Page 68 of Part of Forever
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Doctor Barker saysI have to start chemo almost immediately. There are more tests to take, and I have to get a port, but I’ll be starting chemo in three days.
She said that at best, the chemo will shrink the tumor and put off surgery for a little longer. At worst, it will only give me a little extra time. It’s not the best treatment, but there isn’t really a ‘best treatment’ for where I have a tumor growing. Make it smaller, try surgery—that’s the solution.
Deep down, I have the feeling that it won’t work. I have a lot of regrets about how I’ve lived my life, especially this past year, but every time I think about how I could have been with Tucker the whole time, or told him the truth from the beginning, I push it away. It’s too much to deal with right now.
I look at my phone, staring at the last text Tucker sent me; it was two days after he left, the morning of the funeral. I didn’t tell anyone that he’d sent it to me.
Tucker
I’m sorry, Rosie. I do love you so much (listen to In Case You Didn’t Know by Brett Young). I do. Ijust… I’m sorry.
I didn’t respond. I didn’t know what to say. If you love someone, do you really walk away from them?
“Hey, Rosebud.” Dad knocks on my door as he pushes it open and steps into my room. I set my phone down.
“Hi, Dad,” I say.
“How are you feeling?” he asks, and I shrug, because even though I now know I have a tumor growing in my body, I feel the same way I did before.
Perfectly healthy. Well, almost perfectly healthy—I am a little more tired than usual.
How can you feel like you’re completely fine while your body is essentially eating you from the inside out?
“I’m okay,” I tell him, because even though I feel fine physically, I’m a little shaken up. Tucker’s still gone, and Lucy is in the ground; how am I supposed to feel?
“Want to go to the studio today?” Dad asks, and it makes me smile.
“Yeah, I’d really like that.” I get up and follow him out to the car. We don’t talk about the cancer or about how I won’t be going to Paris. Every time I think about that now, I cry.
My one and only dream, shattered.
We don’t talk about how I’m going to lose my hair or about how after I start chemo, I might not be able to dance at all. Or about Mom, and how she’s barely talked to me since the news of the new tumor, and when she does, she talks as if Paris will still happen. Just yesterday she told me that she made a new plan with Marie to help me get back on my feet after chemo. I wanted to tell her no, but she walked away before I got the chance. Even when I’m sick, it’s always her way; she never asks what I might want.
Dad and I mostly sit in silence as we drive to the studio. He unlocks the door. It’s Sunday, so there are no classes today. It’ll just be us.
“I’ll be waiting in Room 3,” Dad says, and I walk back to thechanging room alone. I change into my leotard and slip my pointe shoes on, pushing back the tears.
“This is not the last time,” I whisper to myself. It can’t be the last time. I will fight the cancer with everything I’ve got. I will dance until I physically can’t, and then I’ll fight some more, so that I can dance again.
“Whew,” I let out a loud exhale and head to the practice room Dad’s waiting in. It feels good to be here, to be dressed and have my pointe shoes laced up. I’m going to dance again.
He’s sitting on a chair by the stereo. “You ready?” he asks and I nod. He pushes play.
I didn’t have to ask which routine he’d pick. I already knew. I feel the familiar beat of my audition routine as the music fills the room, and for a moment, I let everything else fall away.
When I’m dancing, it’s like nothing else exists beyond me and the music. As I leap across the floor, I feel my heart bursting.Thisis it.Thisis what I live for, what I’ll keep living for.
When the song ends, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. My face is covered with tears. I didn’t even realize I’d been crying. I move to wipe them away, but Dad is there first. He brushes a thumb across my cheek, just like he did when I was a little girl, and then pulls me to him.
I can’t tell if he’s crying or not, but I don’t want to let go. He has always been my anchor, and to see him break because of my diagnosis would kill me.
So, we stand there, hugging, for minutes or maybe hours, until Mom’s voice breaks us apart.
“I figured you’d be here,” she says and I pull away from Dad. My tears are gone now, and my eyes narrow into slits at the look on her face. She’s been distant since we got the news, colder than usual, and I’m tired of it.
“I needed to dance before I get my port tomorrow and then start chemo,” I tell her, even though I know I owe her no explanation.I am her daughter. I have cancer. I wanted to dance. She knows all that.
