Season of Sisters (28 page)

Their destination was a shady spot beneath a pecan tree and the wooden glider crafted by a group of Mennonites down in the Texas Hill Country. Justin had bought it for Holly for her birthday, and they'd passed many an hour sitting in it, slowly swinging back and forth while conversing on matters both great and small.

Something told Holly they wouldn't be debating the superiority of blue snow cones over orange ones this morning.

Justin sat beside her. He took her hand in his and she left it there.

A few minutes passed in peaceful silence. Holly steeped herself in the pleasure of the moment: the warmth of the sun on her face, the chatter of the squirrels in the pecan tree, the familiar-and-oh-so-missed scent of the man she loved. It was heaven. Pure heaven.
Worth spending a night in jail for,
she told herself with a grin.

Justin lifted her hand, brought it to his mouth, and pressed a sweet kiss against her palm. "Honey, it's time. I need to talk about our situation. I need an answer to the question I asked on our aborted Saturday-Sunday drive."

When Holly failed to speak up, he continued. "I'm a good doctor and a damned fine diagnostician, but I obviously misread the symptoms in our case. Talk to me, baby. Help me understand. Why won't you marry me?"

"Oh, Justin." Her heart wrenched. How could she tell him? What words would possibly convey the feelings she herself didn't entirely understand?

Yet, she wanted to try to explain. She wanted him to know. Justin was a smart guy. Maybe he'd understand the parts of it that Holly couldn't. "You know what? I want to tell you. I do. It's a surprise even to me. But it's hard. I don't have words for all of it."

"Then give me what words you can, love."

She laced her fingers through his and gave his hand a squeeze. "For most of my life, I've felt like I've been floating down a river in a boat. I have no oars, no paddles, and I've been drawn into treacherous rapids. The current is fast and it's rough and it's rolling. Up ahead, I hear the roar of a waterfall. I've tried paddling away from destruction by hand but it makes no difference. I've tried baling out to swim, but I can't get out of the boat. Every day, every hour, every minute draws me closer to that godawful roar."

"I'm on that river to stay, Justin. No matter how badly I want off, I know there is no way to avoid going over the waterfall. That's why I've always said I can't marry you. I love you too much."

Briefly, he closed his eyes. "I needed to hear those words. I didn't realize until now just how much. As long as you love me and I love you, we can work this out."

"Dammit, Justin. Didn't you listen? I cannot bear the thought of sucking you down into the river with me."

"I heard that part, too. I'm not sure I understand the metaphor." His smile was tender as he reached up and gently tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. "What does the waterfall symbolize, honey?"

This was so hard. In her head, Holly knew her fears weren't entirely rational. In her heart, she heard the inevitable, threatening roar of the waterfall. What words would make Justin understand? He was the most pragmatic man she'd ever known. He would wield his medical knowledge like a scalpel in an effort to slice her beliefs to ribbons. He'd fume with frustration when none of it made a difference because her life, her future, was preordained.

Something strange happened. Holly heard voices in her head. Two voices. Grace and Maggie, each whispering in an ear:
But what if you're wrong?

For a moment, Holly went still. Everything inside her froze. She didn't even breathe.
What if I'm wrong? What if I'm not doomed by bad genetics?

Her palms grew damp and her pulse started to pound and her mind began to swirl like a slow-moving eddy. Holly thought of Grace, of her serenity and strength in the face of her disease. She thought of Maggie, of how she worked to reclaim her positive attitude in the midst of personal despair. She thought of Ben Hardeman and the truth in his voice when he said it wasn't the memories that crushed a soul, but the regrets. She thought of her dad and their Saturday-Sunday drives.

Some great universal truth lay buried in that flotsam, just beyond her reach. If only she could figure out what it was.

"Sweetheart, tell me about the waterfall."

She turned her head and looked at Justin. Stared deep into his eyes. In their golden brown depths, she found compassion, encouragement, and love. So much love.

It gave her strength.

"The waterfall is cancer. Breast cancer." Holly took a deep, bracing breath. "It's death."

Justin nodded. "And you think you're going over the falls."

"Yes. My mother died at age thirty-two. Her mother and two of her sisters have all died young from breast cancer. I have my mother's eyes, her smile, her hair. Her hips. In another few years, I'll have her cancer, too. If we married, you would be just like my dad. One day you would wake up and I wouldn't be there anymore. It was awful, Justin. My dad was such a mess for so long. Losing Mom all but destroyed him. He's never recovered from loving and losing her. I don't want that for you. Maybe if you weren't so much like him, I wouldn't worry about you as much. But you are like him and that's one of the reasons I love you so much."

"Oh, Holly." Justin kissed the back of her hand. "That's why you turned me down?"

"Yes. This is my destiny, Justin, but it need not be yours. It's why I told you from the beginning I wouldn't get serious. I had good intentions, but I wasn't strong enough. I fell in love with you and I couldn't bear to let you go. I talked myself into thinking we could go along the way we were. Then you proposed and..." Holly shrugged.

"Ah, hell, Holly. For a mathematician, you don't know jack about statistics. Don't you know that—"

She hushed him by placing her index finger against his lips. "What I know, what I've recently come to realize, is that it probably wasn't fair of me to make the decision for you."

"Damned right it wasn't." He sighed, loud and long. He shoved to his feet, then stalked away for five steps before halting abruptly. Turning around, he marched back. "I'm sorry. You've finally opened up to me and that's good. I know I should remain calm and be understanding, but the fact is I'm annoyed as hell."

This came as no surprise to Holly. She'd known he wouldn't like what she had to say. But he'd wanted honesty. Wanted revelations. It reminded her of the old adage about watching what you wished for because you just might get it.

"How could you do that to me?" he demanded. "To us? Have you that little faith in me? Do you really think I'm the kind of jerk who would turn tail and run if you got sick?"

"No, I don't think that at all. I think you're the kind of man who would stick right by my side throughout the whole thing and probably suffer more than I. You're so much like my dad, Justin. You're already taking Saturday-Sunday drives, although it's my opinion that a Jeep suits you better than a rebuilt sports car."

He muttered a curse beneath his breath, then sank back into his seat and sulked. Holly eyed his hands, his talented, healing hands, and said, "I've seen firsthand how much he suffered. I heard him those nights when he broke down and sobbed, cursing God for taking her, asking why it couldn't have been him instead. He wanted to die, Justin. I heard him say it more than once. I don't want you to suffer the same way, too. And you would, Justin. That's the kind of person you are."

He raked his fingers through his hair and grimaced. "Maggie told me to figure out why you turned me down. You wouldn't believe some of the wild ideas I came up with. This one... shoot, Holly. You should have known better."

He looked her straight in the eyes. "I'm a doctor in love with a woman who has a strong family history of breast cancer. You think I didn't consider this possibility months ago? You think I didn't investigate current research? You think I didn't spend some time thinking about it, weighing the risks, deciding what was right for me? I went into our relationship with my eyes wide open, Holly."

"Did you really?" Holly didn't know how she felt about that. It was one thing for her to decide she wasn't good enough for Justin. Had he reached a similar conclusion... well... that would have been something else entirely. "Why didn't you say anything about your concerns?"

"I did. At least, I attempted to on any number of occasions. Each time, you dodged the subject like a pro. Dammit, Holly. You're a brick wall when it comes to your mother's disease. I couldn't even tell if you realized you might be high-risk."

"High-risk. That's me," she said bitterly. "Me and my mutant gene."

Justin winced. "So you've confirmed it? You've been tested?"

She turned her head away. "No."

"No?"

"No!"

"All right, then. But you have gone for risk counseling."

"No."

Scowling now, he visibly summoned his patience. "You've talked to your doctor about your risks?"

She shook her head.

"You've researched it yourself, then. Books. Medical journals. The Internet."

Holly didn't want to see the incredulous stare that went with his tone. She turned away. "I don't need to do special research, Justin. A woman picks up plenty of information during the daily course of life. Newspapers, television, magazines do plenty of breast cancer awareness stories, especially during October. I know what I need to know, and I don't like to think about it. I'd rather spend my time thinking about ways to live, not how I'm going to die."

Frustration bubbled over. "I can't believe this. I know from personal experience that some patients prefer to bury their heads in the sand and hide from reality. I know that a percentage of patients would rather run away from the truth than seek ways to help themselves. But I have to tell you, Holly, I never figured you’d be one of those. Not Miz Bungee Jumper. Not Miz Skydiver."

His charge stung, but Holly ignored it. It seemed the safest thing to do at the moment. She simply wasn't ready to check her reflection for a yellow stripe down her back.

"Why?" she wondered aloud, her gaze lifted toward the sky. "Why does everyone insist on throwing my Life List in my face today?"

"Oh, baby." Justin visibly relaxed. He pulled her, resisting, into his arms. "How can you be so brave and so filled with fear at the same time? Did any of those articles or TV segments mention the fact that sharing a family history of breast cancer does not mean you're fated to develop the disease yourself? That even if your mother did have one of the BRCA gene mutations, odds are only fifty-fifty that she passed it along to you? Did a twenty-second public service spot during Breast Cancer Awareness Month happen to explain how your chance of developing the disease may be no worse than that of the average American woman?" When she didn't respond, he gave her a little shake. "Well, did it?"

Holly ceased her struggles. "I know that. It’s simple statistics. I'm a math teacher."

"Exactly."

She rested her head against his shoulder and tried to find a way to articulate her feelings. They weren’t all logical. Weren’t all rational. She recognized that. But her feelings were real. How did that quote go? Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not after you?

"When my mother died, I wanted to die, too. I miss her every day of my life."

"I'm sure you do. You loved her. I know if I lost you, I'd miss you until the day I died. I'd remember you and mourn you, but, honey, I'd move forward. That's what you need to do now. I understand that as an adolescent, as a teenager, you probably needed to insulate yourself from the whole idea of breast cancer. You're an adult now. You need to quit running away and face your fears. That's the only way you'll conquer them. Right now, they're conquering you."

Holly was tired of people accusing her of running away.
Then maybe you should stop doing it,
whispered a voice in her mind.

She blinked. It was true. Justin's thinly veiled accusations were correct. "You think I should get tested?"

"I can't make that decision for you. That's something only you can choose. What I do strongly believe, both as a physician and as the man who loves you, is that you need to educate yourself about breast cancer and your risk factors. Your true risk, not your perceived risk."

"But I don't want to know about it.”

"Then you'll always be afraid."

Jeeze Louise.
"I hate it when you're right."

"I know." He patted her hand. "It's why you're always in a bad mood. I'm always right."

She opened her mouth to protest, but he wasn't through. "Something else I want you to think about, Holly. Don't take this the wrong way, but have you ever considered the notion that in addition to protecting my heart, you're also trying to protect your own?"

"What do you mean?"

"Life comes without guarantees. I could get hit by a truck on my way home, and you could be the one mourning me. Maybe part of the problem here is that you're unable to make a commitment out of fear of losing someone else whom you love."

She pulled back. "What? Did you give up pediatrics to become a shrink? That's a terrible thing to say."

His smile was wry. "Honey, we're all gonna die. It's a question of when. I'm simply suggesting—"

"I don't want to hear your suggestions."

"All right."

They passed a moment in silence. Holly kept the glider swinging with a push of her foot against the ground. "Grace's husband said the same thing. About dying being a question of when for everyone."

"Smart man."

It's not the memories that crush your soul, it's the regrets.
"Yeah, very smart."

"Holly?"

"Hmm?"

He took her hands in his, squeezed them tight. "Let's take this back to your waterfall metaphor. We all have a waterfall. Every one of us. But what if your waterfall is a long way away?"

Sudden tears swelled in her eyes. She blinked them back.

"Think about it, Holly. What if you've reached a bend in that river of yours where the current has slowed? Picture it. See that scruffy old oak tree growing alongside the riverbank?"