“Christ Almighty!” I breathe when I spot my wife lying on her side on the brick paver patio. She’s visibly struggling to help herself up, but very ineffectively. She’s reaching for something to hold onto, but her fingers grasp at thin, vacant night air.
Rushing to her side, I take her gently under her arms and ease her into a sitting position. “Are you okay?”
My eyes rake her from head to toe, pausing at the pale cotton material between her legs to look for signs of bleeding. I exhale in relief when I see none.
Lena laughs, a high-pitched sound like a little girl. “I slipped in the wet grass,” she explains, patting the bricks beside her. “But I almost got it. Look!” She’s pointing up into the dark sky, gesturing toward something only she can see. “Get it, Daddy! Get it before it gets away.”
That’s when I realize what she’s seeing—lightning bugs. In her mind, she’s a child again, chasing fireflies with her father.
Her reality drifts further and further from mine with every passing day, it seems. I’m losing her hour by hour, millimeter by millimeter, breath by breath. I know it won’t be very long before she leaves my world and never comes back.
Another crack in my heart widens into a gaping chasm, leaking a little more of my hope and strength and soul into the cool predawn air.
I reposition myself and bend to scoop Lean into my arms. Her gaze remains trained on the insects I can’t see, her face bright and full of wonder. Despite her sunken cheeks and the blue-black smudges still visible beneath her eyes, she’s strikingly beautiful in her thrall. Enough to make me catch my breath.
Still.
Always.
That’s why I pivot toward the lounger, the one with the cream-colored blanket thrown over the raised back, and sit. I pull Lena against my chest and reach behind me for the fuzzy cover, dragging it over both of us to ward off the slight chill. She tugs it up to her chin and nestles her head into the curve of my neck then lets out a long sigh like she couldn’t be happier. I brush my lips over blonde hair cast silver by the moonlight, and I hold my wife until she falls back to sleep.
********
The following day, I drive Lena to the hospital for the placement of a nasogastric tube through which she can be fed supplemental nutrition. The oncologist suspects that her decreasing ability to swallow means that the tumor has spread up into the bottom portion of her esophagus. Dr. Taffer wants to get the NG tube in as soon as possible, before the cancer grows even more and prevents her from passing the tube beyond it.
I’m not sure if it’s a good thing or not, but Lena is especially coherent today.
As she rests on the stretcher, awaiting her doctor, she turns her soft brown eyes up to mine. “This will be a good thing, Nate.” Her smile says she’s trying to convince herself as much as she’s trying to convince me. “You’ll see.”
“Anything that keeps you with me longer is a good thing.”
Somewhere along the way, we made the silent agreement to drop the pretense of her survival. Now we speak about more time in terms of weeks and days, not months. Definitely not years.
I figure Lena has worked it out because of her worsening symptoms. She seems to be aware of that even when she isn’t lucid for extended periods of time. I worked it out from all of the looks I’ve been getting from the doctors and nurses. On their faces, they wear sadness and a form of pity that rips through my heart like a poison-tipped arrow. They know the end is coming. It’s coming fast, faster than I think I can handle sometimes.
“They’ll show you how to use it for when I can’t,” Lena assures me. Her words are matter of fact, but there’s a hollowness to them, an emptiness that tears at my insides.
It’s a strange and awful thing to discuss dying this way.
********
Much to my relief, having the feeding tube placed has made a noticeable difference. I’ve been diligent about feeding her exactly as prescribed. I keep the fridge overflowing with organic fruits and vegetables that I blend into highly nutritious shakes to give to her via the tube three times a day. I also give her the blue-green supplement twice a day and flush the tube with plenty of water before and after use each time. Not only is Lena livelier and wakeful, her overall appearance doesn’t seem so…sickly. Her skin has pinked up, her mind seems to focus more readily, even her eyes seem brighter. And for better or worse, the improvement gives me a small burst of hope.
If we can just get through the delivery, maybe she can start treatment. Maybe there will be something they can do. Maybe it won’t be too late.
“You didn’t realize this was going to be a full-time job, did you?” Lena teases me. We are smooshed together on the patio lounger, basking in the late May sunset.