Wish Upon a Star (25 page)

"I'm happy for you Annie. I really am. I..."

"What? Out with it."

"I couldn't help but think about how excited you are at me
noticing the growth on your head, that maybe I should do some
additional searching..." I raised my eyebrows.

She stared at me for a moment before her mouth fell open.
"Oh. My. Lord. You are incorrigible, E.J. McCarty." She refilled her
glass, winked, and handed the bottle to me. "Maybe after we finish
the bottle, I'll take you up on that offer."

* * * *

Annie took the weekend to laze around the condo. She was
in high spirits, but admitted the road trip had taken a lot out of
her.

By Monday, she was rested and raring to get the radiation
treatments started. "The sooner I start, the sooner I finish." She'd
tried to talk me out of coming with her, but I'd insisted.

"I want to be there for the first one. After today, you're on
your own. I promise. I know you don't need me, but I just feel like I
should be there today."

While my eyes were on the road, I sensed Annie was
appraising me. After a minute or two, she patted my leg.

"You're sweet. But today's it."

We were finishing up some paperwork when Annie was
called. I followed her into Doctor Francis' office. A framed Hilly
Hundred Bike Tour print on the wall caught my attention. A two day
cycling festival held every October in the hills of Bloomington,
Indiana, The Hilly was one of my favorite events. I'd ridden it at least
a dozen times.

Doctor Francis noticed me admiring the print. "Do you like
to ride, Mr. McCarty?"

Annie jumped in before I could answer. "More than that,
Doctor. He used to be a road racer and spent several years as a
mechanic for a professional team."

Doctor Francis smiled. "Well, then, I guess the answer is
yes." She turned her attention to Annie. "With the mapping and mold
complete, we should be ready to go. Your markings are still clear, I
trust?"

The doctor's question seemed to bring the room's
temperature down a good ten degrees. Annie had already gone
through a session where they'd mapped the area to be irradiated. At
the same time, they'd created a mold she would be fitted into to
ensure the radiation was as focused as possible. The mapping had
involved literally placing marks on Annie's chest where the radiation
should go.

Doctor Francis had recommended that the markings be
made permanent through a tattoo process, but Annie had refused.
Since the treatments would only last for a month or so, Annie had
once again exerted her alpha female instincts and informed the
doctor they could mark her with a Sharpie, but not with tattoos.

"I'll have enough permanent reminders of having breast
cancer. I don't need a bunch of permanent dots on my chest to add to
the list," she'd told me after the session. I couldn't argue with her
logic.

Now face-to-face with Doctor Francis again, Annie nodded
and smiled. "They are, thank you."

"Let's get to it then. Shall we?" The doctor directed me to the
waiting room and Annie to a room where she could get
changed.

I was daydreaming about our honeymoon, a Caribbean
cruise, when Annie joined me in the waiting area.

"One down, thirty or so to go," she said. "Let's get some
lunch. I'm buying."

On the way to the restaurant, I cleared my throat. "So,
ah...thanks for what you said to Doctor Francis in there, you know,
about when she asked if I ride. That meant a lot."

Annie's cheeks bloomed a shade of magenta. "I'm proud of
you and I don't brag about you nearly as often as I should, so when
the opportunity presented itself, I took it. The pleasure was
mine."

The fact that Annie wanted to brag about me, when she was
a world-wide entertainment star, left me at a loss for words. That she
loved me, I had no doubt. But it still put an extra spring in my step to
hear her talk about me that way.

Over lunch, Annie described the radiation therapy process.
The room where she was treated had a table in the middle. Annie's
mold was positioned on top of the table. She lay on top of the dense
foam mold face up, with her arms above her head.

The radiation apparatus looked similar to one in a dentist's
office. A major difference was this one was manipulated remotely by
a technician who used a devise that resembled a video game joy
stick. The table was raised and lowered to allow the radiation
apparatus to rotate around the table and hit Annie with radiation
from all sorts of angles.

"So you're radioactive, then," I said, and leaned away from
her.

"Hardly. The actual treatment didn't last very long at all. It
seemed like I spent more time getting undressed and then dressed
again than I actually spent getting radiated." She chuckled. "Let's
hope the rest of the treatments are as painless as today's was."

Once Annie's radiation treatments began, we shifted into a
double countdown mode. Each day that passed was one day closer to
finishing her treatment. It was also one day closer to the big W, our
wedding day.

I split my days between Cassandra Lawrence Enterprises
and the Co-op. The Indy Chapter of Wheels for Women was growing
at a steady pace. While it was a fantastic development, it also meant
Gloria was spending more time on WfW and less time on Co-op
duties.

That's where I came in. After devoting my mornings to
Cassandra business, I spent my afternoons at the Co-op. It wasn't
anything complicated. I just made sure the routine management
tasks like bike maintenance classes and used parts sales were still
being handled appropriately. The last thing Gloria wanted was to see
her long-standing programs waste away on account of Wheels for
Women efforts. Since she was filling a very special role for us on our
wedding day, it was the least I could do.

It also gave Annie the afternoons to herself so she could
conduct business uninterrupted. Being the night owl she was, she'd
scheduled her radiation appointments for eleven. I'd get her up
about ten and was almost always gone by the time she returned.
From what she told me during our evenings together, much of her
time was spent on record and DVD promotional efforts.

As we closed in on Labor Day and the releases of the record
and DVD, Annie got a little more moody and short-tempered. I
figured she was suffering from Cassandra-induced stress with a
smattering of wedding-induced anxiety to top it off.

I was wrong.

The Friday before Labor Day, Miranda called to invite us to a
cookout the following day. When I asked Annie about it, she
grimaced and put her hand over her chest. Alarm bells went off in my
head.
Oh my God, she's having a heart attack
.

"What's wrong?" I picked up my phone, ready to dial
911.

She closed her eyes and shook her head at an almost lazy
pace. "Nothing's wrong. Well, nothing that needs a phone call. It's
just... My chest hurts. After two weeks of radiation, I've gotten
awfully uncomfortable."

"Can I do anything?"

"No. I just need to use the lotion Doctor Francis
recommended. I keep forgetting."

"Where is it?"

She waved her hand toward the bedroom. "It's on the
second shelf in the medicine chest. If you'd get it for me, that would
be helpful."

"I'll do one better." I dashed to the bathroom and was back
before you could say Tour of California. "Lay down on the couch and
close your eyes." When Annie reached for the tube of lotion, I pulled
it away. "No. I'll do it."

Other than the night after she'd returned from her
cross-country trip, she'd been reluctant to let me see her without a shirt
on. Maybe I was reading too much into something that wasn't there,
but I sensed she continued to feel very vulnerable about how she
looked. Her hair, which had once been long and luxurious, was now
barely there. And her breasts were simply gone, replaced with a
couple of tiny bumps where the expanders had been placed, and two
angry-looking scars that crossed her chest practically from armpit to
armpit.

I didn't care. She was my Annie, my North Star. She would
always be the most beautiful woman in the world, scars and burns be
damned.

She stared at me. Normally her gaze was so intense it felt
like she was looking into the pit of my soul. Not this time. She licked
her lips and looked away before seating herself on the couch.

I settled on the edge of the couch and eased my frightened
fiancé onto her back. After kissing her on the forehead, I unbuttoned
her shirt.

The scars that crossed her chest didn't look as boiling red as
last time I'd seen them, but it still looked like they hurt like hell. The
areas where her breasts used to be were a deep red. The skin was
beginning to peel at the edges of the irradiated skin.

I squeezed some of the lotion into my hand and spread it
around my fingers to make sure it wasn't too cold.
Maybe the cold
will be a relief
. I didn't want to take a chance. With as gentle a
touch as I could muster, I placed my fingers on her left irradiated
area. Even through the lotion, I felt the heat.

With slow, circular motions I worked the lotion into Annie's
burned skin. When I stopped to apply a little more lotion, she took a
long breath and wiggled into the couch cushions a little deeper.

She jerked a little when I first touched her irradiated skin on
the right side, but there was no other reaction from her. At a pace
that said I had all the time in the world, I ever so gently worked the
lotion into the damaged area. I was almost finished when Annie
placed her hand on mine and helped me spread the last bit of the
lotion.

Finished with my task, I capped the bottle, kissed Annie's
cheek and buttoned her shirt back up. Neither of us had said a word
while I applied the salve to her wounded skin.

Her smile told me everything.

The next morning, I was awakened by a repeated nudging to
the small of my back. I swatted the offending nudger away and
glanced at the clock. It was only eight. Kind of late for me, but not
embarrassingly so. I fluffed up my pillow and focused on getting back
to sleep.

I was almost out when the nudging resumed.

"Annie?"

She giggled. Miss-Don't-Wake-Me-Up-Before-Eleven actually
had the nerve to wake me up and giggle while she was doing it. She
yawned, which had to be faked, the little joker.

"Yes, my love?"

I rolled over to find Annie on her side, grinning from ear to
ear. Any hint of annoyance evaporated the moment she winked at
me.

"Something's been poking me in the back. You wouldn't
know anything about that, would you?"

"You're the one with the poking equipment mister, not me.
But since you woke me up, since there's no way I would ever be
awake on my own at this hour, would you lotion my chest again? You
did a really great job yesterday."

There was no way in the world I could refuse. With her
wrapped among the covers and giving me a little smile, she was the
cutest thing on earth.

The split second my lips began to curl up, she whipped out
the lotion. I stared at the tube for a second before it hit me. The tube
was what Annie had been nudging me with.

She flipped the covers back and unzipped the camisole she
wore to bed. I tried to be just as gentle as before. "Your skin doesn't
seem quite as red as yesterday," I said midway through.

She sighed, her eyes closed. "Maybe it's just having a break
from the radiation, but my chest feels a little better, too. The lotion
definitely helps. Can I hire you to do this for me?"

"Well, seeing as how I'm already working for you as
Cassandra's assistant, I suppose this would fall under the 'other
duties as assigned' part of the job description, eh?"

With a snort, she opened her eyes. "Now that you mention it,
I believe it would. I can't imagine Kyrstie would have agreed to do
this for me, though. Yet another reason why you're a better
assistant."

I capped the tube of lotion while Annie zipped up. "And
speaking of being my assistant, how are the promotions going?"

Over breakfast, I gave Annie an update on what we'd been
doing to get people excited about the new record and DVD. With no
tour or promotional concerts to support the release, she had decided
to focus on social media. A Cassandra Lawrence trivia contest on
Twitter had totally blown up beyond expectations. Similar efforts on
Tumblr and CassandraLawrence.net were about what we had
expected.

The little bounce in Annie's step while she helped me clean
up after breakfast brought a smile to my face. When she was pleased
with things, she bounced. When she was ecstatic, she did little
pirouettes across the room. No dance moves for the moment, but
bouncing was good.

When we were finished in the kitchen, she wiped her hands
and gave me a peck on the cheek. "I'm going for a walk. Thought I
might stop by the bakery and pick out a few things to take to
Randi's."

Seeing Annie smile and talk about going for a walk made me
want to do a little pirouette myself. To keep from embarrassing
myself, I simply told her to have fun. While she was gone, I focused
on Cassandra business. As we closed in on the release date, issues
kept popping up. Even on a holiday weekend, questions needed to be
answered and fires needed to be put out.

Before I knew it, Annie was back, with her trusty reusable
shopping bag filled to the brim. The aroma of fresh bread mixed with
the scent of cinnamon and apples sent my mouth to watering in an
instant. I stood, but before I could say a word, Annie put her hand
up.

"Don't even. You're worse than a little kid at Christmas." She
rummaged through the bag and pulled something out. She kept me
from seeing what it was while she put it in the fridge. "I got some
cinnamon rolls that you can have tomorrow morning if you're a good
boy tonight. You can do that, yes?"