Chapter 14 Generation of Variation by Mutation and Recombination
GENERATION OF VARIATION BY MUTATION AND RECOMBINATION
*Samantha*
Ten minutes later, the world had not ended. I was still alive, if slightly less confident in my own skin than usual.
I sat in a leather club chair in the VIP waiting area, hands folded, eyes focused somewhere on the abstract nothingness of the framed art that decorated the lounge, and tried to take inventory of how many small deaths my ego had just suffered.
The scene from the suite replayed, celluloid crisp, through my mind: me opening the door, expecting to make a quick dash to Tara, and instead finding Andreas stationed in the hall like a stone-faced Roman sentry.
Arms folded, cable-knit pullover stretched tight, the kind of sweater only the expensively gloomy could ever pull off.
He hadn’t said a word at first. Just stared.
I, having resolved in advance to project the aura of a woman who absolutely did not give a shit about eavesdropping . . . was startled.
I don’t remember what exactly I said (probably something acerbic), but I know I did a double take on the sweater.
Mostly because the T-shirt and jeans borrowed from Kaitlyn made me feel like I was twelve and about to attend my first slumber party.
The only thing keeping me from freezing was residual post-shower steam and indignation.
Without any ceremony, Andreas unwrapped himself from the pullover, handed it to me, and said, “Wear this. You look”—his gaze dropped to my chest, then back to my eyes—“cold.”
I’d gawked at him for a second, another acerbic remark on the tip of my tongue, then caved and put it on. The sweater had been warm from his body and, once I’d pulled it over my head, the collar sagged perfectly around my collarbones in a way that was both flattering and cozy.
After a beat, he’d asked if we could talk. I’d said yes.
Thus, we’d walked to the VIP lounge, him three paces behind me like he didn’t want to startle a flighty horse.
We didn’t talk when we reached the empty cluster of club chairs arranged in a half circle near the window, which was where I sat now, ensconced in his sweater that smelled like him, hands gripping my knees.
Andreas returned from the small kitchenette at the back of the lounge, carrying two mugs. He set one on the side table next to my seat, leaving it there like a peace offering.
He took the club chair opposite mine. He didn’t sit back or relax; he perched on the edge, his eyes ensnaring mine.
“Thank you,” I said, eyeing the mug.
“It’s only tea,” he replied.
“Still, thank you.”
He nodded and ran a hand through his hair. The movement seemed agitated. Then, before I could say anything else, he fixed his gaze on me and said, “I am so sorry.”
The words hit me like a pillow when I’d been expecting a bus.
I’d waited months to hear him say anything close to these words; I’d planned out a dozen ways I would respond; I’d even rehearsed them out loud with Diya and, once, Kaitlyn. But now, here, in this blindingly sterile lounge, I felt utterly underwhelmed.
I took a second, waiting for more emotion from myself. When nothing happened, I asked, “What are you sorry for?”
He inhaled, letting it out slow. “I am so sorry I hurt you, and I lied to you, and I manipulated you and hurt the people you care about.”
It was so exactly the apology I’d wanted. He’d nailed every point. His answer was the correct one. And yet . . .
I tore my gaze from his, picked up the tea, and studied the surface of the liquid. “You know, when I imagined this moment, I thought it would feel better. Like, emotionally satisfying? But actually, honestly, I feel nothing except tired.” I peeked at him.
He nodded, looking acutely restless, watching me, not speaking. But his eyes were fixed on me with a kind of rawness I’d never seen before.
“You can’t just say sorry and expect things to go back to how they . . . were,” I finished, my voice thin. “It doesn’t work that way. You don’t just say ‘sorry’ and expect me to forget about all of it.”
He nodded, his focus flickering from my face to the mug, then back again. “I do not expect you to forget it. I know I can never take back what I did.”
I set the tea back down again and crossed my arms over the bulge of cable-knit fabric. The sweater was so soft I could’ve buried my face in it. “You can’t. But you can take responsibility. And accept the consequences.”
Andreas inhaled and nodded several times. “I will.”
We let that hang. Reaching forward again, I took a careful sip of tea. It tasted faintly of ginger.
I set the mug down once more, using the action to gather my composure. “So. What now? I mean, what do you want from me?”
Andreas seemed to hesitate, as though carefully debating his next words, then asked, “May I know, what are the consequences?”
For a second, I had no answer. Not because I hadn’t daydreamed about this scenario, but because I never thought I’d get to write the rules.
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “I’ll message you when I know.”
He nodded, accepting this with all the gravitas of a convicted, but repentant, criminal. “What can I do in the meantime?”
It was a reasonable question. I tried to think of something equally reasonable, but all I could do was remember how it felt, for all those months, to want an apology and not get one. To crave an ounce of self-awareness from him, just once.
“For the next ten times you see me,” I said, “you have to apologize. It needs to be the first thing out of your mouth after hello. Every single time.”
He cocked his head, his eyes narrowing with plain confusion.
I leaned forward, giving him the full weight of my frustration. “You should’ve apologized in Paris, first thing! This is to make up for all the times you didn’t say you were sorry and you could have over the last few months.”
Andreas processed this, then gave a tiny, single nod. “Okay,” he said. “That is fair. Anything else?”
“Yes,” I said, even though I hadn’t yet thought of anything else.
He waited. I glared at him. He opened his mouth. Then he closed it and waited some more.
A faint muscle ticked in his jaw several times before he said, “Well? What else?”
“I get to keep this sweater.” It was an impulsive ask, but I knew right away it was a good one. This thing was so freaking soft and snuggly. I wanted it.
Andreas gave me a single somber nod, but his eyes were twinkling. “It is yours. Is there anything else?”
“I’ll make a list. It will be very long. It might be a book.”
I watched him fight a smile, then lost to it, the edges of his mouth twitching. I wondered if he found me funny, or if this was his way of signaling submission, showing me he’d let me have the last word.
Before I could test it by actually saying another word, Tara materialized in the doorway to the lounge, hands planted on her hips, face set in lines of seriousness.
“Sorry to interrupt,” she said. Then to me, “My friend found that guy you were looking for.”
I stood up at once. “Where is he?”
Andreas also stood, tilting his head. “What guy?”
I ignored him. “Where is he?” I repeated.
Tara’s gaze flicked from me to Andreas, then back again. “He’s right here in Manhattan. The NCI-designated cancer research hospital.”
I blinked, doing the math. “He got his medical license back?”
Tara shook her head. “No. He’s a patient. In something called the phase one research unit.”
I felt a whoosh of air leave me and slumped back into the chair, heat draining from my face. “Oh. Geez.” My grandmother had been a terminal patient who’d volunteered for phase one studies before she died. The memory of those days made something inside me recoil.
Tara frowned. “What? What does that mean?”
I rubbed the heel of my palm into my forehead, marshalling my thoughts.
“The phase one clinical research unit is where—not always, but often—many terminal patients go to participate in end-of-life medical research studies. So, after an agent passes bench research, it moves to phase one human subjects research, which is where the entire point is to determine whether the agent—er, sorry, the drug—is safe for humans.”
Tara’s lips pressed together in a line as she absorbed this. “You mean these terminal cancer patients donate their last months while they’re alive? Allowing themselves to be research test subjects to see if drugs are safe for humans? Like being a human guinea pig?”
I grimaced at the wording. “That’s a very crude way of putting it.
Anyone who goes through end-of-life care is brave, whether that be in a phase one unit, in hospice, whatever is right for them and their family.
They are remarkable in a way you and I will never fully understand, God willing.
What these particular patients do as part of a phase one unit is a huge gift to science and the world and it’s disrespectful to them and their sacrifice to call them guinea pigs. ”
Tara looked appropriately chastised. I also felt Andreas’s gaze on my profile, sensed his brain working, calculating.
I didn’t have the energy to guess what his calculations yielded, so I went on. “They’re testing the next generation of therapies so that maybe future cancer patients might go into remission.”
“Okay. I’m sorry. You’re right,” Tara said remorsefully, adding, “My point is, your guy is a patient. And, get this, he’s part of a gene therapy trial conducted by Genetix.”
This gave me pause and I felt my eyes seeking out Andreas. He and I shared a look as I said, “Huh. That’s . . . very interesting.”
She shrugged. “So, you can catch him there if you want to talk to him.”
Crossing my arms again, I nodded. “Please, thank your friend for me.”
Tara said, “I will. But you should hurry and schedule a meeting. If this guy is a terminal patient, your time might be running out.”
* * *