 | ShatterStorm Productions
|
| ShatterStorm Productions
|
Title: Perfect Stranger
Author: Elizabeth
Email: bethiewhyte@yahoo.ca
A week later I walk into Oncology, still wearing my lab coat from work that day. By this time the nurses are tired of telling us only so many at a time, just to have Romano come charging down yelling at them. Jill dragged me to the salon and the result is my hair is a lot different than it was. Turns out she knows a lot about how people should be doing their hair. Mine is now layered, done with a razor and blonde with caramel and red going through it in an attractive fashion. Alex loves it. While we were there we talked about what to do if Kris doesn't match. Jill mentioned there was a brother who Alex refused to talk to. Turns out her coming out really affected him. Also turned out they're twins. “So you're saying they're twins?” I had asked as we had our nails done that night.
“Yup. So he'd probably be a match.”
The only problem was to get him to do it. Because two days later we found out Kris wasn't a match. The Keegan family was now trying to figure out how to approach Andy.
I ponder this as I walk to Alex's room. I am thinking about it so intently I don't even realize she isn't in her room until I am all the way in. I turn around and march out to the nurse station. “Where is Alex?” I demand, making the poor woman jump.
“Peds Onch.”
“What?”
“The Peds Oncology wing. It's down the hall-“
“I know where it is. Why is she there?”
“Don't know. She just said she was going. Could you do me a favor and tell her to come back? It's almost time to change her IV.” She points at the egg timer. I can't believe they are timing Alex's Chemo with an egg timer so she can go to Peds. I turn around and make my way there. I find her in a room reading Harry Potter to a bunch of cancer patients. I thought it was bad watching Alex suffer like she was. These kids were little and suffering. It was worse. Little skinny kids with no hair, white as ghosts all sitting quietly with chemo going into their arms as Alex read, “As they climbed the steps out of the dungeon an hour later, Harry's mind was racing and his spirits were low.”
I clear my throat and Alex looks up, sees me and smiles, “Hey everyone, this is my friend Dr. Susan.”
I smile. Alex looks horrible. A week of Chemo has not done her well. Her hair was already starting to fall out, so that she only had a bit left. But she was smiling and reading this book to these kids. “Hey Alex the nurse wants you to go get your IV changed.”
This was met with groans. Apparently the kids wanted to hear the rest of the chapter. I realized I was outnumbered so I sat on the bed next to Alex and took one of the pale faced, bald kids onto my lap to hear the rest of the story. By the time Alex reached the last line, “Did Hagrid know something about Snape that he didn't want to tell Harry?” the IV's were starting to beep all over the place, including Alex's. She looked really tired, so I picked her up and placed her in a wheelchair. “So when did you start doing that?”
“Oh a couple of days ago. I guess it was the first day you couldn't make it to Chemo. I didn't know what to do with myself so I went for a walk. I found all those kids in that room getting their Chemo treatment together, so I grabbed a book and started reading. It helps them and it helps me.” We get back to her room and I lift her into her bed. The nurse comes in to take the bag and then it's just us. This doesn't happen very often. I knew Jill was home trying to talk to Andy today and the rest went somewhere with Kris. I look at Alex and see that she is staring at me. “What?”
“I love your hair like that.”
I blush and smile. “Thanks.”
“You lost a lot of weight. Have you been eating?”
“Of course. Just not as much as I should be.”
“Susan! You have to keep your strength up. Even I'm eating and I get sick.”
“I know…it's just so hard. Life isn't fair sometimes you know?”
“Yeah but all the same. I'm going to get Jill to make sure you eat more. Where is she anyway?”
I know I turn red this time because she looks at me strange. “Susan? What are they doing behind your back?”
“Uh…nothing. They just thought, well no one's a match yet so maybe they should get…uh…Andy here.”
If looks could kill. “What? No. I'm not accepting anything from him.”
“Well Alex you don't really have a choice right now. If we have a match you're taking it weather you want to or not.”
“You know nothing about this Susan. You don't know how he was when I first came out. He treated me like I was the bad person just because of who I became. You know nothing about it Susan.”
I open my mouth to say something, but Alex has heard enough for now. “I'm going to sleep. Don't talk to me.”
Great.
