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14
MEGAN
Todd’s hand in mind is the only thing keeping me grounded as we sit in my hospital room, waiting for the doctors to take me into surgery.
They got me set up in a bed pretty quickly after we got here, and now, we’re just waiting for an operating room to open up. I’m trying not to think about the surgery in any detail. It’s only going to freak me out more, so I listen to my parents talk to Todd about the football team.
I wish the girls could be here right now, too, but they wouldn’t let any more people wait with me. Mom’s going to call them when I get out of surgery so they can come visit then.
A nurse walks into my room, checking my chart. “Okay, Megan. We’re about ready to bring you back. If you want to say your goodbyes now, that would be good.” I only nod at her as she finishes her checks. The tension in the air is palpable, uncertainty hanging over us as we wonder what will happen next.
“Everything is going to be okay, sweetheart.” Mom leans over my hospital bed to kiss my forehead.
“We’ll see you when you wake up,” Dad says, giving my hand a squeeze. They escort Gabe out of my room, leaving me and Todd alone. He leans his forehead on mine, his eyes closed.
“I’ll see you in a couple of hours,” I whisper, barely able to get the words past the lump in my throat.
“I know. I love you.”
“I love you, too.” The nurse comes into the room, interrupting the rest of our goodbye.
She pushes my bed down the hallway and into the OR. The overhead lights are blindingly bright as they get me situated. I barely have time to take in my surroundings before the anesthesiologist bustles in, cracking jokes about giving me the good drugs. His teasing helps ease some of my nerves as he administers the anesthetic.
Then, everything goes black.
* * *
The feelingof my hand being squeezed makes my eyes flutter open. The bright lights have me flinching them closed.
“Meg,” someone whispers. I attempt to open my eyes again to see who said it. Luckily, this time, it doesn’t hurt quite so bad.
It takes me a minute to figure out where I am when all I see are faces peering at me. My mom and dad stand at the foot of the bed, my brother is sitting next to me, reading a book, and Todd’s handsome face is to my right. He’s got a tight grip on my hand while his brows are furrowed in concern. It makes a smile pull at the corners of my lips.
“Hi, guys,” I whisper against my scratchy throat. I register the noise of machines beeping, finally remembering I had surgery. “How did things go?”
“The doctor said things went fine,” Mom says, moving up the bed to grab my hand.
I smile at her words, happy everything went as planned. Hopefully, everything will be smooth sailing now that all I have to do is heal from the surgery.
“How do you feel?” Todd asks, his deep voice filled with worry. I give his hand a squeeze in reassurance.
“A little sleepy, but fine, so far.” I’d bet the anesthesia they had me on is still running strong through my system. Not to mention any other pain meds they administered.
Dr. Robins comes into the room, checking my vitals while updating me on how the surgery went. They’re running tests on the tumor now and will hopefully have more information in the next week. Apparently, it can take a while to test for different cancers.
I’d rather they take the time to run every test than hurry through it, no matter how hard it will be to wait. I’m also glad the tumor is out of my body. I’ll finally be able to move on from this whole ordeal.
Dr. Robins tells us I should be discharged in a few hours as long as I don’t show any signs of complications. It would be great to recover in my own bed at home instead of on scratchy sheets in this hospital bed. This whole mess has been physically and emotionally exhausting.
“I hear there’s a party going on in here,” Natalie says, busting her way into the room. I laugh, then quickly groan as pain slices through my abdomen.
“Oh, crap. Sorry, Meg.” Nat grimaces, coming over to squeeze my hand.
“That’s okay. It was totally worth it.” I grin at her. The rest of the girls barrel toward me, giving me gentle hugs as hellos. I get them updated on how the surgery went as everyone settles into the room.
“I’ve got soup in the Crock-Pot at home for dinner,” Mom says, in an attempt to change the subject.
“That will be perfect, Mom, thank you.”
“Everyone’s welcome to come over.” She smiles at my friends, knowing they probably aren’t going to be ready to leave my side anytime soon.
They all agree to come over, discussing the reasons why we should eat soup more often—not just in winter.
All I can do is smile through the awkward conversations as we dance around the elephant in the room. It shouldn’t be funny, but we’re talking about soup. About eating it while it’s the middle of summer. I hold back my giggle, knowing none of them would understand my need to laugh in this situation. Instead, I lay there, listening to the people I love the most talk about anything they can think of except why we’re here.
A few hours later, the doctor discharges me, and we’re in the car, headed home. I’m ready to lay on the couch, watch mindless TV, and eat the soup we talked endlessly about earlier.
My body is finally feeling the effects of my surgery, making things very uncomfortable. Pain meds can only do so much for me after the trauma of someone rooting around inside my body.
After Dad pulls into the driveway, Todd helps me out of the car and into the house. I move about as slow as a snail, only making it to the living room couch before I’m too tired to go further. Who knew walking into the house would be so exhausting?
“You okay?” Todd whispers to me. He’s kneeling on the floor since I’m taking up the entire couch.
“Yeah, I’m good. How are you?” He hasn’t lost the concerned look on his face, and I’m ready for things to go back to normal. I hate how serious he is when there’s no reason to be. I’m fine, and I’ll stay fine with the tumor out of my body.
“Worried about you,” Todd says. I lift my thumb to his forehead to smooth out the ever-present crease there.
“There’s nothing to worry about anymore. I’ll be throwing back-tucks again in a few short weeks.” I smile at him, hoping he will see I really am okay. He sighs, pressing his forehead against mine.
“I love you so much, Meg. You’re my everything. I wouldn’t be me without you in my world.” He kisses my nose then my lips.
“I love you, too, and I wouldn’t be me without you, either, so I’m not going anywhere. Promise. Now, stop frowning, and go get me some soup,” I demand, grinning at him. He returns a small smile that feels like progress.
“Yes, ma’am.” He winks, then jumps up from the floor to walk into the kitchen.
I take a deep breath, allowing the stress of the last couple of weeks to slowly lift from my shoulders. I hope it stays that way.
* * *
The phone ringsfrom the kitchen as I continue flipping through the TV channels. Since I’m never home during the day, I had no idea how awful daytime television was. There are reruns of everything on, none of which are interesting to me.
“When is your next available time slot?” I hear Mom ask. I sit up from my nest of pillows to listen to the conversation better.
“We can be there this afternoon.” I’m resigned to waiting for Mom to get off the phone since I can’t hear the other side of the conversation. I hope it’s about my biopsy results. It’s been a little over a week since my surgery, and I never expected it would take this long to get the results back.
“Okay, we can be there at four. Thank you,” she says, then hangs up the phone.
“Well?”
“They weren’t allowed to tell me the results over the phone. We have to go in at four to hear the news from the doctor.”
“You didn’t get anything from their tone?”
Mom’s indulgent smile makes me realize my question was kind of stupid.
“Right, sorry. I’m nervous.”
“We’ll have all of the answers when we see the doctor later.”
All I can do is nod my head and turn back to the TV, clicking on something at random. Surprisingly, it’s a movie I’ve seen a few times before. I doubt I’ll pay much attention to it with the threat of the doctor’s visit hanging over my head.
I’ve been doing my best to ignore the possibility my results will come back as cancer. This whole time, I’ve been operating under the idea that once I had the surgery, everything would be smooth sailing. What I didn’t consider is the constant feeling of doom lurking over my shoulder of what my future will look like.
If the results come back as cancerous, I’ll constantly have the threat of more tumors showing up. At a minimum, it’s going to shadow the beginning of my senior year, which is only a few weeks away.
At least I know they removed the potential for it to spread right away. Maybe I won’t have too much to worry about this year. I have so many plans in place, dreams I want to reach. A cancer diagnosis could get in the way of all of it.
After what feels like years instead of hours, it’s time to leave for my appointment. Mom and I pile into the van to head to the hospital. My knee bounces while butterflies set up camp in my stomach. How do you mentally prepare for bad news? Are there tricks I’m supposed to do before we get there?
I guess I wasn’t prepared for the news of my tumor, and I survived. Maybe this will be the same. If it’s bad news, I’ll need a few days to wrap my head around it. Then I will eventually be fine. It’s all going to be fine.
Geeze, how many times can I say fine in my own head?
Shaking my ridiculous thoughts away, I realize Mom is parking at the hospital already. From there, it’s a blur of white hallways and extra help from the nurses to find where we’re going.
We knock on an office door with Dr. Robins’s name on one of those sliding plaques. I’m surprised he doesn’t have a receptionist or something. He may not need one since he works in the hospital. Or, she’s bad at her job.
The door opens, bringing me back to the present moment. My blonde-headed, surfer-boy doctor opens the door, beckoning us to enter. We step into his well-decorated office, sitting in the visitor chairs in front of his desk.
“How are you doing, Megan?” Dr. Robins asks as he sits in his office chair.
“I’m fine. Still a little achy.”
He nods his head in response and opens a file folder with a stack of papers in it. “That’s good to hear,” he starts, looking back at the file again. “As you know, we got the results back from the biopsy. Unfortunately, the tumor came back as malignant.”
The deafening silence roars in my ears as I play back his words.
I have cancer.
Had cancer?
Does it still count if it’s no longer in my body?
Dr. Robins clears his throat when neither I nor my mom responds to his statement. The stricken look on Mom’s face tells me she doesn’t know what to do right now, either.
“Based on the tests the lab ran on the tumor, we believe you’re still in stage one, which means that by removing the tumor, you should be in the clear, and no further treatment is needed at this time. However, I’d like to start doing regular scans to ensure your cancer does not become recurring and move into stage two.”
“Will I be able to return to my normal activities, or do I need to scale back?” Where the hell did that question come from? It’s like my emotions have taken a back seat to the important details. I wish I could’ve responded this way when I got the news of my tumor in the first place.
“As long as you feel physically up for it, you can do whatever you would normally be doing. If at any time, you start to have symptoms similar to what you previously experienced, you need to schedule an appointment immediately.”
“When do I need to come in for the first exam?”
“I’d like to schedule it three weeks from today. Amy, my secretary, can help set up the appointment.”
I look at my mom to see if she has any questions, but she’s looking at me, tears flooding her eyes. I have to look away before I lose all of my carefully constructed calm.
“Is there anything else I need to know?”
“As of now, no, just pay attention to your body. It’s of the utmost importance that you tell us if you’re experiencing any abnormalities. Catching this cancer early is the key to survival.”
I nod my head. His serious tone causes my mouth to dry up, making responding with words almost impossible.
“Thank you, Doctor,” my mom says, apparently finding her voice the minute I lose mine. She stands to head out of the office with me following behind her and abruptly stops in the hallway to pull me into a bone-crushing hug. I respond accordingly, squeezing her just as hard in return.
From the very beginning, we knew finding a tumor was not good. It was highly unlikely to come back benign. That doesn’t mean we actually wanted to hear this news or were ever fully prepared for it. Now that we know for sure it was cancerous, the only thing we can do is move forward, praying it doesn’t come back again.
