So they upped the chemo dosage and they doubled the radiation treatments. The Tech told me again that it was a good thing that Justin had banked the sperm when he did because they sure as shit were frying whatever he had left.
Well, and didn't that make me feel better? Thanks, asshole.
The original tumor, the one in his arm was just about gone now, and that was good, but the lymph nodes were infected as far away as his groin, so that was bad.
The added treatments, the new regime was wiping the shit out of him and it was like I could hardly believe that someone that sick could still be functioning as much as he was. He would drag himself out of bed at six thirty, shower, usually with me helping because he was too weak to leave in there by himself, we'd get a quick breakfast (which he would throw up shortly after he ate it) then I'd wheel him the few blocks down First Avenue to Sloan Kettering.
We'd take the elevator up to the third floor, they'd plug him in by seven thirty and he'd lay there until about three in the afternoon when I'd help him back into the chair and wheel him home, help him throw up, help him get cleaned up and then he'd usually take a three or four hour nap while I did e-mail or called clients or touched base with Cynthia or something.
Next, I'd try to get some food into him—usually fail, then, if he was feeling relatively OK, he'd look through some e-mails or maybe make it downstairs to watch part of a video. Then he'd go to bed.
In the morning we'd start over again.
A couple of times a week I'd have a meeting with one of Vanguard clients or one of the potential clients. If that happened I'd make sure that Justin was settled, haul ass to Madison Avenue or someplace, do my damndest to be a professional and impress the shit out of whoever I was trying to impress that day and then get my butt back to the hospital.
Jesus, that was the role I was in—I was Dad— we were staying at Ronald McDonald House, for Christ's sake—they were nice and they were helpful, but I had a gut feeling that they'd not take kindly to one of their patient's gay lover making any kind of Pride statement. On those days when I had to be an ad man there would usually be one of the other parents doing the hand holding thing and they would generally offer to keep an eye on Justin for me. They'd get him a drink of water or help him to the bathroom or whatever. One time Nancy, she's one of the mothers, called the nurses when his IV started leaking that shit on the bed.
You need someone to be there.
You want to hear something that even I can't believe I'm saying?
That whole six months that we were there I only tricked about a dozen times, maybe even less. You could almost count them on one hand. Honest to shit, that's the truth.
It wasn't that I wasn't horny or anything like that, it was just that for the first time in my life—well since I finished puberty, anyway—there was something more important that getting laid. Shit, like I ever thought that I'd say that.
So they upped the treatments and everything that had almost started to get slightly better with his symptoms came back with a vengeance. The barfing, the exhaustion, the mouth sores—God, it was fucking awful.
He began getting so weak that the doctors realized that he was suffering from malnutrition on top of everything else so they put him on a regimen of hyper alimentation and lipids, which are basically a way to get nutrition to a patient who can't eat. It worked—he started to get stronger and that was great to see, but the long-term effects on his liver could be a problem at some point down the line.
Of course, since 'down the line' was starting to look like about three months there for a while, it seemed like a reasonable tradeoff.
It was one of those Goddamned bridges that we'd cross when we got to it—if we got to it.
For a couple of weeks things just sort of stabilized, status quo, but then, slowly the readings, the counts, the blood work started looking up.
He was getting better. There was no question and it was definite and not wishful thinking. Fuck me—the day that Ortiz came in and said that we might want to go out to dinner because Justin's mouth was healed enough for him to eat solid food I though I'd break into a Goddamned Irish jig right there in the radiation room.
The tumors were going down, the one in his arm almost nonexistent and the reading in the lymph nodes that he had left showed him almost clear. They said to give it another month of treatment and if the trend continued then—shit—he could seriously think about going home.
He didn't say anything when the doctor told him that. He just sat there, almost stunned but the nurses who had all fallen in love wit him, even though they tried hard to maintain that professional distance, just started smiling and I caught a couple of them wiping tears away. That's the kind of lesbian moment that I normally don't have much patience for but this time I'd decided to make an exception.
Justin? He just sat there in his Goddamned purple wheelchair with no hair and looking like a Goddamned stick figure and he smiled that smile that no one had seen in fuck knows how long and it was like the sun came out and he stood up and put his arms around me and just held on and I could feel his allergies starting and so I just held onto him until he was ready to move on.
We called Jenn when we got back to the room and she was crying and laughing just like everyone else had been back at Sloan a little while ago. She got Molly on the phone and she was thanking me and telling me that if it hadn't been for me her brother would have been dead by now and I told her the truth—that was full of shit and he had done it himself, I'd just pushed the wheelchair for him.
I was going to book a reservation at this Japanese place we'd found that he liked, but he asked me not to—something about not wanting to jinx things.
Hey, whatever.
It didn't matter, as long as he was happy and getting better then who gave a fuck where we ate dinner. I said something about how we could just get Japanese when we got back to Pittsburgh in a month or so and he thought that would be just fine.
That next month? Damn—compared to the last five it was a walk in the frigging park.
He was still on the same schedule while we were there; he still had the chemo five days a week and the radiation a few days, too. He was still on enough meds to choke a horse and he still felt like shit after each treatment, but each time we got readings and results they looked better than the last time and now they were actually starting to use words like 'remission' and 'recovery' and 'follow-up therapy'.
I never thought crap like that would sound good, but I guess my perspective changed after what we'd been living with.
Three weeks later we were at the tail end. We were starting to pack up at the RMDH, we were winding down with the treatments and we were starting to say goodbye to everyone who had helped and they were legion.
There was one last round of shit to go through and towards the end Ortiz came over to where I was waiting for Justin to come out of the radiation room.
He was a good guy, fairly young and the kind of man you'd feel OK trusting your life to. He said he had a few things he had to go over with me.
Justin was clean, as far as they could determine from the latest tests. They had run every test they had and there were no malignancies anywhere. His arm was fine, his nodes were clean. His blood counts were still low, but that was normal and they should start coming up now that he wasn't getting a daily dose of poison. The mouth sores and the sores on his feet were healing well. His hair should start growing back as soon as the chemo and shit ended and that was this afternoon. He should start gaining back some of the weight he'd lost over the next few months.
Justin needed to stay in touch. The cancer he had was known to recur. It was a fucking aggressive kind so, though what was happening right now was good, we couldn't believe we'd won yet.
That made me think of what I'd told Justin about Senator Baxter—who had called a few times, by the way, to talk with him and try to encourage him—that thing about how he shouldn't think he'd won because that was when he'd lose.
He was to have follow up MRI's and CAT's every couple of months. He was to keep taking the meds. If he noticed any changes in his body—anything—he was to see his doctor or come back to New York. He wasn't to return to school or work for at least six months. He'd need at least that much recovery time. He had to take it easy, rest, eat and build up his strength. He should try to avoid stress or getting upset.
Yes, yes, anything. We'd do anything. I promised that I'd make sure that he stuck to what he was supposed to do. I swore that he would.
I'd fucking make sure of that and if I slipped up, Jennifer would be the back up plan. He'd make it to every appointment. That wasn't even up for discussion.
Three days later we were driving the rental down Route 80 enroute to the Pennsylvania Turnpike with Justin next to me and our shit filling the back seat.
He was skinny and bald and as happy as a pig in shit. The last chemo and radiation were days ago and the side effects were wearing off. He was happy and laughing and it was so fucking good to be there with him. I still remember most of the conversation.
"Brian? I don't know if I said it or not, but I couldn't have done this if you weren't there."
"Yeah, you could have."
"Whatever. Thank you, OK? Honest to shit, you saved my life."
"The doctors saved your life. Don't be a drama queen"
We rode for a while without saying anything.
"You're not going to admit that I owe you, are you?"
"Christ, Justin—you don't owe me shit. You know me—if I didn't want to be there, I wouldn't have been."
" Mom said that you wouldn't take 'no' for an answer. So, thank you."
"Yeah. Whatever."
That was all we said about it. We never brought it up again and neither of us forgot it.
We drove the 350 miles in about seven hours, about what it usually takes and I knew that Jennifer would be waiting for us to pull in. To make things easier and to spare some feelings, we had agreed that Justin would stay with his mother during the week and probably come to the loft for the weekends. She wanted to see him, I had a shitload of work to catch up on—it was reasonable and we could always change the arrangement if we wanted to.
So we get to the condo and she comes running out with Molly close behind. Justin was helped up the stairs and settled into the living room which was filled with balloons, while I went out with Molly to get his bags.
That's when the strangest fucking thing happened, you know—one of the signs of the apocalypse.
I was carrying this suitcase up to Justin's room and fucking Craig comes out of the bathroom where I can hear the toilet flushing. He sees me, I see him and I'm about to just walk past to drop the bag when he put his hand on my arm, but gently, and said,
"Kinney? I want to thank you for what you did for my son."
That was all he said before he walked back downstairs.
And the pisser? I think he actually meant it.
TBC