The past week had been uneventful.
Spencer's counts had been a little low, but dr edmonds had been confident that since they were just under the benchmark, they would climb in time for chemo to start.
His weight check had also gone well. His weight was not increasing as much as the doctors would have liked, but in dr edmonds eyes, at least it was increasing. Some progress was better than none.
They had changed his nj tube during the appointment, as it was getting quite cruddy (to the point where spencer had complained he could practically smell his insides every time they uncapped the tube). However, within half an hour of arriving home, the tube had become blocked with formula. It took two hours, but with persistent use of coke and warm water, dave had managed to unblock it.
And so it was that on that cold tuesday morning in march, spencer and his father had made their way to allegheny general to begin spencer's next round of chemo. Counts had been cleared, spencer had been admitted, and the first bag of poison had gone up.
Considering spencer had drifted off to sleep ten minutes after the cisplatin went up, dave had quietly slipped out of the room and made his way to the other end of the ward, where the parent's room was, intending to make herself a strong cup of coffee and something to eat.
As he was finishing up making the coffee, dave heard the door open. Turning, he gave a quick smile to the woman who had just entered the room, dumping his spoon in the sink before making his way over to the sofa.
"hi," he said softly, shooting another friendly smile to the pretty woman, who had graceful asian features and long silky black hair.
"hi," the woman replied, somewhat uncertainly.
"are you new to the ward?" dave asked as the woman sat down across from his.
Chuckling softly, the raven haired woman nodded. "how did you guess?"
Dave smiled. "you look exactly like i'm sure i did in september"
The woman managed a stronger smile, reaching across the table to shake dave's hand. "i'm sakura"
"dave," dave replied warmly, clutching his cup of coffee between his hands once he had let go of sakura's.
"so your child was diagnosed in september?" sakura asked softly.
Dave nodded. "spencer. He's five. Diagnosed with leukaemia in september"
Sakura swallowed thickly. "my son, kaito. He's only six. He was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma just three weeks ago. This is our first night on the ward"
Dave got up, moving around to sit beside sakura. Setting his coffee down, he took sakura's hand between his own, giving the young mother a reassuring smile.
"it's hard. I won't lie. And you know what, i still feel like this all just started yesterday, like i have no clue what i'm doing," he said softly.
"how far through treatment is spencer?" sakura asked.
"he's just started his next round of high dose chemotherapy this morning. After this, he had four rounds of chemo left and then hopefully he's in remission," dave explained.
"kaito had a surgery to remove as much of his tumor from his neck as possible. Then he's having chemo, which i think starts next week. Then radiation, then more chemo," sakura replied. "i don't know what drugs or how much of everything, but that's the rough schedule"
"don't worry, i can't pronounce half of spence's medication. He can, but i can't," dave chuckled. Sakura managed a soft laugh, a smile spreading across his face.
"how bad was his cancer?" he asked quietly after a moment.
"pretty bad. But it hadn't spread, and that was the key to his having a good chance of beating it. So far, so good. We are just taking it day by day and getting through it as best we can,"
"kaito's is spread through his tissue. But they hope the chemo can kill it off," sakura explained.
"these kids all find strength they never knew they had within these walls. I'm sure kaito will kick cancer right to the curb"
By nightfall, spencer was feeling pretty rough. After alternating between vomiting bile and crying about wanting to go home all afternoon, he had fallen back to sleep, clutching the emesis basin like a lifeline.
Sitting in the recliner, dave was wide awake, his eyes never leaving the silhouetted form of his sleeping child.
He still couldn't fathom how this had happened to their family.
He still remembered the day they had brought spencer home from the hospital. He was a tiny little thing, like a little sleeping doll in his little white onesie. The moment they had walked through the door, penelope had begged to hold her baby, not letting up until aaron had sat her down on the couch and placed spencer in her arms. Back then, they had no idea that one tiny cell had formed incorrectly in spencer's brain. No idea what was going to happen eleven years later.
Sitting up closer to the edge of spencer's bed, dave gently took spencer's free hand.
"we love you, sweet boy. We are always with you," he said softly, rubbing gentle circles on the back of spencer's hand. " you are gonna destroy this cancer, and i know your going to get you to the end no matter what it takes"
Tears running down his cheeks, dave stood up for a moment, kissing spencer's temple and pulling his blankets up a little more.
"i love you sweet boy"