The False Flat

CHAPTER 48

LIFE REALIZATION #22: IT’S ALWAYS SOMETHING

The cold, white tiles.

The muffled voices.

The smell of rubbing alcohol and floor cleaner and dinner trays.

The slight squeak of a passing bed, someone else going for imaging.

The laughter that didn’t belong.

The silent sobs coming from the person crouched against the wall because she just couldn’t stand up anymore: me.

Grant hadn’t been killed by the white Honda that had ripped his bicycle out from under him, but while he was getting his fourteen stitches, I tried to find life inside this hospital, our life. Because this accident was one more thing, and I felt like I was dying inside. How could we live within the confines of this diagnosis, chemo and radiation interrupting what little life we had left?

I went into the bathroom, where an onslaught of anxiety left no room for the food inside my stomach. When I was done, but still sunken inside, I stepped back into the hall.

A young girl wearing a beanie was being pushed past me in a wheelchair. Her gown fell off one bony shoulder, and before her mom could pull it back up again, I saw the bandage on her upper-right chest. It was a port. I knew because Grant had one in the exact same place. A little implanted reservoir, just under the skin, that connected to a vein so a chemo patient wouldn’t have to continually get stuck by needles. The nurses could “access the port” instead.

I started to turn back into the bathroom, hit by another wave of nausea, but the pale girl looked up at me with her watery blue eyes and smiled. Then she went back to talking to her mother, a casual discussion about a dance next month.

They were living, laughing. They were here at this hospital, merging outside life with hospital life, but they weren’t making a distinction. They were just living wherever they were. I wanted to follow them, to observe. I wanted to take notes, make a spreadsheet. I wanted to know how to do it when everything fell apart.

Later, when I carried thoughts of that mother and daughter into Grant’s room on the fourth floor, where he’d been transferred so they could watch him for the night, he was crying. I’d never seen him cry over his illness, and it scared me.

I ran to his bed.

But he wasn’t crying over his injuries or illness. He was crying because he’d lost his best friend. Gaia was gone, totaled. In the middle of Grant telling me about his plan to put her in storage because he couldn’t bear the thought of scrapping her, there was a knock on the door.

Dr. Killjoy, Grant’s oncologist, breezed in, smelling of hand sanitizer and leather, and told Grant he shouldn’t ride anymore.

“It’s not safe or wise,” he said, his tone matter-of-fact, like he wasn’t crushing Grant’s heart in his oversize fist.

I hated Dr. Killjoy. What kind of oncologist has a name like that anyway? That was his real name. But I’d researched it. He was the best in Nashville.

“I’m not going to ride either,” I told Grant once the intelligent jerk had closed the door.

“Umm. That’s not a good idea.”

I shrugged. He was right. I would probably live to regret the promise. Riding was like breathing for me. Could I promise to stop breathing?

“I don’t care. I’m doing it.” I meant it. I’d stop breathing for him.

As darkness crept through the small hospital window and the halls quieted, Grant motioned me over to his narrow hospital bed. Hip to hip, we could almost pretend we were home, all but for the occasional interruption of the nurses, who checked his grip strength and asked him the date and who the president was—apparently concussion protocol. It made me think back to my own concussion, when I hadn’t been able to remain in the hospital for even five seconds. I wasn’t the same person, though I did have to regularly suppress the urge to ask him if he really needed to be here. I was going to attempt to live where we were, wherever that took us.

“I want to go to a dark-sky park,” Grant said.

I shifted from lying on a patch of uninjured shoulder so I could see his face.

“Then we’ll go. Isn’t there a whole community dedicated to keeping the sky dark in California?”

He smiled and nodded. “There is. We’ll go there if you prefer. I don’t care where, as long as I have you and the open sky.”

He reached over, let his finger move down the side of my face. I grabbed his hand and held it in mine.

“Some July, we’ll go to Spain. There’s a lavender festival in Brihuega every year, midmonth. One of my friends arranges his visits to his parents’ house in Spain around the festival; it’s that good.” He moved his free hand in front of us as we pictured the fragrant, budding lavender fields and the warm sun on our skin. “They celebrate the blooming of the lavender with all kinds of activities: painting exhibits, hot-air balloon rides, paragliding, tours through the fields, cooking master classes. We have to go.”

“Then we’ll go there too.”

“While we’re in Spain, we’ll visit the Puente Nuevo, New Bridge, in Ronda. I’ve always wanted to see the city separated by a gorge. From what I hear, it’s a magnificent view.” He closed one eye. “Though they’re also known for bullfighting, so we probably won’t want to stay too long.”

“That sounds wonderful. The lavender and the cooking classes. Not the bulls.”

“Not a fan of bulls?”

“Oh, I’m a huge fan of bulls, and bullfighting for that matter. I thought you wouldn’t be interested. But if you are, by all means, let’s—”

He laid his head back against the pillow. “We aren’t going to see the bulls.”

My fingertips played over his forearm. “Suit yourself.”

“But maybe we’ll go to Cappadocia, Turkey, instead. A city cut into the hills.” He paused, picturing it. “I hear they’re planning to start a new tradition of hot-air balloon rides with champagne breakfasts.”

“Mmmm. Then we must go there.”

“Then we’ll of course have to hit all the most talked-about bike routes. Maybe we’ll start three hours southwest of London. Isle of Wight, Great Britain? Huh? Huh?” He wiggled his eyebrows. “Rolling hills beside dramatic seas and long curvy roads that’ll take us past both cliffs and lush green valleys.”

I suppressed a smile. “Were you a travel agent in your former life?”

“I’d be a good one, don’t you think?”

“Only if the next thing you were going to suggest is the Route des Vins.”

“Mmmm. I like the way you say that.” My accent was horrible, and we both knew it. “Tell me more.”

I arranged words in my head. “Vineyards grace the landscape, known not only for their luscious wine selection but for their stunning, jaw-dropping scenery as you pedal through the multimile route from France into Germany.”

He nodded, an impressed flare to his mustache. “A little over the top with the whole ‘jaw-dropping’ bit, but I definitely want to go.”

“You knew about that one before I told you, didn’t you?”

“Can you reach my laptop?” He pointed toward the rolling table near my side of the bed. Deanna had dropped his computer off.

I retrieved his laptop, pulled it onto the bed, opened it, and entered his password. The first thing that popped up was a spreadsheet where Grant had started a list numbered one to twenty-three.

“Check out number seven.”

I scanned until I reached number seven, where he’d typed the words “Route des Vins.”

I looked at him. “You have this all listed. You’re serious.” When had he done this? My eyes moved back to the screen, where Grant’s imagination took us on bike rides that spanned the globe.

“These sound amazing,” I said, my voice shaking. Reality reached all the way down until it gripped my bones and squeezed. All of these places did sound amazing, but we would never go. He hadn’t made this list for us; he’d made it for me. Here I was, trying to find a way for us both to live together, and he was making plans for my life without him. My body shook.

He put a hand over mine.

“But you know where I’d like to go most of all?” he asked.

I couldn’t speak. If I spoke, I’d start screaming, cursing cancer and God.

“Let’s go to our place. Close your eyes, Penelope, and think about our Sunset Rock in Chattanooga.” His voice was low and comforting. “A romantic picnic. We’re looking out at the trees and the city lights.”

“And we won’t dig our food out of the ground because no one in their right mind digs up a romantic picnic dinner.” I was trying—so hard I was trying.

“And we won’t dig our ... hey!”

We closed our eyes on the mountain, breathing in the cool, evening air under the open sky that trailed down to a city waking at dusk, and we fell asleep, the two of us curled together in each other’s arms, the wind gently sweeping over us.