The Sisterhood of the Dropped Stitches (13 page)

When we get to my car, I give Uncle Lou another hug good-night. His legs have been stretched all day long; he's not walking me to the parking place because he wants some exercise. “You're the best.”

Uncle Lou hugs me back, “You're not so bad yourself.”

Yeah, I definitely have to hug my Uncle Lou more.

I think about Uncle Lou's words as I get ready to go to bed. When I slide into bed, I pull the covers up to my shoulders. The night is chilly enough that I want blankets on my bed.

I don't want to think about Uncle Lou's words, but I do. I wonder if he's right. Did my parents' marriage lower my expectations for finding happiness with a man? I had always assumed it was the cancer that did that—especially when I had the partial mastectomy. Despite what I told the others earlier, I do feel a little different about my body now. Not hugely, horribly different. It is just that I never take my body for granted the way I did before. I'm not sure what that means for me and men.

I worry when I wear T-shirts that they might be too tight even if they are modest. The reconstruction on my breast had gone very well, but I have yet to put on a swimsuit that isn't matronly.

If a man hugs me—and only a few have since my operation—I always turn to the side a little. Of course, it might be my father who's responsible for that. He stopped giving me regular hugs when he left Mom and me. If he hugs me at all now, it's an arm around the shoulders kind of half hug. It could be the partial mastectomy or it could be because of his leaving that he does that.

I go to sleep wondering if my cancer will follow me all of my life, or if the day will ever come when it will be as if I'd never had it.

S
ometimes we just couldn't take another serious thought. That's when someone, usually Rose, would bring us a silly quote and we would sit and talk about what our lives might have been. When Rose brought us the handsome servant quote, Lizabett thought we should pretend to have servants.

It was Becca who pointed out that we already did have servants—well, sort of.

We spent weeks chuckling over our handsome servants—the nurses, the lab techs, the doctors—all of them working for us. The whole thing wasn't much, but I can't tell you what it did for us to have our own private joke that no one else understood.

 

I wonder if someone in a thousand years will pick through the pages of our journal and find little proverbs or quotes. By that time, cancer will hopefully be a novelty and the idea of us sharing our thoughts about the disease might interest people. We'll be like the old Chinese people who wrote the proverbs I've used in this journal. If these pages get that ancient, I want to say right up front that anyone is welcome to quote anything in them. And don't bother to try and figure out which one of us wrote the words you pick. Anonymous is fine with us.

I hope you can read my writing okay. I haven't exactly written things down with a thought to preserving them that long. Anyway, if you can't make out a word or two just make up one that sounds as if it fits. Don't worry if it's the wrong word. We'll all be gone by then so we won't care.

 

I woke up feeling determined. I don't know what I had been thinking about during the night—whether it was my Uncle Lou's words or the realization that I had faced my fears and my dreams both when I went out with the grill guy after so many years—but sometime during the night I decided I was tired of hiding from my fears and hopes. Hopes are sometimes just fears flipped around, don't you think? It seemed that way to me this morning as I lay in my bed and watched the sunshine work its way through the blinds in my bedroom.

Anyway, I decided to talk to my father. Today, after work, I will go to his apartment and, in a very civilized manner, I will ask him if he knew I had cancer when he left me there with Mom. Just like that. I'll put the question out there.

I am writing this all down in the journal so that I won't back out. I'm not going to fold any pages over or put in any clips. Everyone is free to read what I am going to do. And, if I haven't done it, they are welcome to nag me until I do.

I know the other day at The Pews my father probably overheard my conversation with Uncle Lou, but I need to know for sure. I need to hear from his own lips that he left us knowing I was sick.

I don't know what I will do with that knowledge. I don't think I'll be ready to forgive my father if he did know about my cancer when he left and I'm not sure I'll believe him if he claims he didn't know. It's one of those no-win situations.

I could always ask Pastor Engstrom about it all when I go to his group on Thursday morning—and I intend to go. There's a lot I don't know about things like forgiveness and faith. I'm beginning to think Quinn is right about it not being easy. Plus, now that my father knows I've gone to church, it doesn't feel as though it's so complicated to go again. He never once seemed to think I was taking sides.

In the meantime, I want to spend some of my time today calling around to see if I can find a place
for Lizabett's ballet troupe to have their performance. I go into The Pews around ten and I usually have some time before lunch when I can do some calling.

I'm also going to check my e-mail and see if I have any responses to my announcement about my date with the grill guy. I am especially interested in what Carly's response will be, if anything. I might even invite everyone over to The Pews for lunch today. It's a long time until Thursday, and I think we might need to touch base with each other. I particularly want to give Carly the message that the grill guy is all hers—which isn't something you can just blurt out in an e-mail. It requires some finesse.

I drive down Foothill Boulevard and then go south to Colorado Boulevard to get to The Pews. If there's no roadwork going on, it's an easy drive. Today I have to wait for a couple of trucks beside a construction site—new condos going up. But I don't mind the wait. It's a warm day and I can see the leaves starting to come back on those trees that lose their leaves around here, which is not all of them.

The Pews is never busy on Monday morning, and once I greet everyone, there's no need for my help up front, so I head back to my office.

I don't even get back to my office before I hear Becca coming in the door and saying hello to Uncle Lou. I wait in the hallway going to my office because I can hear footsteps.

“There you are,” Becca says as she turns the corner and sees me.

I think she's here to talk about me counting my dates, but she's not.

“I need a job,” Becca says as she walks closer. “Well, I guess it shouldn't be a job—at least I shouldn't get paid.”

“You want to work for free?”

Becca nods. She's walking toward my office and, since she's not stopping where I am in the hall, I follow her to my office door. I keep my door locked so I get the key out of my purse and open the door.

Becca turns the light on as she steps through the door and heads for my spare chair next to the desk. “I talked to that law clerk finally. Seven o'clock this morning I called. I knew someone like him would be at his desk before everyone else.”

Becca seems very satisfied with herself.

“Sounds like a guy with no life.” I walk over to my desk and set down my purse.

“I think I got to him before he really woke up.” Becca grins as she settles into my guest chair. “He complained he hadn't even had his coffee.”

“So what did he say?” I sit down myself.

“He said I'm not well-rounded. That's why I didn't get the internship. I don't volunteer any place.”

“Doesn't he know you've been sick?” I say.

“That's just it,” Becca says with another grin.
“They don't care if I've been sick. Turns out they have a formula and everyone gets so many points for each thing—grades, references, community involvement—that kind of thing.”

“Well, so they're not discriminating against you.”

Becca shakes her head. “It's all done by points. They didn't care about my religion or my health status. Just those points.”

I look at Becca for any signs of strain. “You seem to be taking it well.”

“This guy—the law clerk—he told me about another internship with a federal judge at the courthouse downtown. Said I would enjoy that one even more and no one hardly even knows about that one, so they don't have many applications. He's friends with the law clerk who handles it.”

“Well, that's good.”

“I'm going to apply today.”

I silently count the number of days between today and this Thursday. It's a maximum of four. “How long will it take to find out if you get it?”

I can see by the look on Becca's face she hasn't realized until now what the delay will mean. “I'm not going to make my goal.”

“It's not a big deal. So you meet it in a few weeks instead of Thursday.”

“I've never given up on a goal.” Becca's face is pale. “I've never done that.”

“Maybe we need to all give ourselves more time
to meet our goals,” I say. I am certainly hoping for more time.

Becca looks at me as if I've suggested we not pay our taxes.

I hear footsteps coming down the hall fast and I look up just as Lizabett reaches my doorway. She's breathing hard and her hair is flying around her face which means she took off a scarf recently.

“Maybe we can at least help Lizabett reach her goal,” I say to Becca, assuming that's why Lizabett is looking so harried. “You might even consider volunteering to help the ballet studio.”

Lizabett starts talking when she hits my doorway and looks right at me. “You had your date with the grill guy.” She doesn't look thrilled about it. “Date number one.”

I nod.

“Well, that's just fine,” Lizabett says as she steps inside my office. “I hope you wrote about it in the journal.”

I nod.

“Well, I have something to write in the journal, too,” Lizabett says.

I have never seen Lizabett this assertive. She looks positively fierce.

“Did my dad talk to you?” I ask, thinking maybe he has told her that he couldn't find a place for the ballet.

“I'm going to write about it first,” Lizabett says
stubbornly. “Some things are just better written in the journal.”

I reach over and pick up the journal. “Here.”

Lizabett takes the journal. “I'll be out front writing.”

“Whew,” Becca says when Lizabett is gone. “I wonder what she's so mad about.”

“Probably her ballet,” I say as I pick up my phone. “I should take some time to make some calls.”

“I should go tell her I'm volunteering to help, too,” Becca said as she stood.

“Oh, can you stay for lunch today?” I ask. “I thought I'd try to get everyone together and since you and Lizabett are already here, I'll call Carly and see if she can drive over.”

“Sounds good,” Becca says as she walks toward the door. “Hopefully, by that time we'll know where the ballet will be.”

I nod. In the meantime, I wonder what Lizabett is writing in the journal. I also wonder if she will take the time to read what I've already written this morning about my father.

 

Hi, this is Lizabett. I need to write this down some place so that I don't say it aloud. I am stupid, stupid, stupid. I guess I really sort of thought that Quinn was taking Marilee out as a favor to me—I mean, he does everything he can for me. I thought he was worried about all of the Sisterhood meeting
their goals and that he was just being nice and taking Marilee on a few dates so she would meet hers, too.

Of course, I knew he liked her, but I didn't know he
liked
her. And there I was this morning, running off my mouth about Marilee having a date with the grill guy—which didn't seem to surprise Quinn—but then he asked how many dates this made for her meeting her goals, and I said she had said it was one.

I didn't even think about what I was saying—I mean, that's what Marilee had said in her e-mail. I didn't realize Quinn might take it the wrong way. I'm sure his dates were perfectly nice dates even if Marilee isn't counting them.

Oh, dear, what am I to do? I know you're only a journal and you can't answer me back, but I could use some help. I'm writing this fast, because I see Becca and Marilee walking this way.

I don't know why we need to have these goals anyway. Nobody is meeting them.

I'm going to fold this page down and then give the journal back to Marilee. When I get it all folded down, I think I will stick it together with some tape. Quinn would not be happy with me if I let Marilee know his feelings are hurt. Quinn never wants anyone to worry about him.

I know I complain about him, but he's my big brother and I love him. If Marilee is so stuck on the grill guy that she can't see what a great guy Quinn is, then she's not the woman I thought she was. I guess I shouldn't say that, either. Oh, well, I'm done now.

 

It took me—Marilee—a good fifteen minutes to get the journal back. Lizabett wouldn't let me have it until she borrowed some masking tape from Uncle Lou and taped her page so tightly shut that I don't know if it will ever open up for reading. Remember what I said earlier about the people years from now who might want to read this journal—well, if that happens—I'm sorry about the pages and I hope you have something that removes tape from paper by then.

Anyway, I'm not as worried about the tape issue as I am about Lizabett. Something is wrong, but she won't say what it is. She has put her black scarf on, however, and she's sitting on a hard chair near one of the rear tables looking like a recent immigrant with an attitude.

“I'm going to call City Hall,” I say to Lizabett. Becca has already gone to call her law clerk to see if volunteering to help with the ballet would count on her application. “They let groups use their courtyard in the evenings. I think it's marble and would work just fine for ballet. We could put folding chairs up around the edge of the courtyard and you'd be all set.”

Lizabett nods in one swift bobbing motion. “That would be okay.”

It doesn't take a genius to tell something is bothering Lizabett. “Maybe we could even put up some pink balloons around to make it look more festive. Or red ones. The color doesn't matter.”

Lizabett nods again. This time she crosses her arms, too. “Is the grill guy going to help with the chairs?”

“Well, maybe.”

“He's kind of skinny. My brothers should help, too.”

“Well, we'll have everything set up in no time at all—no matter where we find a place for the performance,” I say.

“A chair's nothing to my brother Quinn. He can lift anything. I bet he's stronger than the grill guy.”

“Most men can lift a folding chair.” I am anxious to stop all of this talk about how skinny or strong the grill guy is, because I see that Carly has just come in the diner door and I don't want her to think that we've been talking about Randy—which I guess we have, but not for any good reason that I can see.

“Carly,” I say. “I was just going to call and ask if you're free for lunch in a couple of hours.”

“That works,” Carly said. “I just came down here to give you an update on my cat.”

“Oh?”

Carly gave a nod. “Marie came in this morning. She's in my room now.”

“Well, that's good news,” I say, even though Carly doesn't look particularly happy.