Iwas ten when I first overheard a doctor talking about life expectancy. He and my parents had sent me out to get some water in the waiting room while they chatted in his office. I came back quietly enough that none of them heard me, and I realized the doctor was talking about me in a very solemn tone of voice.
“There’s every reason to expect that Nathaniel will live well into his early adulthood. We’re doing everything we can, and who knows what treatment might be discovered by the time he’s eighteen? The important thing is to help him to enjoy every minute. Quality of life, you know, and Nathaniel has that in spades.”
My mother sighed, and my father cleared his throat. I stood frozen just outside the doorway.
My dad spoke quietly. “Is there anything else we can do right now? More therapies, other doctors at other hospitals?”
“We’re doing everything we can,” the doctor repeated, patience in his voice. “I make it a point to keep up with all the articles and papers published on this condition. If I think there’s anything that will help him, you know I’ll be the first to let you know. Try not to let what might happen in the future rob you of what you have here in the present—a wonderful, loving son.”
I couldn’t stand it any longer, and I stepped loudly in the hallway before I pushed the door open. My mother turned toward me, her eyes bright and a smile on her lips. She grabbed her purse and patted my father’s arm.
“Are we all set then? Ready to go?”
On the drive home, my mom chattered about everything and nothing. My father chimed in only when she specifically addressed him, and I was silent. As soon as the car pulled into the driveway, my mother jumped out and said something about getting dinner in the oven. My father climbed out of the driver’s seat more slowly and opened the back door for me.
“Dad?” I said. “Can I ask you something?”
He smiled at me and tousled my hair. “Sure, kiddo. Anything. What’s up? Woman trouble?” My father always did that, pretended that we were talking man-to-man and that I might really have some sort of adult problem that we could discuss.
I shook my head. “No. I just wanted to ask you. Am I going to die? I mean, like soon? Like sooner than most people?”
His face fell into the less familiar lines of sadness. He didn’t ask me why I wanted to know or pretend that I was posing a silly question. Instead he answered me thoughtfully.
“No one knows the answer to that question, Nate. We’re on this earth for a certain span of time, and truthfully, no one can tell us what the future holds. My grandfather lived to be a hundred and two, and my dad is still going strong. But I could walk out to get the paper in the morning and get hit by an out-of-control car. We just don’t know. We try our best to stay healthy and safe, but life is a fragile thing sometimes.”
“But what about me, about what’s wrong with me? It makes me different from other kids, but is it going to make me die younger, too?”
My father sank onto the bottom step of our front porch. “I don’t know. I guess, if everything stayed exactly the same as it is right now, the answer would be yes. The same disease that makes your muscles weak and complicates your breathing sometimes would eventually end your life. But we know that nothing stays the same. There are scientists and doctors working to figure out how to cure you. You’re working hard to get better, too. So you see, we could focus on the possibility that’s there right at this moment, or we can choose to believe that there’s a better future out there.”
I thought about what he said, and I nodded to show that I had listened. And I really had. I decided that I was going to do everything I could to live as long as possible, and I was also going to make sure that I lived as fully as I could. I had a good reason to want to live, the best reason in the world, actually.
I was in love.
I don’t know when I realized that I was in love with Quinn. I had loved her all my life, that was for sure. Along with Leo, she was my best friend. But Quinn was always more patient with me than even Leo was. She chose me more often than he did. I knew that making choice didn’t help her social life, but she did it anyway.
But the summer before we started junior high, something changed. Not Quinn, although she was growing up and getting prettier every day. It was me. That August, when my family was about to go to my grandparents’ house in the mountains and Quinn’s family was heading to the shore, I was grumpy. I couldn’t figure out why; I loved our two weeks in the Poconos. We hiked trails and played in the creek and sat around reading for hours.
Then the night before I left, Quinn came over to say good-bye. She gave me a typical Quinn hug—fierce and tight and full of her particular brand of love—and she said, “I guess I’ll see you the first day of school!”
And just like that, I knew. I was in a perpetual bad mood because I was going to have to go two weeks without my best friend, who, as it turned out, was also the love of my life.
I spent most of that night trying to figure out how I could get Quinn to come to the Poconos with us. Or how I could go to the beach with her family. Of course, it wasn’t possible. My mom never would let me be away from her for that long; she always worried if I were out of her sight for longer than a typical school day. And Quinn was an only child, like me. Her mom and dad had planned this week at the beach especially for her. They wouldn’t let her go with us, and even if they would, how could I explain this sudden need not to be away from her?
So the next morning, I got into the car with my parents, and we drove west. I stared out the window as we crossed the Walt Whitman Bridge into Pennsylvania. My mother was talking about everything she wanted to do on vacation, all the food she’d brought to cook delicious meals. My dad was in a good mood, too. It was his parents we stayed with during these two weeks, and he enjoyed that family time.
We had been the car almost an hour before my mother noticed that I was quiet. I shrugged and told her that I was tired, that I hadn’t slept well. A few minutes later, so they wouldn’t guess that my sleeplessness was related to my question, I spoke up.
“Mom? Will I be able to get married some day?” I tried to make it a casual question, something that had just randomly gone through my mind.
I caught the quick glance my parents exchanged, and then my mother turned around in her seat.
“Why do you ask? You planning to propose to someone soon?”
I stifled a sigh. Just once I wished they would take me seriously and give me a straight answer.
“I just wondered, that’s all. You know, with me being ... different and all.”
My dad met my eyes in the rearview mirror. “I think it’s one of those things we talked about a few years back, bud. Your mom and I hope you can fall in love and get married. But since I’m thinking you’re not going to be eloping any time soon, maybe we don’t have to worry about it today.”
