Dawn finally fell into an exhausted slumber without one of her questions answered and without any of her ragged emotions settled.
* * * * *
Dawn got her chance to talk to Marlee’s grandmother the very next afternoon. She got off the elevator on the oncology floor and was walking past the activity room when she saw the elderly woman sitting in a lounge chair inside the empty room.
With her heart thudding, Dawn entered. Grandmother Hodges was lying back in the chair, her feet elevated, her eyes closed. Unsure if she were asleep. Dawn softly cleared her throat. The older woman’s eyes opened, and Dawn could tell she’d been crying. “I–I hope I didn’t disturb you,” she said.
Grandmother Hodges studied Dawn as if trying to bring her into focus. “Oh, yes,” she said. “You’re Marlee’s friend.”
“Yes, ma’am. I was on my way to visit her. How is she today?”
“Sleeping. It’s the pain medication, you know. It makes her comfortable enough to sleep.”
Dawn felt her mouth go dry. There was so much she wanted to ask, but didn’t know how. “Umm, she told me the specialist wasn’t going to operate.”
“No. They won’t be operating again,” answered the woman.
Dawn felt her knees tremble and her fingertips turn icy cold. “Mrs. Hodges, will you please tell me something? I’ve tried to get the answer from other people, but no one will tell me the truth.”
Grandmother Hodges’s face became a solemn mask. “You want to know if Marlee’s going to get well, don’t you?”
“Yes, ma’am. She really wants to go home.”
Grandmother Hodges sighed. Then she answered softly, “No, my dear. She won’t be going home. My poor baby is dying. She’s dying.”
Sixteen
DAWN felt numb all over. She thought about screaming. She thought about running away. She thought about collapsing. But all she was able to do was stand, rock solid still, rooted to the floor. She wasn’t surprised about Marlee, not really. She realized that deep down she’d known the truth all along.
“Does Marlee know?” she asked Grandmother Hodges, who had begun to cry softly.
“No.” The old woman grabbed Dawn’s hand. “You won’t tell her, will you?” she begged. “Please say you’ll keep it a secret.”
“She’ll be able to figure it out. I know she will.”
“I want her to have her illusions as long as possible.”
Dawn thought Marlee should be told. She’d want to know if it were her. Dawn shuddered as she thought back to how sick she’d been after her transplant and how tired she’d felt. Even the act of breathing had been a chore. If it hadn’t been for Rob urging her on, she didn’t think she would have made it.
“Do Marlee’s doctors have any idea how long she has?”
“Evidently, there are tumors all inside her body pressing against her vital organs.” Grandmother Hodges’ voice caught. “It won’t be long.”
Knowing the truth and hearing the truth were two separate things, Dawn decided. “I was on my way to see her.” Her lips felt wooden as she said the words.
“She loves having you visit her. Every evening she tells me about what the two of you did, and she tells me how she can’t wait to see you the next day.”
“Doesn’t anybody else come visit her?”
The elderly woman shook her head. “There’s no one else. I’m all she has, and she’s all I have.” Her eyes filled with tears and she fished a linen handkerchief from her lap. “Please excuse me.”
Dawn watched her weep softly. “I should go in and see her now.” Still overcome, Grandmother Hodges nodded. Dawn slipped out of the room and headed down the hall. She forced herself not to cry. It wouldn’t be good to go into Marlee’s room crying. As she passed the nurses’ station, Katie caught her eye.
Quickly, Katie came around the desk and took Dawn’s arm. “You’re pale as a ghost. Are you all right?”
“I just talked with Marlee’s grandmother.” Katie nodded, and Dawn added, “She told me everything.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t say anything the other night.”
“It’s okay—really.”
Katie gave her a quick hug. “You’re a very special person, Dawn. I’m so glad I know you.”
Dawn hugged her back. “You, too.”
Dawn put a smile on her face and swung into Marlee’s room. “Ready for a game of Monopoly? This time, I get to be the banker.”
Marlee was propped up. Her skin had a yellowish cast, and her face looked pinched with pain. “It’s about time you came,” she said crossly.
Ignoring her tone of voice. Dawn asked, “Are you okay?”
“I hurt.”
Dawn motioned toward the morphine pump. “Isn’t it working?”
“I’m trying not to use it so much.”
“Why not? You should—it helps you.”
“It makes me groggy and sleepy. I hate sleeping so much.” Marlee shifted in bed and grimaced. “Will you open my blinds? I want to see the sunlight. Grams always closes them, and I hate lying here in the dark.”
Dawn opened them and immediately the room was filled with a wash of summer morning light. “Is that better?”
“Yes.” Marlee did appear more relaxed, so Dawn brought her favorite chair over to the bed. “I don’t feel like playing a game,” Marlee confessed.
“What do you want to do?”
“I hate it here. I want to go home.”
“But you can’t leave today.”
Marlee turned her body toward Dawn and winced. Dawn clenched her fists, but otherwise tried not to react to the pain. “I don’t like the way they treat me here.”
“How’s that?”
“They’re keeping secrets from me.”
Dawn’s heart gave a little lurch. “Oh, I don’t think—”
“Yes, they are. I can tell. Grams is always whispering to the nurses. And my doctors hardly visit anymore. They’ve even stopped taking me down to radiology.”
“Marlee, after you first got admitted, you were complaining about too much medicine and too many visits.”
“It’s different now.”
Agitated, Dawn got up and walked to the window. Staring out at the bright blue sky, the memory of Sandy stole over her. Sandy who always knew what to say. Who always knew how to be kind and understanding. If only Sandy were here now.
Silently Dawn pleaded, Let me say the right things to Marlee. Please let me say the right things. She turned back toward the bed, resting her weight against the sill. “This is a big hospital, Marlee,” she said. “You’re not the only sick person here, you know.”
“You think I’m terrible for complaining, don’t you?”
Marlee’s voice sounded so small and miserable that Dawn hurried to her bedside and took her hand. “Of course, I don’t.”
“Do you like me, Dawn?”
“Like you?”
“Are we friends? I–I want you to be my friend.”
“Why would I come here all the time if we weren’t friends?”
“I guess you wouldn’t.” Evidently, another spasm of pain went through Marlee, because she gave a slight cry.
“Don’t try to be brave,” Dawn urged, her insides feeling like twisted knots. “Friends can’t stand to see their friends hurting.”
Marlee reached over and adjusted a knob on the morphine pump. Moments later, the look of pain eased on her face. Her ragged breathing became more even, and her body relaxed on the bed. With eyes closed, she said, “I’m such a loser.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I never fit in anyplace. Not at school, not at camp, not at home.”
“But your grandmother loves you very much. I can tell.”
“I know she does. I hardly remember my parents. Mostly in the pictures Grams has of them. Sometimes I wish I had a mother to be with me. Grams and I did all right together, but still . . .” Marlee’s eye closed, and for a moment Dawn wondered if she’d drifted off to sleep. “Poor Grams.
If only I hadn’t gotten sick. Why’d I have to get sick, Dawn?” Marlee asked in a whisper.
Unshed tears clogged Dawn’s throat. Why didn’t she have any answers? “It’s not your fault, Marlee. Nobody gets to pick what happens to them in life. Things just happen. We have to keep going on, no matter what happens.”
“This stuff is making me tired,” Marlee said, motioning toward the pump. “Will you stay with me until I go to sleep?”
“I’ll stay,” Dawn told her.
“I will get to go home, won’t I, Dawn?” Marlee’s voice faded off and she fell asleep.
Dawn slowly extracted her hand from Marlee’s fragile grasp. She was grateful that she hadn’t had to answer. Dawn knew she couldn’t have lied to the girl about her going home. She sat for a long time beside Marlee’s bed and watched her sleep. Later, when she was certain Marlee wouldn’t awaken, Dawn left the room to call Rob to come and take her home.
Seventeen
“THIS will be my last day on the job.” Dawn tied her apron behind her back as she made her announcement to Rhonda.
“What! You can’t be serious.” Rhonda dropped the ice cream scoop she was washing in the sink with a loud clank.
“I’ve already called your uncle and told him.”
“But you said you loved this job.”
“I do.”
“Then why?”
“I have to quit. Marlee’s dying,” Dawn told her, expecting the phrase to explain everything.
But an uncomprehending look crossed Rhonda’s face. “What’s that got to do with you?”
“Because she needs me to be with her. She wants me to be with her.”
“But what about all the plans we’ve made? Buying new school clothes? What about all the fun we’re having?”
Dawn stared at Rhonda in amazement. “Didn’t you hear me? I said Marlee’s dying.”
Rhonda turned and began to furiously wash the sink full of ice cream scoops. “Well, I think it’s weird and creepy to hang around someone who’s dying.”
“It isn’t weird or creepy,” Dawn declared. “It’s something I have to do.”
“How long?”
“‘How long’ what?”
“How long will you be with her?”
“However long it takes.” Dawn felt bewildered by Rhonda’s response, by her lack of sensitivity. She whipped around, grabbed a damp sponge, and hurried over to wipe off the table tops in the empty shop. This is ridiculous, she kept telling herself. How could Rhonda be so heartless?
Dawn heard the sound of crying coming from behind the counter. She dropped the sponge and ran back to the sink. Rhonda was leaning over the basin of water, tears slipping down her cheeks. “What’s wrong?” Dawn asked.
Rhonda burst into sobs and grabbed Dawn and hugged her fiercely. Shocked by her outburst. Dawn cautiously patted her on the back. “Why are you crying?”
“I don’t want you to go away,” Rhonda said, gulping for air.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Dawn insisted, confused. “I’m just quitting my job, that’s all.”
“But you’ll start school with me?”
“Of course, I’ll be starting school. Why wouldn’t I?”
“You’re not going to get sick ever again, are you?”
Was that what was bothering Rhonda? That she might get sick? That she might die? “It’s not in my plans.”
Rhonda wiped the back of her hand over her cheeks. Melted chocolate made a dark smear on her skin. Dawn reached over and dabbed at it with a paper towel. “You’ve got fudge on your face,” she explained. “There, I’ve got it off.”
“How will I manage without you?” Rhonda asked with a self-conscious half-laugh. “If you aren’t here, who’s going to look out for me? Who’s going to tell me I’m making an idiot of myself over some cute guy?”
“I’ll hang around and keep an eye on you.”
“How long will you hang around with me?”
Dawn held onto Rhonda’s shoulder and looked her straight in the eye. “Until we’re both old and fat and wrinkled.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
* * * * *
Dawn lay awake in the dark. The lighted digits on her radio alarm clock read 5:00 A.M. Go back to sleep, she told herself. You’ve got to be at the hospital in a few hours, and you’ll be all tired out if you don’t. She didn’t want to fall asleep while visiting Marlee. But no amount of plumping up her pillow or snuggling down under her covers could make sleep come.
Her mind kept resisting what her heart kept telling her to go do. I can’t, she said inwardly. Yes, you can. You must, another inward voice directed. In the end, the “must” voice won out. Quietly, she slipped from her bed, tugged on her summer robe, and stole into the hallway.
The house was quiet, her parents and Rob still asleep. A nightlight from the bathroom cast a glow along the wall. She followed it and at the end of the hall she found the door to the attic. Beside the door was the flashlight her father always kept plugged into the wall socket. She took it, turned it on, and slowly climbed the stairs. At the top, inside the attic, she swung the light in a wide arc, throwing beams into the dark corners.
In a few hours, the summer sun would make the area unbearably hot. But right now, the room was only stuffy, a contrast from the air-conditioned coolness of the house below. “Where is it?” she asked aloud, swinging the flashlight in a circle. Where had she put it?
The light beams fell on an old dresser. Behind it, there was a set of wooden shelves. Her heart hammered as the rays of light fell across an old, dog-eared box. Forcing the dresser quietly aside, she tugged the box off the shelf. Clutching it, she dumped a pile of old curtains from a sagging overstuffed chair, sat down and placed the box in her lap.
Dust had settled on the lid, and she blew on it, making it billow. She rested the flashlight on the arm of the chair so that it spread a circle of light across her lap.
Open it, she told herself. It should be so simple. But her hands were shaking, and her mouth was dry and every nerve in her body tingled. “Nothing’s hard about taking a lid off a box,” she whispered aloud as if the words would give her courage.
The smells of the attic clung to her. She wanted go back downstairs, wash the grime off her hands, and climb back into bed. But instead she lifted the lid. Inside the box everything was exactly as she remembered. All that remained of Sandy Chandler’s life lay cradled in her lap. At least, all that remained of the things she could touch and smell and see.
She had expected to break down, fall apart, as she’d done so often in the past. But although a huge lump had risen into her throat, she didn’t cry. Instead, a feeling of warmth and tenderness spread through her. Her finger caressed the hair combs and popcorn necklace. Each memento was like a tiny sparkling jewel that glowed in her memory.
Dawn untied the bundle of letters and re-read them, one by one—from the first, following Sandy’s return home from the hospital where they’d met, to the last, postmarked from Mexico. Sandy had written. Good night, my friend. Go with God, in small, neat, perfect handwriting.
At the very bottom of the box, in a plain white envelope, Dawn discovered the page from the Bible, Ecclesiastes 3. She didn’t have to read it. She knew the words by heart. Aloud, she said, “‘For everything there is a season. . . . A time to live and a time to die.’”
Dawn sighed and rested her head against the chair. “I miss you, Sandy,” she said. “I wish I could talk to you. Tell you about camp. And Brent.” She smiled. “He’s pretty cute, and he kisses real nice. Of course, with my limited experience, I’m no expert.”
There was a window high above her, at the highest point of the attic. Daylight was breaking, and she could see pale streaks of pink in the sky. Soon, it would be time to get ready to go to the hospital. “I wish I could tell you about Marlee, too, Sandy. She’s kind of a pain, but I like her anyway.” Dawn said in the close air. “I wish you could have been a CIT with me this summer.” She thought abou
t the fun they might have had and smiled again.
Dawn stared absently into space, images of the two of them running through her mind’s eye like a scene from a movie. The pretty pictures made her feel warm and soft. Yet, they always ended with the image of her standing alone by her front door, receiving a box from the mailman. Alone. That’s how her memories of her and Sandy always ended.
She closed her eyes and saw herself walking down a road. Sandy was walking with her, but then somewhere along the way, Sandy dropped back. Dawn saw herself stop and turn to signal to her friend to come beside her, but Sandy simply stood and waved. And no matter how urgently Dawn beckoned to her, Sandy would not come.
Slowly Dawn opened her eyes. She was in her attic and day was breaking outside the window. She thought of Marlee. Soon she, too, would slip away from her. Why did the people she cared about go off and leave her?
Dawn stood, her eyes still fixed on the outside sky that grew brighter each minute. From below, she heard the sounds of water running. Her father taking his morning shower. Life was going on all around her. Her life. She put what was left of Sandy Chandler’s away in the box and took it downstairs to her room.
Eighteen
DAWN sensed a hushed atmosphere on the oncology floor the moment she got off the elevator. The first person she saw was Marlee’s grandmother, shuffling down the hall with her cane. Dawn hurried up beside her, her heart thudding. “Is everything all right?” Dawn asked.
“Yes. Marlee’s resting. I’m going down to the lounge to prop up my feet. Doctor’s orders.”
Dawn tagged after her, unsure of what else to do. She watched the elderly woman settle into the chair and elevate the footrest. “Can I get you something?” she asked.
“No, thank you, dear. The nurses have taken good care of me.” She gazed at Dawn with kind, tired eyes. “I want to thank you for being here for Marlee these past six weeks. It’s meant so much to her to have somebody more her age care about her.”
“You mean a lot to her, too.”