“Adam . . .”
“Don’t argue with me. Just drive, lady.”
When we got back to the hospital, I pushed Adam past the nurses’ station quickly. Leah shook her head and then came into his room a moment later. “You better hurry up and get out of those clothes and back into the gown, Adam.”
“Leah,” he stated assertively. “I need a pen and some paper as soon as possible.” Leah chuckled to herself and then left the room, still shaking her head as Adam stripped away Chucky’s clothes.
“But you can’t write,” I said to him.
“Charlotte, I need you to go home and stay there.”
“What?”
Standing near his bed, completely naked, he pointed to the shelf where a gown was folded. “Can you hand me that and then go home and wait until you receive instructions?”
“Receive instructions? Adam,” I started to say. I was fully worried now.
“Charlotte, look at me. A human does not get more desperate and vulnerable than this. I’m naked and skinny, my bald head is wrapped in gauze, I can barely stand up, and I’m dying. I’m begging you, please, just do as I say.”
“Okay, okay.” I handed him the gown and helped him into bed.
“Now go. I have your number. I’ll call you. Don’t call me.”
“This is crazy.”
“Just go.” He shooed me away, but he was smiling while he did it.
I couldn’t laugh even though he was trying to be funny. “What if . . .”
“What if there is a 9.0 earthquake right below us in the next minute? What if the sun explodes tomorrow? What if heaven is real? What if God is a woman? What if the moon landing was a hoax? What if Donald Trump is an alien?”
“No one really questions that last one,” I said.
“You promised me there would be no more fear and no more what-ifs. If something happens, then it is exactly what is supposed to happen. Have you learned nothing from me? Now go before grumpy Adam shows up.”
I kissed him and left the room without another word. I felt strange walking out to my car alone. It felt even stranger to know that I was leaving Adam in his hospital room alone, and that at any moment he could die and I would never see him again.
22. The Trial
Everyone walks around blabbing about love and life like we all know what it’s supposed to mean and how we’re supposed to feel. We put these stupid restrictions on our relationships . . . for what? According to whom? God? Society? None of it actually matters because when you have the unfortunate knowledge that you’re going to die very soon, none of it applies. Rules are for people with the luxury of time.
Nothing holds you back—certainly not rejection. You’ve already felt the ultimate rejection. And when you’re young, lying in a hospital bed, waiting for the lights to go out because this shitty fucking world has rejected you, there’s nothing you can do but try to plant a seed of yourself inside another person so deep that you will undoubtedly live on through them. That’s what legacy is. That’s what made Adam brave enough to love me.
He may have planted himself inside of every person who viewed his beautiful art and felt moved by it. And in the public sense, that will be his legacy, but for me, his legacy is that he taught me something very important. He taught me that one way to give your life meaning is to teach another person how to look within and love.
I made it back to my apartment and walked listlessly up the stairs, clutching Chucky’s clothes Adam had been wearing. When I walked in, Chucky jerked his head toward the door from where he was sitting at the breakfast bar. “Oh man, did he die?” he said with wide, sympathetic eyes.
“No. He kicked me out.”
“What? Why?”
“I don’t know; he has something up his sleeve.” I handed Chucky the clothes.
“Hmm. I was reading a medical journal last night—”
“Shocker.”
“Charlotte, listen to me. They’re starting a new trial for Adam’s exact kind of cancer. I asked him about it when he was here. He didn’t want to do it. He’s given up.”
I shook my head. “He has brain cancer and it’s already spread everywhere through his body. He had chemo and radiation and surgery.”
“But there’s a new trial and he knows about it. He doesn’t want to try.”
“That is insane. Adam would fight for his life. He’s the most vivacious person I know. What’s the treatment?”
Chucky walked to the counter and grabbed the medical journal and tossed it to me. “They’re doing it at Cedars, on the same floor. He declined to participate. He told me about a study . . . a trial that was coming up, but then he mumbled about the number of fucks he had left to give.”
The news devastated me. Would Adam really refuse a possible cure? Or at the very least, an opportunity to prolong his life? He had ordered me to stay away from the hospital until I was told to come back, but I wasn’t going to let this go.
I read the study. Some of the cases had yielded very promising outcomes for exactly the kind of tumor Adam had—a glioblastoma. I called the hospital and asked for his room. He refused to take the call, so I told the receptionist it was an emergency.
Finally, he answered. “What’s wrong, is everything okay?” he asked, sounding genuinely worried.
“Is there a trial going on there that you refused to participate in? A trial that could possibly prolong your life?”
There was silence on the other end of the line.
“Hello?”
He cleared his throat. “I have some time, I know I do. There’s something I really want to do, but I can’t do it if I’m being poked and prodded.”
I was angry. “So you’re not gonna even try?”
He took a deep breath. “If you agree to my plan, I will do the trial, Charlotte. I promise.”
It was like the sky opened up. Adam would fight. We could have a future.
“What’s your plan?” I asked him.
“I can’t tell you yet. Wait for the call.”
“Fine.” I took a deep breath. I trusted Adam. “I’ll wait, but I want to be with you.”
He didn’t say anything for a long time. “We’ll be together.”
I couldn’t get our moment in the hotel room out of my mind. It was so beautiful, so strikingly different from my time in another hotel room with Seth. Not that it was bad with Seth—far from it; it was exactly what I needed at that moment—but there was more depth of emotion and a stronger bond between Adam and me. I missed him five minutes after I left his side. When I was away from Seth, I didn’t yearn for him. I hadn’t even chased after him on the footbridge.
I killed time by cleaning up, taking a shower, doing my hair, and going through bills that were piling up on the countertop.
Chucky came out and saw me gawking at the past-due electric bill and the stack of other bills underneath it. “Were you just leaving these here for me to take care of, Chuck?”
“No, I was making a pile for Dad. He’s going to float us until September.”
“What?” My parents were comfortable, upper-middle-class people with a sufficient retirement. I know paying our bills for a couple of months until Chucky started working wasn’t going to break them, but I still wasn’t clear as to why they were doing it, except for the fact that they’d do anything for my little brother.
“I told Dad that you quit your job because you decided to play nurse to some artist dude with cancer.”
“That’s what you said to him, you dick?” I was crushed and my face wasn’t telling any lies.
Chucky’s expression finally softened when he took note of my anguish. “Not exactly,” he said. I noticed Chucky was wearing the tracksuit that matched mine. “I told Dad I thought what you were doing was kind, okay? I said it was big of you.” It’s hard for brothers, even adult men, to compliment their sisters this way, especially for someone like Chucky who has an extremely large ego and competitive streak.
“Kind?”
“Look, Charlotte, I told Dad the whole fucking story. I said I had met Adam and that I thought what you were doing was really respectable. He agreed and said he’d cover the bills for a while. You should call him and thank him.”