amused
chuckle at the memory.

“Yeah. I guess
so. Anyway, thanks again for the flowers. I’ll see you soon.”

“More than
likely.”

I hang up the
phone and once again I begin to ponder, or could it be over-analyse, what the
last comment meant.

Chapter 32

All hands on
deck. It’s moving day. If you’d told me a year ago that I’d have lost my
breast, my boyfriend and my house within the space of a year, I’d have probably
laughed but as I stand here, in the midst of the jumble of boxes and unpacked
cutlery, I see that this is what my life has come to. Endings.

There’s no getting
away from it. At the beginning of this year, I had a long-term partner and a
relationship future. I’m loathe to blame the cancer for Brendan’s departure,
and I absolutely don’t want him back, but the fact I have only one breast has
to have had some impact on his decision to mess around with my former friend.
From the day I came home from hospital that first time, he was different. And
even though he put on the façade of being the concerned boyfriend, it’s clear
his concern couldn’t overcome his need for things to be flawless. Who knows,
maybe the thing with Melinda would have happened anyway but that doesn’t stop
me feeling a little resentment towards the cancer. And a bit of thankfulness
too. If I hadn’t had it, I might still be with Brendan. I might have still been
accepting his faults and putting up with his anal approach to perfection.

I take the last
of the knives and forks, securing them with a rubber band before stowing them
in the box. Two months ago, I was close to using them as stabbing implements
and not on a roast. I’m proud of how far I’ve travelled in that respect. I’m
satisfied that I can look at them again and only see a tool for eating. I write
‘Kitchen’ on the lid and run some packing tape along the flaps. I remember the
day we moved in, the day I unpacked those forks and chose which slot of the
drawer would be their home. I remember Brendan and his pantry-organising and I
smile a little to myself at the way I teased him, suggesting that maybe we
should put each item in height order as well. Even though it annoyed me, his
obsession was kind of useful. At least I knew where to find stuff.

Jeff comes in
with the trolley. Seeing my melancholy mood, he offers to take me for a quick
spin around the family room but I decline, citing his poor driving skills and
my need to remain in one piece as an excuse. So he stacks the boxes I’ve now
finished packing and wheels them along the corridor, leaving me alone in the
empty kitchen.

“It’s not too
late.” He chuckles as he reaches the front door. “One last lap up and down the
street to give the neighbours something to talk about after you’re gone.”

“I think they
have plenty enough to talk about already.” The neighbour across the road has
been seen on numerous occasions dressed in his wife’s lingerie while she’s out.
Not to mention that couple down the street, who have those strange parties
where people put car keys in a bowl. This is a respectable suburb but you never
know what goes on behind closed doors.

I shoo Jeff out
with a tutt about his juvenile behaviour. He knows I don’t mean it, though. He
knows I’m supremely grateful for the team of willing men he’s assembled to help
me move house today. After the costs have been paid and the lawyer’s hefty bill
settled, I’ve barely enough for Rory and I to live on, let alone pay for a
removalist. Every spare cent is going towards the next round of surgery. Thank heavens,
this lot’s working for the price of a cold beer and a burger at the end of the
day.

With a sigh, I
head to Rory’s empty bedroom, where I check his wardrobe for anything left
behind. I pull the curtains and pause for a moment in the middle of the room,
looking at the glow-in-the-dark frieze I spent hours sticking to the ceiling
above his bed, so it would look like a night sky. I remember making Rory’s bed
for the first time in this house, and then putting him to sleep in it. He
wasn’t quite three. His curls had framed his little cherub face as it lay
against the pillow and I’d taken a photo of him, one that still remains a
favourite today. We’ll have to create new memories now, in our new house. I
walk to his door and close it for the last time.

Now, I’m back
in the family room, and it’s empty. It feels cavernous, like the soul has been
taken away but I can picture Brendan, sitting on the sofa, with Rory cuddled on
his lap. I can see us clinking a glass of champagne the night we arrived. I can
even feel his lips, kissing my forehead and telling me he loved me. In his own
way, I know he did. How things change.

And now, for
some reason my mind has moved to babies. Coming from a family of one, I always
wanted a gaggle of children running through the house. As I move to secure the
locks, I look out the window, staring at the backyard Brendan and I created for
that very purpose. This cancer has changed me so drastically inside, I probably
won’t be able to have more children.
 
Not for the next five years until I finish taking Tamoxifen, anyway. And
by then, I’ll be almost too old. The gap between Rory and new siblings would be
too wide.

I’m starting to
get hormonal and teary. I can feel the emotions getting bigger and bigger and
there’s nothing I can do to control it. I hate this medication. I hate what
it’s doing to my body and how it’s messing with my head. Okay, I don’t hate
that it’s keeping the cancer away, but sometimes the positive doesn’t outweigh
the negative.

Putting the
heels of my hands to my eyes, I attempt to press away the tears. This isn’t
fair. I feel so lost, so alone, even with my friends and family supporting me,
I am so utterly alone because not one of them can truly understand the way I
feel. I wonder what I did to deserve this and as I do, I cry silently. I’m
shuddering with the force of keeping my tears in check. I’m feeling the grief
of everything that’s happened, the grief I’ve not let out until now. The
emotional rollercoaster after the failed reconstruction was bad, but this? This
is like I’m dying, like my body is heaving its last breath.

“Sophie?”

I take my hands
away from my eyes to find Jared standing in the doorway, looking at me with
concern. The sun is shining behind his body in a sort of halo effect, which is
so appropriate for the heavenly entity he is. It’s so nice he came to help
today. He certainly didn’t need to. But as he’s already explained three times,
as my ‘boyfriend’ it’s probably expected that he help me move house. So who am
I to argue? He can bend over and show off his bum or flex his muscles by
lifting boxes the entire day, for all I care. It’s no hardship to my eyesight.
And as a new friend, he wants to help. That’s something I can respect. I may
have lost some old friends in the cancer process but I’ve gained a very
valuable new one and I’ve learnt to love my remaining ones even more.

“Everything
okay?” he asks.

“A few goodbye
tears,” I say, wiping my hands over my eyes.

He walks into
the room, stopping about half a metre from me. His t-shirt is clinging to his
torso from the sweat he’s built up and his hair is dusty where he crawled under
the house to make sure nothing had been left in Rory’s hidey-hole. I try not to
stare but it’s difficult. I mean, I can see every muscle in his stomach through
that shirt and clearly, squash is not the only type of exercise he does.

“Anything I can
do?”

I look up into
those friendly green eyes and give a sniff. “Say something funny?”

Jared moves
closer. He’s invading my personal space, but I don’t care. The tangy male scent
of him is making my insides flutter. My mind has gone utterly blank. Shit. This
isn’t good.

Think of bad
things, Sophie. Think of those TV shows with blood and gore that make you
cringe.

“Now you’ve put
me on the spot,” Jared jokes. “You think I can be funny on demand? I’m a doctor.
Funny isn’t in my job description.”

And that’s enough
to send me over the edge. I collapse against his chest. I sob into his t-shirt
and, as I do, feel his arms move to cradle me. I want him to pull back but I
don’t. I want to be friends but I don’t. I have no idea what I want any more.
My brain has been rendered so incontinent from the Tamoxifen and the smell of
his body; I don’t even know why I’m crying.

“I know I need
a shower.” His voice is so soft and soothing. “But I don’t think washing me
with tears is going to get rid of the perspiration smell.”

I smile wetly
against his chest and begin to relax. With his strong, muscular arms about me,
I begin to calm down.

“Tell me a
joke,” I say. Anything to take my mind off the images that are being conjured
in my dirty little brain.