I’ve never been much of a morning person. Sure, I’ve gotten up at the crack of dawn too many times to count, for early flights and morning show interviews, but I’ve spent just as many mornings in bed, sleeping off late nights out partying. It sounds cliché, but as I watched the sky lighten over the golf course, its color changing from purplish-blue to pinkish-orange, I couldn’t help but think, I wish I had watched more sunrises.
Ever since the day I’d decided not to waste the rest of my life lying around, I’d been getting up early and staying up late, trying to stretch out every last hour as long as I could. Sometimes it wasn’t easy, because I wore out pretty quickly, and it was only going to get harder as my body got weaker. But I was still determined to make the most out of the time I had left.
Playing golf with my best friend seemed like a good way to spend the day.
Brian and his family had flown in to LA the day before, a couple of weeks after Kevin called to tell him I was dying. I was glad he hadn’t rushed out here right away, like I only had days to live. The two weeks at home had given him a chance to deal with everything on his own first, and now that we were together, he seemed to be handling it the best out of anyone, just like I’d told Cary he would.
He had called, wanting to get together as soon as possible. Golf had been my suggestion; I knew he loved the game, and he had turned me onto it in recent years, too. It was a sport I still felt up to playing, and it was something we could do together, just the two of us. I wasn’t ready to deal with Leighanne and Baylee just yet. Brian picked me up at the crack of dawn – I wasn’t supposed to drive anymore; apparently, seizures were a risk now – and we set off for the course.
I didn’t want the whole day to be about me dying, but after we’d run out of small talk, I knew we couldn’t keep tiptoeing around the elephant in the room. We had to acknowledge it, put it out there and get it over with, and then hopefully we could move on without it being awkward.
“So what have you told Baylee?” I asked, as we rode to the first hole in a golf cart. This was a change; usually we just walked the course, but I knew Brian had seen me struggling just to get my clubs out of the back of his SUV, and I’d let him rent the cart without complaint. As much as I hated to admit it, I could feel myself getting weaker.
“The truth, more or less.” I saw Brian’s jaw tighten and couldn’t imagine how tough that conversation had to have been. It had been bad enough talking to the guys about it, but telling a little kid? I didn’t envy him that job. “He knows that you’re sick again and that you’re not gonna get better this time. He knows we’re in LA to spend more time with you while we can.”
I nodded. “We should do something fun. Give him some happy memories, you know?”
Brian looked over at me and smiled, but it didn’t hide the sadness in his eyes. “That’d be great.”
I felt bad about leaving Baylee behind. Brian’s kid was like my nephew, and he’d thought of me as another uncle his whole life. I’d been more of an uncle to him than I ever would be to my real niece, and that bummed me out. “Did I tell you I got to meet Alyssa over Skype the other day?” I asked, changing the subject. It’s weird how, in the aftermath of devastating news, wonderful things can still happen. My sister Leslie had given birth on the first of April, a date that couldn’t have been more fitting for our family, since it meant my niece, Alyssa Jane, was an April Fool’s baby. I hoped she would carry on the Carter legacy of practical jokes and pranks for me.
“Did you? That’s awesome. Who does she look like?”
“Leslie says she looks more like Mike. But I think I see a little Carter in her.”
I’d never given much thought to having kids of my own; it just wasn’t something I saw myself doing for a long time. But watching my sister with her newborn made me wonder what it would have been like to create a life that way, to be a father to my own little Mini-Me, like Brian was to Baylee, and raise him and bring him onstage and sing songs with him and shoot hoops with him and play video games with him – or her. I didn’t have any regrets about not settling down and starting a family sooner; it would have just made this whole thing harder, knowing I’d be leaving a wife and children behind. But still, I sort of wished I could have experienced those things with my own kid, and it made me sad to realize I’d never have a son or daughter who looked like me.
Brian, Kevin, and Howie were lucky, and so was Leslie. At least I could count on my siblings to keep the Carter line going. They’d probably pop out a whole bunch more babies, nieces and nephews I would never know.
“Any plans to meet her in person?” Brian’s question broke into my thoughts.
“Yeah, they’re planning a trip to Florida next week, so I thought I’d fly down there and see the whole family.” Probably for the last time, I added inwardly.
It had been hard telling my family the news, almost as hard as the guys. I had told Angel in person and Leslie over the phone and let them tell everyone else. Angel called Aaron and Dad; Leslie took care of BJ and Mom. I just had to deal with the tearful, awkward phone calls from them all that followed. But all that was over now, and I was both looking forward to and dreading going home to Tampa for one last visit.
“Good. That’ll be nice,” Brian said, but we both knew it wouldn’t be. It would probably be like any other Carter clan get-together: dramatic and dysfunctional, with a little death on the side this time. “Cary going with you?”
“Nah, just me and Angel. Cary’s gonna go home for a few days, spend Easter with her dad. They’re real close, and I know she probably needs a break from me and all this bullshit.”
Brian nodded. He slowed the cart to a stop as we reached the first hole and cut the engine, but didn’t get out. “How’s she handling it?” he asked, glancing over at me again.
I shrugged. “I think she’s taking it harder than she lets on. She wants to fix everything, and she can’t this time.” Not for a lack of trying, though, I thought, remembering her frantic research into clinical trials and alternative treatments. Cary had given up on that now and instead did everything she could to keep me happy and comfortable. She cooked a combination of my favorite foods and healthy meals that I guess she hoped would keep my body going for as long as possible. She brought me ice packs and heating pads and gave me massages when my back was hurting. She did her best to keep me entertained, making suggestions for things that I could do to stay busy. She kept herself busy, too, working at her clinic while one of the guys came over or took me out for the day. We were both handling it, as well as anyone could.
Brian nodded again. “It’s gotta be hard for her. She lost her mom to cancer, didn’t she?”
“Yeah… when she was a kid.” I squirmed a little on the seat, realizing I was going to make her relive it. “I hate that I’m putting her through that again,” I added.
“So does that mean she’s gonna stay with you, until…?”
“Until the end? Until death does us part?” I gave a humorless laugh. “Yeah. That’s the plan, anyway.”
“And is that what you both want?”
I frowned, wondering why he was asking so many questions. What was he trying to get at? “Well, I know I don’t wanna get stuck back in the hospital. She’s the one who thought home care would be a good idea, and I agree; I’d rather die at home, where I can see the ocean and the people I love, than in a hospital room, surrounded by medical equipment and strangers who don’t give a damn about me.”
“That makes sense,” Brian said quietly. “Is that what she wants, too? She wants to take care of you?”
I suddenly felt sick, in a way that had nothing to do with the cancer eating my spine. “Are you trying to say I’m being a burden on her or something? Because… alright, I know I am, but it’s not like I can help it! What do you want me to do, send her home? Tell her she doesn’t have to stick around to see me die?” When Brian didn’t say anything, I added, “She can leave whenever she wants, but I know she won’t. She loves me.”
“What about you? Do you love her?”
The question rattled me more than I’d thought it would. “I… I dunno,” I admitted. “I mean, I like her…”
“But you don’t know if you love her,” Brian finished.
I shrugged. It made me feel shitty to admit that, even to myself. It was basically like admitting that I’d been using Cary all along, which was what I thought Brian was trying to get at. I felt guilty, but how was I supposed to know it would turn out like this? I thought I’d given her a pretty fair deal originally, but I hadn’t held my up end of the bargain. Instead of helping her further her singing career, I’d made her move all the way across the country just to watch me die. It wasn’t fair at all.
Even so, I asked, “Does it matter?”
Brian gave me the same kind of look he had the first time Paris showed up at the recording studio. “It matters to her.”
***
Golfing wasn’t very much fun. Eventually we quit talking and started playing, but we only got through nine holes. By the end of the ninth, I was way too wiped to do the other half of the course, so we headed back and had lunch at the clubhouse before Brian drove me home.
Cary wouldn’t get off work for another few hours, and I wasn’t supposed to be left alone – seizure thing again – so Brian stayed. “You wanna lie down for awhile?” he asked, after he’d helped me upstairs to the condo.
I was too tired to pretend I wasn’t. “Yeah… that sounds good.”
He walked me back to my bedroom and waited for me to get settled in bed. “You want me to sit in here with you for awhile, or should I just let you sleep?”
“You can stay. Talk to me.” I stifled a yawn, snuggling deeper under the covers. “Sorry in advance if I fall asleep in the middle of conversation. I promise you’re not as boring to listen to as your cousin.”
Brian laughed. “Good to know. What should I talk about?”
“Tell me Baylee stories… or how about Leighanne’s bag line; that’s always fascinating…”
“Ha, ha.” He didn’t miss my sarcasm. “Baylee did a musical last month. Community theater. And he’s gonna be playing Little League this spring.”
“Chip off the ol’ block, huh?” I smiled. Inside, I felt that pang of… not jealousy, exactly, more like regret, that I’d never know what it was like to have a kid to play catch with and watch in musicals. I wished my life had turned out more like Brian’s. Settled. Predictable. Long. But I wouldn’t trade any part of my life, even the mistakes. They’d made me who I was. I could never be like Brian; I could never be anyone but myself. It just would have been cool to know how my life might have turned out, if I hadn’t gotten sick. Maybe I would have gotten married someday, and had kids of my own. Maybe I could have had that kind of life, if cancer hadn’t taken it from me. Sometimes it was hard not to be bitter.
But I was so tired… I didn’t have the strength to get angry. I just lay there and listened to Brian babble on and on about his kid’s baseball team, while my eyelids got heavier and heavier…
I only meant to close them for a minute, just to rest my eyes, but when I opened them again, the chair next to my bed was empty, and Brian was gone. I could hear the clatter of dishes and smell something good wafting out of the kitchen, which meant Cary was home. Somehow, “resting my eyes” for a minute had turned into a four-hour nap. I struggled into a sitting position, annoyed with myself for sleeping so long. I’d wasted the whole afternoon.
Still groggy, I stumbled out of bed and walked stiffly out to the kitchen. Cary had changed out of her scrubs, into a t-shirt and a pair of pajama bottoms, and was cooking dinner. “Hey there, Sleepyhead,” she said, smiling at me.
“Hey. Brian still here?”
“Nah, he left when I got home. He said to tell you he’ll see you later. How was golf?”
“Eh.” I sat down on a kitchen chair. “We played nine holes.”
“Who won?”
I made a face. “I got my ass kicked. But I was a crappy golf player before I got cancer, so it would’ve been obvious if he’d let me win.”
She smiled again, then turned her attention back to whatever she had on the stove. “I’m making fajitas,” she said, and I realized the good smell was coming from strips of chicken sizzling in a frying pan.
“Thought I smelled Mexican. Sounds good.” I didn’t have much of an appetite these days, but I knew Cary went to a lot of effort to keep me fed, so I always made an effort to eat.
I waited until after dinner to bring up what Brian and I had discussed. We were just watching TV together, when a commercial for an Easter sale came on and reminded me that, in another week, Cary and I would be with our families in our hometowns, a thousand miles apart. “So, next week, when you go home…” I started casually, looking over at her, “…you don’t have to come back here, you know. I mean, if you don’t want to.”
Cary blinked and gave me a confused look. “What do you mean?”
I muted the TV. “I mean that I don’t wanna be a burden on you. You didn’t sign up for any of this when you first came out here last year, thinking you were just getting a gig on the tour, and I don’t want you to feel like you have to stay here just to watch me die.”
Her mouth dropped open. “Have to? Of course I have to! But not because you’re making me, and not because I want to, but because I care about you, Nick. I love you. How could you expect me to just walk away and leave you now? Unless… unless that’s what you want?”
There, again, was another opportunity to be selfless, to do what was better for her than for me, to let her go so she wouldn’t be stuck on deathwatch duty for five more months.
Again, I didn’t take it.
I was still too selfish, too afraid of what would happen to me if she really didn’t come back. There was comfort in knowing Cary was there to take care of me. I knew her, I liked her, and I trusted her. I just didn’t love her enough to let her go, to sacrifice my own feelings just to spare hers. “No,” I said quietly, “That’s not what I want. I just wanted you to know you have a choice.”
She smiled sadly and scooted in closer, putting her arm around me. “I made my choice when I moved out here. Just because the circumstance have changed doesn’t mean I’ve changed my mind. I choose you.”
I’d known all along she would never leave me, unless I forcibly pushed her away. She was too involved. She cared about me too much. One way or the other, she was going to end up hurt and heartbroken because of me, and I was helpless to stop it from happening. It was too late.
I couldn’t save her any more than she could save me.
***
