CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
But first thing the next morning wasn’t when the papers got signed.
Come with me to the doc? Roy’s text had been waiting in Emily’s messages when she woke up—blessedly with her alarm, not before it.
What time? she’d typed, thinking she should check her work schedule and when they were due to sign for the lighthouse. But before she had sent it, she backed the text out and wrote, Yes. Just let me know where to be and when.
When was only an hour and a half after Emily and Daniel got Chantelle ready for her zoo day with Bailey, and handed a slightly fussy Charlotte off to Amy for babysitting.
Where was an office downtown Sunset Harbor, where the ceiling tiles were exactly the kind Emily remembered from Dr. Liberman’s office: off-white, pocked, slightly sagging.
The three of them sat in a horseshoe of vinyl seats in the consultation room—Roy at the center, Emily and Patricia flanking, as if they could buffer him against whatever the appointment would yield.
There were results ready from tests done two weeks before Roy’s fainting spell, and that was all he would say.
Emily couldn’t keep her eyes off her father’s hands.
They rested in his lap, fingers interlaced, still broad and blunt-knuckled but too thin now, a scattering of age spots across the backs.
The nails were trimmed with military precision, though the cuticles told the truth: he’d been nervous, picking at them.
His face was the only part that betrayed nothing.
He stared at the door of the consult room as if he could will the doctor through it. Get all this over with.
Patricia checked her phone for the third time in as many minutes.
The gesture was all performance—she wasn’t really reading anything, answering anything, just toggling the lock screen, glancing at the time, then setting it face down on the side table.
She crossed and uncrossed her legs so often that the hem of her pants began to creep up her calf, revealing the indentation of support hose.
The tension was visible in every muscle.
The door rattled and the three of them straightened, almost comically synchronized.
The doctor entered, crisp in green scrubs, dark hair pulled into a tight knot.
She was young for an oncologist, Emily thought, or maybe that was just the effect of seeing her beside Roy, who had aged ten years in the last two.
The doctor’s name badge read “A. Halloran, MD.” She smiled politely, slid onto the little wheeled stool, and propped the clipboard on her knee.
There was no trace of warmth in her expression—pure professional, but not cold.
Emily wondered if that was her personality, or a sign.
“Mr. Mitchell,” she said, and then nodded at the others, “and family.”
Roy managed a smirk. “All present and accounted for.”
Dr. Halloran lifted the clipboard. “I have your latest labs and scan results. Do you want the summary first, or do you want the details?”
“Start with the big picture,” Roy said.
Dr. Halloran turned the sheet so Roy could see, though Emily doubted he could focus on the words. “Your PET scan is clear. No evidence of disease.”
The room tilted. For a second, nobody moved.
Does that mean what I… Emily felt dizzy herself.
Patricia made a sound and gripped Roy’s hand with both of hers. Roy’s face remained impassive, but Emily saw the red flash at the tips of his ears, the way his right foot began to tap in a slow, almost imperceptible rhythm. Emily’s own heart went weirdly slow, then resumed at double speed.
“Clear?” Roy repeated.
“Remission,” Dr. Halloran said. “Your last round of therapy worked. There’s no measurable cancer at this time.”
The word therapy ricocheted, caught in Emily’s ears.
She searched the faces on either side of her, looking for the tell—some sign that she hadn’t misheard.
Patricia’s mouth was slightly open, eyes shining wetly at the corners.
Roy’s eyes stayed on the printout, tracking left to right like he was still trying to parse it.
Dr. Halloran set the clipboard aside, steepled her hands on her lap. “You’ll still need follow-up every few months. Then, after a year, a yearly. Maintenance, labs, scans. But I’m happy to say you have no active disease.”
It was Patricia who broke first. “I don’t understand,” she said, voice feathering at the edges. “He’s been so tired. No appetite. The hand tremors, the forgetfulness. The dizzy spell—”
“That’s not cancer,” Dr. Halloran replied.
“That would be in the details I mentioned. Your hemoglobin is low, Mr. Mitchell. You’re anemic.
That’s likely due to the chemotherapy, but it’s easily treated with supplements.
I’ll send you a script for a strong iron and give you a list of foods that can help.
Appetite will improve as the anemia does.
Everything else is in the normal range. Liver function is good.
The low platelets will resolve on their own. ”
Emily blinked, hard. “So, he’s not… you’re saying he’s not sick?”
Dr. Halloran’s smile this time was real, the lines at the corners of her mouth creasing deeply. “He’s not sick. Not anymore. He’s in remission.”
“If you have any questions, my cell is on the card,” the doctor said, placing it on the side table. “But for today, I’d say go celebrate.”
Roy let his head loll back against the chair, eyes closing. Patricia was openly crying now, silent but unstoppable. Emily sat rigid. Her mind ticked over the words, trying to fit them together: remission, therapy, iron-deficiency, not sick.
She said to Roy, “This is because of the new treatment?”
It was like the air changed pressure in the room. Patricia’s crying quieted instantly. Roy opened one eye.
Dr. Halloran looked between them, then at Roy. There was a quick exchange, silent, electric.
“I’ll give you a minute,” the doctor said, voice gentle. She stood, gathered her clipboard, and let herself out with a quiet click of the door.
Emily watched her father, searching his face for the punchline. He didn’t look at her; his eyes were fixed on the closed door. It was Patricia who answered. She turned to Emily, cheeks streaked but voice already back under control.
“There was a change, after the new treatments. We didn’t want to give anyone false hope, though.”
Emily swallowed again. “You could have told us it was working, Dad. You said you wanted to spend the rest of the time—”
“I did,” Roy said, cutting her off, voice low. “That hasn’t changed. I didn’t want to believe that things might turn around so drastically.”
Emily shook her head, the movement making her dizzier. “When? How?”
“Thanksgiving,” Roy said. “I started showing better signs right after. But, like your mom said, I didn’t want to get your hopes up.”
Patricia reached across Roy to take Emily’s hand, fingers trembling. “He didn’t want to tell you unless it was confirmed beyond a doubt.”
Emily pulled her hand away, not out of anger but a need to anchor herself. “You lied to me.”
Patricia’s mouth twitched. “No. We kept it private.”
Emily pressed her fists to her knees, as if she could squeeze the confusion out through her own skin. “Why?”
Roy answered this time, the words gruff. “You think you can fix everything, Em. I wanted to do this myself. If it failed, you’d know I tried. And that you didn’t have anything to do with the failure. If it worked—well, here we are.”
Emily looked down at her hands, which had gone pale and clawlike against her jeans.
She tried to imagine all those weeks—holidays, the push and pull of daily life, her mom disappearing and Roy trying to still pitch in with the family as though he were fine—while her parents had been living this secret life, one appointment at a time.
And she had agreed to keep the secret when Patricia had finally let it slip, hoping her father would eventually confide in her.
“We wanted to protect you,” Patricia said.
Emily’s voice, when it came, was a whisper. “Don’t ever do that again.”
Patricia nodded, tears starting fresh. Roy made a move to stand but changed his mind, instead pulling Emily toward him in their seats in a half-hug, his arm awkwardly around her shoulders.
Emily let herself sag into the hug, and for a second, she was a child again, not the woman who ran everything, or a mother herself, or anything but someone’s daughter.
When everyone was composed, they gathered their things.
Roy moved slowly, as if unsure of his new, healthy body.
Emily watched as Patricia steadied him, then looped her arm through his.
The three of them made their way out of the office, into the parking lot, into the first day of the rest of whatever time they had.
They didn’t go straight to the car. Instead, Roy steered them to a bench just outside the revolving glass doors of the oncology office.
No one said anything at first. Emily waited, determined not to be the one to break.
Patricia gave in first. She cleared her throat and turned to Emily, eyes rimmed with red but her voice unnaturally steady. “You have questions. I think we owe you answers.”
Emily stared at her mother. “You think?”
Patricia’s lips thinned. “We made a decision, your father and I. He was doing worse, much worse, before the new treatments, but we didn’t want to put you through the wringer. Not again.”
Roy let out a grunt, then shook his head. “It was me, Em. It was my call. I didn’t want you or Daniel or the girls to have to watch me fall apart day by day. It’s hell on a kid.” He paused, then corrected himself. “It’s hell on everyone.”
Emily watched the two of them, so much older and more fragile than they’d been even last year, and couldn’t marshal even an ounce of anger. She just felt hollowed out, her whirlwind thoughts rattling in the empty spaces.
“I wanted palliative only when I first got my diagnosis. That’s what I told you. It was true,” Roy said.