Chapter 19 Phyllida #2
‘I—’ but her voice caught as adrenaline flooded through her.
Phyllida had worked hard to push away the heavy thoughts; the sick niggling sense that things were not good.
She had worked hard to convince herself that her intuition was out of kilter—that all would be well—so that now she found herself tripping over the idea of sharing anything at all.
David had expressly asked her not to, which should be reason enough.
Still, Caleb was a doctor, and yes, he was somewhat friendly with David from his Saturday bookshop visits, but Caleb was bound to secrecy in this context, wasn’t he?
She was the patient, so it didn’t matter what she told him. It was confidential.
‘Anyway,’ she said, resolved now to her task, ‘is there an information sheet you can give me, on nutrition in cancer for helping immunity? A booklet? I realise there are many types, but surely all varieties respond to a boosted immune response if the cells are properly fed?’
Caleb appeared to be far away for a moment, staring at the wall behind her. She had an odd desire to check behind her shoulder, even though she knew it was only the door there.
Finally he said, ‘You’ll want specific information on the type of cancer you’re dealing with, I expect.
Not just the nutritional side of things.
And it will be important how early they’ve caught it.
What stage it’s at. I can give you information, but it will be different for each type of cancer, and …
will depend on the severity of the disease, and on the treatment he’s decided to undertake. ’
‘He or she,’ said Phyllida.
‘He or she,’ agreed Caleb.
‘Well …’ She took a breath, thought about how to answer.
She didn’t actually know much. They had told her he would be starting treatment in Sydney, next week.
Then, on the phone, David had been making an appointment and mentioned some details.
He would be staying with Miriam in Sydney, he said, so not to worry herself about accommodation.
‘Well,’ she began again, ‘I know he told someone on the phone that it was …’ She hesitated, bringing the conversation to mind. ‘It was stage four.’ She ignored his deepening frown. She took a breath and focused. ‘And it was pancreatic.’
Phyllida had studied herbs and ancient medical texts over the years; had a good handle on the human body.
As a young woman, she had sold a first edition of Gray’s Anatomy to a young woman in a trench coat who said she wanted it for the diagrams. Printed in 1858 but still in pretty good condition, considering.
But there was nothing in her shop right now that was even remotely useful in this situation.
David had told her about these new computer inventions, recently.
Information superhighways that could be accessed at your fingertips, apparently.
Internets, he called them. They sounded very complicated, and anyway, she didn’t have one.
So, Phyllida had no information available to her about pancreatic cancer.
She hoped it was one of the curable ones.
‘I assume it can be …’ She trailed off as she noticed his eyes, now as big as saucers.
‘He said he needs to delay the start of his university course work, that he needs time off. Or … she needs it … Is that enough information for you, though? Is it useful?’
Phyllida regarded Caleb with interest. Her urge to cry had completely cleared now.
She was zipping with resolve. She’d made the decision to confide, and she would soon get the correct information.
Did her lovely boy need chicken soup or was spinach better?
Turmeric was thought to detoxify carcinogens, but milk thistle might work too.
It was good for your liver, and there was bound to be some digestive system interaction with the pancreas, surely?
Phyllida just needed some more details about how the systems interacted with food and with each other.
She was aware that some herbs, while used for healing certain ailments, could be harmful for others.
She just needed clarity and for Doctor Patel to tell her that all approaches were valid.
And if she was honest, she wanted the reassurance of modern medicine; for the doctor to tell her that David would be all right.
Ancient herbal knowledge passed down by her grandmother was one thing, but when it came to the crunch, to David, she wanted a guarantee from someone with a medical degree.
‘I see,’ said Caleb, not meeting her gaze.
She wanted his eye contact; she wanted to explain her thought processes, her ideas on how her own medicinal research might interact with his learnings.
She had read an Ayurvedic text not long ago in an Orientalist collection of books she’d bought.
It was fascinating the way they considered herbs as powerful medicines.
Ancient wisdom, still so relevant. She had so many questions about smoothing the way to a quick recovery.
And did David really need to do chemotherapy in Sydney?
Was there some sort of option locally? Caleb was sure to know.
Caleb would be her co-conspirator in her Getting David Better project.
But then, Phyllida realised something wasn’t right. It was the strangest thing. Caleb’s lovely rich complexion had vanished.
He looked pensive for a long time. ‘I’m going to proceed on the basis that we are talking about David,’ said Caleb.
‘And that David has stage-four pancreatic cancer.’ He took a breath.
‘If so, Phyllida, I need more information to be sure, but in such a case, I would say that the prognosis is likely not good.’