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15
Trent
I’m sitting in a chair in the hallway right outside the room Ally is getting her treatment in. I balance my coffee in one hand and scroll through funny videos on my phone with the other. Ally’s treatment usually takes about thirty minutes, so she should be wrapping it up soon.
I glance up when the door across from me opens. A middle-aged woman wearing street clothes walks out pushing a small wheelchair. The girl in the wheelchair looks like she can’t be any older than eight. I don’t need to see the sign beside the door to know what she was doing in the room. A heavy weight sits on my chest when I look back at the little girl. She has a piece of cloth wrapped around her head, covering what I have no doubt is a bald head, and her face is pale and gaunt. Whatever cancer she has is taking its toll.
“Mrs. Miller!” A doctor calls the attention of the woman who’s pushing the wheelchair. “Can I have a word with you before you leave?”
The woman sets a hand on the girl’s frail shoulder and leans down. “I’ll be right back, Erica.”
The girl nods, and even that simple movement seems to take a lot out of her. “Okay.”
The woman walks away, stopping at the doctor standing at the counter. She turns so she can keep the girl in her view. The girl, Erica, looks down at her hands in her lap, her expression filled with hopelessness.
An image of Ally comes to mind of when I first met her. She was about this girl’s age and already in the middle of her treatments. She had just had a bone marrow transplant. Weeks later, her treatment was finished, and the doctors announced her leukemia was in remission.
“I always hate coming to the hospital,” I say quietly. “The smell reminds me of when my mom would go through one of her cleaning spurts and would clean the house from top to bottom. She’d have me down on the floor scrubbing floors.”
Erica tilts her head up slightly, her eyes pointing at me. “It does smell really bad. Like the bathroom at grocery stores.”
I chuckle. “Yeah. I don’t like using the bathrooms at grocery stores either. And I’ll let you in on a little secret.” I lean forward in my seat and lower my voice. “The boys’ bathroom always smells so much worse than the girls’.”
The girl giggles. “How do you know what a girls’ bathroom smells like?”
I won’t be telling her I may have made out in the girls’ bathroom a time or two. I stretch my legs out in front of me. “Because I’ve walked in before thinking it was the boys’.”
Her eyes crinkle at the corners. “I bet that was embarrassing.”
I shrug. “Maybe a bit.” I glance down the hallway where the woman stands. “Is that your mom?”
The lightness in her face that came with our silly conversation dims. “No. That’s Mrs. Miller. She’s my social worker.” Erica’s lips tremble for a moment before she presses them into a firm line. “My mom’s dead.”
My gut twists with her heartbreaking words. “I’m so sorry to hear that.”
She moves her eyes away and looks down the hall. “It’s okay. She died when I was a baby. I don’t even remember her. She had the same kind of cancer I did.”
“What about your dad?” I ask, keeping my voice soft.
“Mrs. Miller says she doesn’t know who my dad is.”
The knot in my stomach tightens. I had a crappy mom growing up, but I always had my dad, who I knew loved me and would do anything for me. I also had Mia—once they got back together. I can’t imagine not having either of them. This poor girl has had no parents since being a baby.
The door beside me opens and Ally walks out. She looks tired, but no more than she usually does lately.
She looks down at me before her eyes slide to Erica. Erica unashamedly looks over Ally, her eyes staying locked on the head scarf on Ally’s head for several seconds. Ally’s expression softens on the girl.
“Hi,” she says gently with a smile.
“Hey,” Erica returns.
I get up from the chair. “I never introduced myself. I’m Trent, and this is my wife, Ally. She’s also getting treatments here.” I wrap an arm around Ally’s waist. “Erica and I were discussing the nasty smells in hospitals.”
Ally laughs and she looks comical when she wrinkles her nose. “They do smell awful.”
Erica smiles and nods.
The woman, Mrs. Miller, walks up to our trio, her hands going to the handles on the back of Erica’s wheelchair.
