Her Cornerstone

Tracy turned her head on the pillow and let out a sigh for the effort such a simple movement involved. She stared out the largest picture window, one of three panes that filled the west wall. Her room was on the first floor so that from her high bed she had a panoramic view of the wide green lawn. Small brown birds, sparrows she guessed, flitted from branch to branch mostly hidden by the thick foliage of birch trees while far below, neat concrete paths wound in seeming disarray over the expansive lawns, all leading eventually to a man-made pond at the western most corner of the hospice grounds. It had been a long time since Tracy had been out to the pond. If she had the energy to lift her head, she could see part of it from her bed, but not today.

A woman in a bright yellow dress and black high heels meandered along one of the paths; her arm tucked in the crook of a man's arm. Tracy recognized his standard issue clothing. He wore a blue housecoat, thin, easily wrinkled, short in the sleeves and remarkably unattractive. One size fits no one. Yellow Dress hadn't brought him a more manly robe, something to set him apart from the rest of the patients. At least Gary had brought Tracy her favorite pink robe and even bought her a new purple one for variety. She had yet to wear the purple one. The pink robe was tied up in wonderful memories - the old days when life was ordinary.

Mark. That was the man strolling outside with Yellow Dress. Tracy hadn't spoken to him in a long time, and even when she had, they'd only shared polite small talk. It had been a while since she'd been out to the common room. He was new here then, however long ago that was. Losing track of time was easy to do when every day melted into another in relative sameness. He was thinner now, she noted.

Every now and then, Yellow Dress left his side to run heron-like across the lawn as she gave chase to a small boy in red overalls. She'd pick him up, tickle him, set his feet back on the paved path, and push her long, blond hair over her shoulders in a practiced one-handed gesture. In this awkward way, they moved off in the direction of the pond. Tracy imagined the scene when they reached their destination. Mark would collapse onto a bench and Yellow Dress would rest her hand on his knee, offer idle chatter, never focusing fully on him since she would have to jump up and down to pull the little boy back from the water's edge. The woman would get that look in her eyes - the one Gary always gave Tracy during their visits together.

Gary's steady gaze, meant to convey caring, concern, perhaps even love, couldn't hide the feelings he was careful never to discuss with his wife - pain, anger, disappointment, unfocused guilt and myriad unnamed emotions. "I love you, but when will this be over? I love you but when can I get on with my life? I love you but when can I grieve the loss of you?"

Maybe Yellow Dress was able to avoid all that by keeping herself busy with the boy, but how did she handle the visits without his distraction? Twice a week, she drove out to the well-hidden and over-priced hospice to see Mark; one visit with the boy tagging along, the other alone. She was his wife, obviously. Tracy was sure of that. Common-law maybe? She didn't remember seeing a ring on Mark's finger, but that didn't mean anything. Many occupations could cost a man his finger, even his hand or more if he wore jewelry.

Tracy always noticed small details like that. Reading people, understanding their relationship through their actions, their personal symbols and decorations had been Tracy's livelihood for as long as she could remember. Show, don't tell. The Golden Rule of Writers, and Tracy did just as the overused phrase demanded, quite lucratively - at least she had until three years ago.

She hadn't sent a single manuscript to her publisher in four long years. Mabel still called from time to time, more a token of friendship than faith that Tracy would produce any more novels. Tracy remembered the long conversations and arguments she'd shared with Mabel - a working relationship that had shifted to friendship over time. They'd been close until Tracy began to spend her days aimlessly for almost a full year before the diagnosis, when she'd first suspected there was something wrong. She started avoiding Mabel, ignoring the taunting computer where words no longer flowed from fingertip to screen and slowly felt herself drifting further from everything that kept her anchored to the life she'd built and loved so deeply. Avoidance and denial consumed her the way her writing had until finally she was a dry well with nothing to offer her fans, her publisher, herself. For the entire year prior to her family doctor giving her a declaration of death, before another doctor and still another had confirmed it, she lived her days in constant worry - no doubt worsening the condition. She threw herself half-heartedly into things she faithlessly assumed would improve her life. There was jogging (when she had the energy), gardening, and speaking at every garden party within the tri-state area including the ones she wouldn't be caught dead attending. And, of course, chain smoking. All of it was in a futile effort to avoid confirmation of her worst fears.

The little family she'd been watching had long since drifted out of sight. Tracy turned her gaze to the photograph on the bedside table. Taken two years earlier, it was of the last summer her own small family had gone fishing with Gary's sister and her large troupe of offspring.

Five kids: all loud, unruly, robust boys. They were as intellectually different as physically from the one child she and Gary had produced before ovarian troubles had decided the size of their family. Ovarian cancer. It had given them a scare, but they were thankful when it was all over, never knowing, or believing if they had known, that it was merely the appetizer.

Debby and Jordan's numerous boys were handsome, athletic, and dare-devilish in all they did. Not like Tracy and Gary's only child, Brian. His cousins called him a computer geek, which upset Tracy more than it upset Brian or Gary.

"When I own the biggest computer company this world has ever seen - move over Billy Boy Gates - they'll rethink their opinion of me." Brian said.

"Actually, no they won't." Gary had said. "They'll say 'See? We were right. You're a geek. Got a couple thousand you can loan me Brian, old buddy?' They won't stop labeling you son, but they will respect you. I think. I hope."

Brian was in the photo next to the bed too but not really 'with' his parents. Tracy and Gary were in the center of the picture. It was more than just a family photo, if she could call it that. It was the last time they'd gone out to Wawesha Lake as a family. Brian and Gary had gone up last summer with Jordan and the boys, at Tracy's insistence, since she'd been too sick to go herself. Brian loved their trips to the lake and Tracy refused to let her illness interfere more than necessary in her son's life. Debby had stayed with her, driven her to the out-patient clinic at the hospital for her chemo, and served as mother/babysitter/friend. That was when Tracy thought there was still hope of recovery and tried to hide the extent of her illness from her son. Gary was more than happy to go along with the charade - but then he wasn't one for confrontation.

Tracy studied the photo and reached out a trembling hand, tried to grasp the silver frame, but it was too heavy. She managed only to turn it towards her a little more. She couldn't help smiling when she looked at it. That one moment in time, frozen for all eternity or as long as pictures last before they fade to nothing, captured them all so eloquently. Their personalities shone through despite their lack of awareness of it at the time. The sky behind them glowed a rosy orange as the sun set, turning the water beyond the boat a burnished red-gray. Fir and pine trees on the distant shoreline looked like construction paper silhouettes. Tracy could almost smell the lake, the falling needles of the trees, and feel the cool air brushing her cheeks. She could almost smell the overpowering odor of dying fish. Loved the taste, hated the smell, but she felt a lump rise in her throat as she longed for all the sensations of a summer on the lake one last time.

There was Gary beaming and holding up a rather small rainbow trout. It was his only decent catch - not of the day, but of the whole trip. The baseball cap meant to cover premature baldness shaded his eyes so only the whites glinted, matching his toothy grin. Typical Gary - proud and goofy all at once. His bare chest and shoulders shone pink from too much sun. His other arm was around Tracy who stood next to him in Gary's gray sweatshirt (always feeling a chill), her arm wrapped around his waist. Her left arm was stuck out from her side in an attempt to keep her cigarette out of the picture - her shameful addiction. The attempt was futile as it so often was as smoke tendrils seeped along the edge of the freeze frame. To the right of them, Brian, sixteen then, leaned against the stern and managed a small for-politeness-only smile. He wore his signature oversized T-shirt and had two fingers raised in a gesture of peace, dark blond hair tumbling forward almost hiding his eyes. "Peace." That's what the symbol meant in Tracy's youth. She didn't know if her son meant the same thing or if he meant victory that his father had finally mastered the waters and caught a tasty sample of what dinner could be.

That Brian had gone to the trouble of having the photograph enlarged and framed when she first checked in to the hospice gave Tracy to wonder if there was a super-imposed meaning to it now. Victory over her illness? Peace as death descended? She didn't ask her son about it. Maybe she was reading too much into it. Maybe there was no symbolism at all. Maybe it was just a gift of a good picture when she still looked relatively healthy, before she got too thin and pale. She imagined herself asking Brian what it meant and could see him rolling his eyes, giving her the response she hated but had become accustomed to hearing.

"Mom, just because you try to get all this symbolism going in your writing doesn't mean it's everywhere. Sometimes things just are and they don't mean anything at all."

He wasn't always right about that. If there was meaning behind his gift of the photo, Tracy wasn't so sure she wanted to know it. To talk about it would only cause them both more pain than they were strong enough to handle right now.

Brian's high school graduation was only a few weeks away. Tracy hoped she'd be strong enough to attend, but lately she'd been getting sicker, the medication barely managing to cover the pain. Half the time she was in pain, while the other half she was stoned out of her mind. She was just about at the midway point now, not sure if she wanted to cloud her mind just now or live through the pain and think clearly. Hadn't Freud avoided his medication for the same reason? Lucidity for the bargain price of a pain-wracked body. What a trade-off.

"Oh, screw it," Tracy whispered. She reached for the little silver box with its big red call button. Bony fingers grasped at the bed covers. Where was the damn button? It should have been by her hip for easy reaching but it must have slipped. Tracy didn't have the strength to start looking for it. This is better anyway, I guess. Really. She sighed. Just like Freud, she thought, that old coot with his crazy ideas. He should have been a writer not a psychiatrist. What bizarre and interesting stories he could have told. Having cancer himself, did he understand the psychology of the disease - did he know there was a psychology to it or did he avoid it as Tracy herself did? Get through one day, and the next, and the next and never mind what the hell goes through the mind. Never mind the mind! Tracy smiled at her joke.

She thought again about the painkillers and decided to give herself a little test: see if she could wait until the nurse, Yvonne, came in to do Tracy's hair. She had to test herself first before inevitably succumbing to begging like a damn junkie for her next hit. Yvonne always did her hair up in a nice scarf on days that Tracy had visitors. Gary was stopping by after work and Tracy liked to look her best for him. Yvonne tried to make her look pretty with makeup, but when she held the mirror up for Tracy's approval, Tracy only exclaimed "Perfect" to keep Yvonne happy. All Tracy saw in the mirror was a grotesque little skeleton with cheerleader cheeks - the furthest one could get from perfect. Nevertheless, she liked Yvonne's lies.

Tracy pictured the large girl in her pale blue uniform, her grin a startling white against her dark skin as she bustled into the room. Yvonne was so full of life she never just plain walked into a room. She bustled, burst, strode, danced, but never, ever walked. Her constant humming was as welcoming and comforting as her colorful manner. Just being around her was like having a sudden infusion of life when death seemed imminent, but Tracy liked her lies most of all.

"Oh, Honey! Look at how that scarf brings out the blue in your eyes. Such a pretty little thing! With just the right amount of blush, like so, you look like you're about ready to dance the night away!"

Beautiful lies. The irony of it wasn't lost on Tracy. She'd spent a lifetime railing against dishonesty her entire life. That's what writing was for: it was the one place where lying was allowed and kept the rest of her world pristine, free of dishonesty. Especially in her marriage and now she was glad to have someone aid her in deceiving her husband; make him believe, even just a little, that she was doing better than she actually was.

Honesty in all things, had been Tracy's creed. "Don't have an affair behind my back." That had been a paramount truth in their marriage, at least to Tracy. "If you don't want to be here anymore, tell me and I'll go or you can. Nobody has the right to hold that kind of power over someone who is supposed to be their partner." She'd said the words when her heart told her it was already too late for them to matter. "The word 'partner' clearly indicates that all decisions for the marriage belong to both parties," she'd said. "If one goes off screwing around and the other is oblivious to it, then it isn't marriage anymore, just a power trip."

It was four months later that Gary finally admitted he'd been having an affair. His move from the conjugal bed to the adulterer's took only a day, one suitcase, and too many tears to count. It took another three months for him to discover he'd made a terrible mistake. With nothing to hide, the power died. That he had come back was all the assurance either of them needed to know it would never happen again.

She thought that had been the end of it, but now here she was, trying to look more alive than she felt in a blatant attempt at dishonesty. How could she claim her marriage to Gary was a partnership now? Had he been part of the decision to have her insulated against the world, hanging on by a tenuous bony thread, turning his life upside down? Had he agreed to let the cancer consume Tracy, ravage her body and their shared future? She closed her eyes as a fresh wave of pain danced through her veins. How could he love a partner who wasn't there, giving her all to the marriage?

She almost wished he were having an affair now. Affair wasn't a fair word. It rang of deceit and manipulation. Affair, cancer - weren't they the same side of a crooked coin? No, she wished he were in a new relationship now, with someone who could be fair, and good . . . and there for him. Perhaps he was and their marriage now consisted of lies.
Hers: "I feel wonderful today."
His: "You're the only one for me."

Tracy opened her eyes and gazed at the picture. Outside, clumps of patients moved with loved ones over the grass patches and cement mazes without destination. Tracy knew what they all knew - once checked into the hospice, there was only one destination. Until departure time, everyone seemed to need the aimlessness, as though the inherent boredom stretched the days and so prolonged the time left.

The pain subsided for a moment and Tracy was acutely aware that she had been lost to her surroundings for some time. She was mildly observing, yes, but not drinking in the life around her as she had done before. Besides honesty in all things, Tracy had always had a watchful eye. It had been a cornerstone of living. She watched people, studied them intently, wrote about them in her novels, and spun new lives for them that turned into salable words. She forced herself to pay attention now; not to gain material for her next best seller, but to remind herself that she was still alive. She focused on a bent old man, watched as he grasped the arm of a younger, yet aged man. Both were bald and the sun glanced off their bobbing pink scalps making Tracy think of balloons reaching up to the sun. The effort of watching and thinking was too much and Tracy closed her eyes again.

"Tell me lies and I'll close my eyes, pretend I know nothing of other lives." Tracy murmured, opening her eyes to stare up at the ceiling. Her voice, mostly unused now was hoarse and unfamiliar in her ears. She was exhausted and the pain waves seemed to be coming more frequently now, lasting longer.

Don't give in yet, she chided herself. Wait for Gary. She looked outside again. Keep watching, keep thinking, she thought. A couple that looked to be about her own age, sat down on a bench beneath a birch tree. She imagined herself sitting on that bench, remembered other benches in other parks where she'd sat, winded, while her husband and son tossed a Frisbee back and forth. She saw Gary, his body still in good shape for a man of forty-something. Brian's youthful body was still unflawed and supple, muscles rippling gently across his arms and chest. Young girls strolled by, ogling and pretending not to as they flipped their hair and giggled too loudly. Tracy, comfortable on the sun-warmed bench, smiled and lit a cigarette. She stretched her legs out before her, leaned back, and stared up at the blue sky. She took a long drag and let the smoke out on a sigh, watching the cloud dissipate into the clear blue perfection above her.

Think about the sighs. Tracy frowned as she pictured herself taking a languorous drag off a cigarette. No, it wasn't the cigarette, it was the sigh, she berated. A sigh is a sound symbol of satisfaction. Not cigarettes! She sighed now.

She remembered all her failed attempts to quit smoking: acupuncture, hypnosis, determination, tapering, willpower and cold turkey. Nothing had worked. Finally, she'd resorted to prayer. "Please, make something happen to make me quit," she'd begged. "Make me quit because I can't do it on my own."

Tracy smiled and shook her head. Of all the prayers she'd sent up to heaven - make me thinner, make me happier, help me be a better person, make me quit smoking - it seemed only one had been heard. "I meant a slipped disk or a broken leg or something," she said aloud now.

Weakness was overcoming her and the pain was beginning to subside. She hoped she could hold on until Gary arrived. Was Brian coming by tonight? She hoped.

A tear escaped the corner of her eye as she thought of all the things she'd loved, the things she'd lost, and those she would soon be losing: her husband, her son, her writing. Her cigarettes.