Discalimer: No I don't own King Arthur.
This is very loosly based on the film the Bucket list.
Summary is basically: Izzy has a successful lie, money, good job, but when she is diagnosed with Cancer she decides to live her life to the full She is given a second chance, a chance to fulfil her life, and find meaning, and maybe change her own destiny and others along the way.
Please don't flame me because of the illness, I know what its like to deal with loved ones with cancer, but this is a happy story really. Let me know what you think and whether i should continue.
Thanks x
On the third of March 2007, at 3.37pm Isabella Sullivan sat in Dr Sampsons office, looking stunned at the news she had just received from the woman who sat in front of her. She thought back a few weeks earlier, before this nightmare had started, she was 41, the editor for one of the most successful newspaper in England, 'The Times', one of the most intelligent people in London. She ate in fancy restaurants, was constantly consulted for information and news, even found time to go to the gym on a regular basis.
But now that all felt irrelevant, it didn't matter that she knew who were the top runners for the next US elections, or that she had been personally or that she was earning more than most people in the UK, or all the irrelevant knowledge that she did. It did not help her now.
Just one sentence had changed her irrevocably.
"I'm afraid that its not good news, the cancer is terminal, there's nothing we can do."
Six months, maybe a year, that was all she was given. 'Six months!' she thought, what kind of diagnosis is that, 'I paid all that money, and for what! They can't even do anything'. Dr Sampson asked whether she wanted to be admitted for care and observation, but Isabella declined, 'what can be done now?' she thought.
An hour later, she was walking down Oxford Street, she didn't take in any of the hustle and bustle around her, it was half term so she was surrounded by chattering girls and boys, free from school to go sightseeing, and shopping. She didn't listen to any of their conversations, didn't look at their youthful faces, just walked, lost in her own morbid thoughts. Six months, six months, six months, continually reeling round her mind, what kind of time is that, it had taken her 41 years to get to where she was in life, 41 years to be successful, and she had sacrificed so much.
'41 years, and what will I have to show for it, when I am buried, who will be there?' No family no friends, she'd let that part of her life go, at the time she'd told herself it didn't matter, she had loads of time to make up that part of her life, after all loads of people had children in their 40's now didn't they? But now, six months, what could she do in that time. There was still so much she wanted to do, she had always told herself that she would get round to it, but she had always been too busy.
She reached her apartment, sliding her key into the lock she shook her mind back to the present. Looking around her flat, she realised what her life really was, just stuff. The artwork ad sculptures that adorned the minimalist style living place. But where was the sign that it was a home, where were the pictures of her with a husband and children, friends even? There were none, she had no family, no friends. Where were the ornaments from exotic places she had visited in her gap year? There were none, she had ever taken time off, to busy finding a career. Where were the hand drawn scribbles from a child, telling its mother of its love? There were none, she had never bothered to stop to love.
Falling down to the floor Isabella sobbed, not just tears, but real heart-wrenching sobs that echoed and howled throughout the flat, she sobbed not because she was dying, but because she was dying and her life had come to nothing, for all the time she had spent trying to build a career, trying to be successful, she had forgotten to live her life, had always said that everybody wanted to be rich, wanted people to know their name.
Now she knew she was wrong, did it matter that she was on a seven figure salary with generous bonusus and perks, when she had no one to come home to. She always thought she needed to have money to leave to those behind when she was dead, but did that matter now when she had no one to leave the fruits of her success to. When she had no stories to tell, no memories to comfort her.
She remembered back to the hospital when she was in the waiting room, an old lady had just been given bad news opposite her, but she just said it wasn't too bad.
"Don't worry, I've got my stories to tell, places I've been to, people I've seen, got my grandchildren to love me, I've lived my life, now its time to rest" she had said to her husband who had sat next to her holding her hand like he had held it for the past 50 years.
Isabella sobbed for all this, and so much more. Darkness fell over, yet she did not move, after she had shed all the tears she could she just sat there, on the floor, numb with everything. Wishing that she could have a second chance, promising that if she could she would live life properly, would do all she could to bring joy into her life, and into other lives as well. That she would go places, and see things, that she would love someone else like she had never loved before.
Well into the night she finally hauled herself off the floor. Determined, she wasn't going to live the last six months, possible a year of her lie in regret, she was going to do everything she could, ok maybe she oculdn't have children, but there were some tings she could do, as she was going to do them! People had always remarked how determined she could be if she tried. So she pulled a pen and an A4 piece of paper towards her, in big letter she scribbled "MY BUCKET LIST" on the top of the paper, and listed all the things she was going to do, no matter what!
Dance with the Masai Mara
Stand on top of a mountain
Eat until I burst
See India
Watch the sun rise over the Serengeti
Learn to play an instrument
Walk over a frozen lake
Ride a horse so fast the world falls away
Make home-made bread
Sleep when I want
Sail a boat
Walk up the Himilayas
Walk the great wall of China
Learn to paint
Learn a new language
Get totally lost
Help a total Stanger
Find a true friend
Love someone
Get a Tatoo
She looked over the list, determined, and strangely satisfied. 'Somehow' she thought 'I will find a way to do all these things. I will not regret my life!' Looking over the list she thought there was one this missing, at the bottom of the list she wrote
Find peace and freedom
Satisfield she folded up the list, she would start tomorrow, go straight to the travel agent, book a flight to somewhere she didn't even know, and live her life, she wouldn't even bother to phone work, she was just going to go, even if she didn't finish the list she was at least going to try. But for now she was tired and needed to close her eyes. So she fell asleep right there on the sofa, with her bucket list still in her hand. Tomorow it would start.
Little did she know exactly how it would start, somewhere in the universe something heard her, saw her despair and showed some kindness. She would be given a second chance, somewhere else, somewhere she would have no choice but to live her life to the full.