Page 96 of While I’m Still Here

I close my eyes.

“I woke up after losing one breast,” he continues. “You're going to wake up after losing both. I can tell you what happened to me and what I remember feeling, but I can't tell you exactly what that moment will be like for you. I don't want to pretend I can.”

My eyes fill again, although this time the tears don't frighten me.

“Did you look straight away?”

“No.”

“How long did you wait?”

“Two days.”

“Two days?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because I didn't want to.”

I stare into the darkened bedroom. That's it. No inspirational fucking speech. No story about summoning the courage to confront his new body. He simply didn't want to look, so he didn't. “Did anyone try to make you?” I ask.

“No. They asked whether I was ready. I wasn't, so that was the end of the conversation.”

I let my head sink back against the headboard and stare at the ceiling. “Everyone talks about the first look as though it's supposed to be this enormous moment. Like I'll look down, see the scars and suddenly understand I'm a warrior.”

“You might.”

“Marcus.”

“You might also look down and think it looks fucking awful.”

I go completely still.

Nobody has said that.

Not once.

They say different. They say healing. They show me photographs of healed scars and talk about reconstruction and prosthetics and body confidence. Everything is careful and considerate and phrased in ways designed not to frighten women who are already frightened.

“You thought yours looked awful?”

“At first, yes. It was fresh surgery, Bea. It was swollen and bruised. There were dressings and strips and a drain coming out of me. I'd spent weeks looking at photographs of healed mastectomy scars, and then I was shocked when mine looked like what it actually was.”

“An injury.”

“Yes.”

Something inside me loosens. Not because it sounds good. It sounds fucking horrible. But it sounds real, and reality is becoming strangely comforting after weeks of euphemisms.

“What happened after that?”

“It healed. The bruising faded, the swelling settled, the scar changed. Eventually it stopped looking like something that had just happened to me.”

“And then you liked it?”

“No.”