Dear Jack
Chapter 1: 2009
~.~
As I said, I realize this is an overdone cliché idea, and that's the main reason I never posted this, since I kind of pride myself on trying to write the opposite. But…I changed my mind, haha. Thank you for the kind reviews so far!
Oh, and it's my birthday today, so, ya know, a review would be an awesome birthday present. Just sayin'. :)
~.~
"Erica?" Monica paced quickly through the living room, now decorated with streamers and balloons. "Erica?" she again called, running up the stairs. "Erica?" She opened the door to her room, and the little girl looked up at her from her bed.
"What, Mommy?" she stretched out sleepily.
"Erica, your friends are going to be here for your birthday party any minute! Jack and Emma are waiting for you downstairs. Come on," she held her hand out for her to take. "And since when do you nap, missy? I could never get you to nap when you were younger!"
Erica shrugged, and Monica tried to brush out some of the wrinkles in the dress she was wearing. "Mo-om," she whined, pulling away.
"Do you feel okay?" Monica placed her hand on her forehead. "You're awfully hot."
"I'm fine. Let's go-oo," she dragged out the last word, now pulling at her mother's hand.
"Okay, just don't touch anything anyone else is going to be eating. You don't need to get everyone else sick, too," she conceded, following Erica out of the pink bedroom and down the stairs. She frowned once more as she touched the back of her neck, sure she had a fever, but decided on slipping her a couple of Tylenol in a few minutes, and letting her have fun at her party before deciding she was actually sick.
"Happy birthday to us!" she sang, pulling away from her mother as she bounded down the staircase towards her brother and cousin, along with the first of their friends to show up. "Hi Emma, hi Jake!" She stopped in front of them.
~.~
"And how long have the fatigue and fever been going on?" the doctor asked, feeling along Erica's neck.
"For a little over a week," Monica began slowly, almost sure that made her sound like a bad mother. "The fevers usually go away during the day, though, so I thought since we already had a wellness checkup scheduled, she could just wait until now," Monica shrugged, suddenly feeling guilty for not bringing her earlier.
"Well, her lymph nodes are pretty swollen, but that isn't completely uncommon in younger children. It doesn't look like she has strep throat or anything else like that that would be causing it, but I am going to swab for it and put her on some antibiotics to see if it's from another type of bacterial infection. If after three days there isn't any improvement at all, call back and schedule another appointment," he handed a prescription to Monica, who nodded, trying to feel some sense of relief at how sure the doctor seemed of himself, though she had a gut feeling something was wrong.
Fighting off that feeling, Monica smiled. The doctor surely knew better than she would. "Thank you."
~.~
Monica tapped her fingers quickly across the counter, first pinky to index finger, and then the other way around as she clutched the phone to her ear with the other hand. She had been on hold for what felt like forever. "Yes, I'm still here," she finally sighed, relieved someone had picked back up. "No, my daughter's been seeing Dr. Nelson. I'd like her to see someone else. I don't care if he's the one on call," she paused. "Because she isn't getting any better. What was a sore throat and fever turned into a cough, and what was a small cough has now turned into her barely being able to breathe," Monica again paused. "Yes, I can hold again," Monica sighed as she was put on hold yet again, Chandler walking into the room.
"Still on hold?" he raised his eyebrows, going over to the refrigerator and grabbing a juice box to take back upstairs to Erica.
"On hold again," Monica sighed. "I'm about to say screw trying to get one of the on-call doctors in our doctor's office to see her and just go to the emergency room," she covered the mouthpiece on the phone as she spoke. "Is her cough getting any better? She took that medicine almost an hour ago."
Chandler shook his head. "No, and she's up there in tears now, saying it's hurting her chest she's coughing so hard," he ran a hand through his hair. "So, I'm not at all against-" Chandler stopped talking as Monica held a hand out to stop him, being taken off hold.
"Yea, I'm still here," she replied. "Wait, why does he want to meet us at the hospital and not your office?" Monica paused. "What kind of tests?" Another pause, and Chandler stared at her impatiently. "About fifteen minutes." Chandler raised his eyebrows. "Okay, we'll be there soon. Okay, thanks, bye," she hung up the phone. "Well, we win. We're going to the hospital tonight."
"Wait, what, why?" Chandler followed after her as she headed through the living room and towards the stairs.
"You need to not freak out right now," Monica came to a halt, halfway up the stairs. "Because Erica is already freaking out because she doesn't feel good, and I'm sure having a bunch of x-rays and tests done isn't going to help that."
Chandler took a deep breath. "Okay," he let it out slowly.
"Can you call Ross and Rachel and see if it's okay if we drop Jack off over there?" Monica asked, taking the juice box from his hand as she headed towards Erica's room.
Chandler only nodded, pulling his cell phone out of his pocket as he headed down the hall towards Jack's room.
Monica took a deep breath, trying to keep herself from freaking out, as well, before heading into Erica's room, trying not to let her five-year-old's tears break her down, as well.
~.~
Monica closed her eyes momentarily, leaning her head back against the cold concrete wall behind her chair in the waiting room of the hospital, having been there for over twenty-four hours now. Chandler had gone downstairs in search of coffee and food for them, but Monica had stayed in the waiting room, just in case the surgeon came out with any information.
As soon as Erica had been admitted, test after test had been run. First, a blood test, which came back abnormal. Then, an x-ray. After the x-ray had shown an abnormal growth in her chest, most likely responsible for her coughing and problems breathing, a CT scan was done, which confirmed the location of the tumor, and that it was operable.
More tests were done. Erica spent the entire time crying and coughing as they took blood, bone marrow, and did an excisional biopsy of one of her lymph nodes.
Erica cried.
Monica and Chandler tried hard not to cry, each taking a moment when necessary to pull themselves together.
They would have to wait on results from the tests, but the oncologist they had been referred to, Dr. Craig, told them the most likely cause looked to be Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma from her symptoms thus far.
Oncologist.
Cancer.
The room had spun when he said the word, both Monica and Chandler silent, in disbelief.
She couldn't have cancer. She couldn't be sick. She was five. Earlier that week, she was running around outside playing with all of the other kids on the street. She was less than a month away from their preschool graduation ceremony. She was so little; she couldn't be sick. It was completely unfathomable.
Chandler returned, sitting down next to Monica, handing her a paper cup of coffee and a sandwich. Monica took a sip of the coffee, but set the sandwich on the chair beside her, Chandler silently reaching for her hand.
Erica couldn't be that sick, yet here they were, sitting in a hospital waiting room, waiting for her to come out of surgery. The diagnosis wasn't finalized, but they couldn't wait for that, because Erica couldn't breathe. And if it was NHL, it was most likely aggressive because of the rapid on-set of her symptoms, so they couldn't take any risks by waiting longer.
"Mr. and Mrs. Bing?"
Chandler and Monica immediately stood up as a doctor walked into the waiting room.
"Surgery went well," he smiled, both of them breathing a sigh of relief at that. "We were able to remove all of the tumor, and you should get the biopsy results of that in a few days when you get the other results."
"Oh, thank god," Monica sighed in relief.
"She's still asleep, but you can go in and see her now."
"Thank you, doctor," Chandler smiled, as well, before the two headed down the hall and towards her room, leaving their forgotten food behind.
Once they reached her room, they both hesitated, looking in at the little girl, their little girl, who looked so small, lying asleep in the middle of a hospital bed in a hospital room. It was almost as if they were both choked by a sudden, silent sob in the back of their throats, halting in unison, the pain of being faced with their daughter's mortality much more painful than ever being faced with their own.