“How does anyone ever hold up when the love of their life is dying at the age of twenty-nine?”
“Probably as well as you are.”
“Then not too good.”
“It’s a shit hand of cards he was dealt, Cate.”
“Yeah, it’s not fair. And all I keep asking myself is why can’t the bad people get shit like this? Drew never has a bad thing to say about anyone. He was always the good guy, you know?”
“It’s what I’ve been told. Everyone says he’s the golden boy. Smart as hell and the greatest diagnostician. He was like a god around here. When he had the recurrence, everyone was just sick about it. Let me tell you, he had the best care, Cate. His case went all over the world. There wasn’t a stone left unturned.”
I reach out and touch his hand. “Thank you for telling me this. We haven’t been here long enough to meet a lot of the other fellows, so I didn’t know. I appreciate that.”
He digs in his pocket and pulls out a card. “Listen, if you need anything, just call. I’m out of here in about an hour. But the whole department is on this thing. You should know that. This has been really tough on Rosenberg. Everyone loves Drew.”
I look at his card briefly and say, “Thanks. You’ve been very kind.” Then I gather up my crumbly muffin and coke and head back to the room.
Two days later, my Drew, my husband, the only man I’ve ever loved fades away as he takes his final breath, with me in the bed next to him, Ben holding one hand and Letty holding the other. It’s very peaceful—for Drew. For me, my world shatters into tiny pieces as all the pieces of Drew leave this world. All the pieces of me remain behind, broken and … alone.
DREW’S FUNERAL TAKES PLACE ONE week before our first anniversary. Drew being Drew, left Ben explicit instructions on how he wanted things handled. So Ben took care of mostly everything. It was a good thing, too, because I was in a state of perpetual numbness. Ray and Letty handled the venue, choosing the same church Drew and I were married in.
I am told later that people attended from his residency, his hockey team including Sam and Caroline, from his medical school class, and his fellowship program. I see none of them. The church is nothing but a blank slate, all I am is a huge empty space, and the place where my heart used to be is a black hole. I am hollow, vacant. The minister says some lovely things, but I don’t really follow. Ben sits on one side and Letty on the other. I squeeze both of their hands, just to make myself feel something, anything.
The minister allows anyone to come up to the pulpit to say something about Drew, if they wish. I see many people step up and speak, but I hear nothing. Not until Ben. He has to untangle his fingers from mine when he walks up to take the microphone. His hands tremble as he digs into the pocket of his suit coat and pulls out his speech. Ben’s eulogy is the one I listen to and my heart latches onto it, hanging on every syllable.
He starts when they met, in kindergarten, and progresses throughout their lives. But his delivery is priceless. It’s funny but punctuated with moments of love, not enough to bring everyone to sobs, only enough to get the points. It’s his story about Drew learning to ice skate that brings down the house.
“So he says, ‘Dude, I’m serious. I’m going to learn this if it kills me.’ And you have to picture Drew—six feet three inches in one of those leotard outfits, right? So I say to him, ‘You do know you’ll be in recitals and stuff, right?’ And he says, ‘Yeah. Will you come watch?’ And he’s serious. So he goes at it like you’ve never seen. He comes home all bruised up and tells me about how he’s learning these Salchows and axels and is all geeked out about it. I’m talking Drew McKnight everyone. Figure skating! So he finally gets to the point where he has to perform all these jumps and things and he begs me to come watch. I’m his best friend. What am I going to say? So I head over to the ice rink and I see huge Drew in the midst of all these seven and eight year old girls in pink tutus. It would be like seeing The Rock taking ballet. No kidding. Each time he performs, or one of the little girls does something, they all high five or fist bump each other. And Drew is right in the middle of them. It was freaking hilarious. But I swear to god, that night, the man comes home, puts the figure skates in the closet, trades them out for a pair of blades and picks up hockey like he was born to play. And that was Drew McKnight.”