Page 5 of Born to be Wilder

“She’s trying not to cry,” I explained. “You said no crying.”

Doris made a small, strangled sound of confirmation.

Alice turned back to me. “Sylvie. Be reasonable. This is the annual Wilder Widows trip. I won’t have you miss it for me.”

“You’re a Wilder Widow,” I said. “I agree with Marge. We all go together or not at all. We skip this year, we beat this cancer, and next year we’ll just go bigger and better than ever before to celebrate.”

Alice’s eyes softened as she looked at me. We’d been friends long enough that words were no longer needed. I could see it—that silent hope that she’d beat the cancer and be around next year to celebrate, and the guilt that we’d all miss this year because of her.

“I just don’t want everyone missing out because I, you know, have cancer.” She waved a hand at her breasts.

Doris’s hands flew to her mouth as she struggled to suppress her sobs.

Alice shot her a warning stare.

Marge pulled a face. “Doris is at more risk of dying from suffocation than you are of cancer if she can’t breathe. Doris… breathe.”

Doris shook her head, her mouth covered behind her hands, and I knew if those hands moved, if she took a deep breath, the sobs would come rolling out.

I let out a sigh. “Okay, Alice. I get that you want us all to react to your news exactly how you want us to react to your news, but Doris is a crier. You know Doris is a crier. Doris weeps at the drop of a hat. And she’s going to actually pass out if you don’t just let her… cry.”

Doris pressed her lips together.

“I’m the one with cancer,” Alice said plainly. “I get to set the emotional tone. And the emotional tone is fine. We’re fine. I don’t want a big emotional thing here. We’re not crying.”

Doris nodded vigorously, squeezing her eyes shut, her hands over her mouth to suppress her cries, clearly trying with everything she had.

The trying made it worse. Her face scrunched. Her chin wobbled. She changed to a new shade of pink.

“Uh, guys,” Marge said. “She looks like she’s going to crap her pants.”

“She might,” I agreed. “And this is a new couch. Alice, please. Just let her cry. People process how they process. This is how Doris needs to process.”

Alice looked at Doris’s face, at the heroic, losing effort playing out across it, and let out a long sigh. “Fine. Get it out.”

Doris dropped her hands and let out an ear-piercing cry that made the rest of us cringe.

“Maybe I need to get the chainsaw anyway. If I cut off her head, she won’t cry anymore.”

I shot Marge a look. “Stop it. Let’s just give her a minute.”

So we did. We sat in silence while Doris wailed and cried. I got up, and my legs felt stronger as I walked to the other side of the couch, grabbed a box of tissues, and sat beside Doris. She blew her nose while I rubbed her shoulders, struggling to suppress my own tears, a lump fighting to form in my throat, but I swallowed it back down.

Finally, her sobs started to soften.

“You alright there, Weepy Wanda?” Marge asked.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” Doris managed to say, her first words since Alice had dropped that bombshell of news. “I just… This is so scary!”

I rubbed her back. “I know it is. But this is Alice. She’s tougher than all of us together. Think of everything we’ve faced together and survived. She’s gonna survive this too.”

“Yeah. She had a dance battle with a big cat and lived to tell the tale,” Marge pointed out.

Alice chuckled. “We have faced things far more life-threatening than cancer. You’re right.”

“So… it was caught early?” Doris sniffled.

Alice nodded. “Yes. Very early.”