All of a sudden Roland's throat closed up tight, and his whole body felt like it was contracting in on itself. He wanted to curl up in a ball, because he could almost guess what his mother's next words were going to be.
"Maybe I don't want to fight this. Maybe I just want to let things take their natural course."
"But Mom, leukemia is usually very treatable."
"I understand. I'm not saying that I don't want to treat it. I'm just saying... I'd like to think about it."
Terry’s eyes got big, and then she looked at Roland, as though expecting him to throw in on her side.
He shrugged his shoulders. "I'm here to support her. I... I don't necessarily agree, but Mom is closer to God than I am, and she trusts Him. I wish I had her faith."
"You're developing your own, son," his mom said, patting his hand and giving him a benevolent smile, almost as though he'd done something she was proud of.
"Mom, you know that medicine is not anti-Bible, right?" Terry asked, almost as though she were panicking, scared that her mom was somehow anti-medicine or something.
"My daughter is a doctor. Of course, I think that modern medicine is perfectly okay to practice, and I have nothing against most things that doctors do." Their mom didn't mention anything that she might disagree with, but Roland didn't have too much trouble thinking of some medical procedures that perhaps weren't in line with what the Bible taught.
"But, I also believe that while God gives us medicine so we can use it to help heal our bodies, I also believe that it's not necessarily the first thing we should try, and I'm not necessarily talking about healing myself. I'm talking about allowing nature to take its course."
"So you're not talking about alternative medicine. You're talkingabout dying from leukemia?" Terry asked, and there was an edge to her voice.
Roland felt bad for her. All of her training must be rebelling at this conversation, and it was with her own mother. So her emotions were involved as well. This might well be the hardest conversation Terry had ever had in her life.
"Yes. If that's God's will. I... I'm not saying that it's wrong to use medicine, or that when someone is sick it's always God's will for them to die. Or if an operation can save someone's life, it's somehow not right to use it. I'm not saying that at all. I'm just saying... Why do we always think that struggling to live is the right choice? Maybe... Maybe sometimes when you get a disease like this, it truly is your time to die."
"But Mom, you're young. You have decades ahead of you. You could live to see your great grandchildren, and possibly your great-great grandchildren. Don't you want to? Don't you think your family needs you? Are you thinking about your children and your family?" Terry seemed to be unable to comprehend why their mother might make a choice like this.
"She has people in heaven who want to see her too, and people she wants to see," Roland added for his mother, although she was perfectly capable of having this conversation on her own. After all, she'd raised Terry to be the wonderful person that she was, the compassionate doctor, the concerned human being. His mom didn't need him to fight her battles for her, but he just couldn't stop himself.
Terry’s lips flattened into a line as she folded her arms across her chest, holding the clipboard beside her, and looked between Roland and their mom.
"All right. Of course the choice is yours. I can go over treatment options, and what I think would be best to do, or... We can wait for further tests to come back, and go from there."
"Let's wait for the tests to come back, and in the meantime, let's not ruin anyone's Christmas with this news. The New Year will beplenty soon enough for us to get down to what we need to do in order to either treat this, or to make me comfortable."
The Peace that Passes Understanding seemed to be all over his mother, and she did not look the slightest bit upset or scared.
Terry didn't look nearly so serene, but Roland was pretty sure that would come in time. Terry was a true believer, and her husband, Judd, would probably help her as well.
It wasn't long until they were walking out, and after taking his mother home, eating lunch with her, and then cleaning up while she went back to her bedroom to nap, he spent the rest of the day working at the Christmas tree farm.
And telling himself that everything would be okay. Whether his mother lived, or whether she died, God was in control. And He wasn't going to allow one single thing to happen that wasn't supposed to happen, because he could stop it and change it all if he wanted to.
And in the meantime, it was foolish for Roland to worry or fret.
With that fixed in his thoughts, his mind turned to Nelly, and the fact that he knew his Secret Saint helper. He also thought about the feelings that he had for her, and somehow the idea of his mother's illness made him even more aware of the fragility of life, and the passing of time, and how quickly it went by. He didn't want to waste any more of his life being without Nelly. She made him feel complete in a way that he hadn't felt in a long time. If ever. And he wanted to be with her, forever.
The only problem was, he didn't know how she felt.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
"Thanks so much for coming today," Nelly said to Lilly, smiling at the young girl who did not say anything in return. She hadn't spoken a word since her mother had died three years prior.
"Thanks so much for doing this. She just glows when it's time for me to bring her," her dad, Jack Henderson, put his hand on Lilly's head as he spoke to Nelly.
"It's my pleasure. I couldn't do it without Roland, though," she said, glancing across the sanctuary to where Roland was also greeting parents and giving them updates on how practice went.
She took a few seconds to admire him, before she looked back at Jack, who had added a comment to the effect that Roland's presence had made such a difference and brought so much to the play.
