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Inside, as we wait, I’m aware of Forrest casting his eyes around as patients come and go around us. Hidden numbers of them that until now, I’ve been unaware of; patients of all ages, at different stages in their treatment. Instinctively I grip his hand more tightly, grateful that he’s here.
This is now,I tell myself as I’m fitted with a radiotherapy mask. It will be over soon – for today.It’s still a good day.I feel OK. And this is buying me more precious days, days I desperately want.
It feels like hours later when I come out. Forrest’s still sitting where I left him. I take his hand. ‘Can we get out of here?’
As we walk away from the hospital, I’m silent.
Eventually he glances at me. ‘How are you feeling?’
I shake my head. ‘Strange.’ There’s a part of me trying to embrace what medical science can give me; another part is screaming to run away.
By the end of the first week of treatment, other than tired, I feel unaffected.
‘I feel OK,’ I tell Forrest as we walk out of the hospital. ‘Can we do something normal, like go for a walk or sit on the beach?’
But my mind is all over the place and a few minutes later, I don’t feel like doing any of it.
I value the people in my life more than ever, seeing them as I never have before. Rae emerging from the mire of grief; Forrest’s drive simply to live better. I love that Birdy’s her own person; that she has this desire to experience life to a degree that most people could never dream of. And it isn’t for any of us to say what’s right or wrong. It’s simply that we’re all different.
When Birdy next comes over on her own, she’s wound up about something.
‘Sienna had a real go at me yesterday. She said travelling’s a waste of time. It’s like we live on different planets.’ She looks frustrated. ‘She obsesses about clothes and perfect makeup. It takes her an hour to apply it. Anhourof her life, for frick’s sake. I want to tell her to zoom out, to look at her life from far away. To realise how in the grand scheme of things, how small it is.’
I take in Birdy’s ancient jeans and faded vest top, the smooth skin that’s devoid of makeup. In many respects, she and Sienna are from different worlds. But so is most of this town. ‘You shouldn’t be too hard on Sienna,’ I say gently. ‘You’re verydifferent people – and there’s nothing wrong with that. Life’s taking you in one direction, Sienna in another. The world needs scientists just as much as it needs free spirits. Plus, you know she’s influenced by her parents.’
‘That’s what I don’t get.’ Birdy looks frustrated. ‘She shouldn’t be doing something just because they want her to.’
‘It’s what we do, though, isn’t it? We don’t want to upset the people we love,’ I say quietly. ‘And in a way, it’s the same for you. You can’t make decisions based on keeping Rae happy. It’s your life – and I think you’re a bit like me. For us, it’s about so much more than staying in one place. This is your time. You have to seize it.’
She’s quiet for a moment. ‘Thank you. I know you understand. I’m sorry, bringing this here when you have enough to think about.’
‘Oh no.’ I shake my head. ‘Don’t ever stop bringing your dilemmas here. I need them, Bird.’ My voice wavers. ‘I need your questioning mind and your sense of adventure… Every time we talk, you remind me what life’s really about.’ And what it’s not about, too.
As she sits there, she looks wistful. ‘I don’t know anyone else like you. Everyone around here… They follow the same predictable path – like Sienna is.’
I sigh. ‘But it’s her choice – and there’s nothing you can do about that. Everyone eventually finds their own way. But I really believe that more of us are open to something different.’ I pause. ‘Stay open,’ I say gently. ‘You’ll find your tribe.’
‘I already am,’ she says shyly. ‘I mean, I have you.’
‘You do.’ There’s a lump in my throat. From the start, there’s been an unspoken bond between us; it means the world that she feels it too.
As my treatment goes on, Forrest spends more time here, leaving now and then to ‘sort his unnecessary shit out’, is how he phrases it – and albeit reluctantly, until I reassure him that what I need most is to rest.
It isn’t the kind of fatigue that makes me sleepy. It’s deeper, my body needing periods of immobility as it responds to the treatment I’m receiving, as does my mind to process everything that’s happening to me.
As I perfect the art of wearing a head scarf twenty different ways, Forrest seems distracted, as though his mind is somewhere else.
‘Hey.’ Coming up behind him, I wrap my arms around him. ‘Is everything OK?’
‘As OK as it can be.’ Turning around, he forces a tight kind of smile.
‘Don’t worry about me.’ I search his face. ‘I really think I’m doing OK.’
He gently strokes my hair off my face. ‘You’re amazing,’ he says quietly. ‘Sometimes, I don’t know what you’re doing with me.’
I look at him, startled. ‘What’s brought this on?’
He shrugs. ‘Seems like I’m one big fuck up – not just in this life, but in the last one.’
