New Novel Sneak Peek

Get the first glimpse at my 90-Day Novel today!

If you haven’t been following along, I’ve been working on a new project: writing a novel in 90 days. I’m hoping to post the novel as I work on it over on my Ream subscription, but it just isn’t there yet. You’ll be the first to know when I make the big reveal over there!

This week, I put the first words in after my outline and plotting were finished. Here is a sneak peek of what I’m working on!

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David is taking an extraordinarily long time to get ready, and he doesn’t even have hair to style. I have been waiting for him to get out of the shower for half an hour. During that time, I had a chance to paint my nails and let them dry because who doesn’t want to look their very best for a cancer support group meeting? I feel like people expect me to have it all together because I’m not the one with the cancer. As a caregiver, I should never complain about the hard parts of caring for someone who is a constant state of crisis, medically speaking.

            “You know, we don’t have to go,” I call through the bathroom door after a quick glance at the clock tells me it has been forty-five minutes since he first turned on the water. I wait for a beat and then knock on the door when I get no response.

            “I heard you,” he says, but his voice is weak. I feel guilty for my uncharitable thoughts. I know he can’t help how sick he feels from the chemo even though it has been weeks since his last infusion. He moves slower than he used to when we first got together three years ago, before he got sick. The difference still astounds me sometimes. “I’m almost done.”

            At that, he cracks open the bathroom door and a plume of steam hits me square in the chest. His neuropathy means that he feels temperatures differently than he did before the cancer and for him, that often means extra hot showers because cold makes his skin tingle in an unpleasant way, even more than it does for normal people. David feels like he will never be warm again, as if the cold radiates directly from his bones.

            My face softens at the sight of him. Despite the heat, he is still extremely pale and the skin of his face is drawn tight from the lack of appetite, the nausea and vomiting, the days spent in bed without the energy to exercise or stretch his muscles. He looks obviously sick and the beanie he wears on his bald head doesn’t help disguise his ailment. If anything, it draws more attention to his lack of eyebrows and eyelashes in this summer heat.

            “I didn’t mean to rush you,” I tell him, trying to sound gentler than I felt a few minutes ago when I was thinking of several expletives that I would have liked to yell to hurry him up. “I don’t mind coming to these meetings with you. You know that.”

            “It’s meant to be a family thing.” He sounds defensive, and I know it’s because of the fights we have been having about my caregiving responsibilities.

I feel like he has been asking too much of me for months now, allowing many of his friends to take a step back from his long-term cancer treatments. They no longer accompany him to chemo and blood transfusions or come to visit him in the hospital when he has yet another infection. It comes down to his parents and me. And his parents come infrequently because they can’t take time off from their high-powered corporate jobs. I try not to remind them that I also have a job I would like to keep, and that I’m skating on thin ice and pity at the moment. Nobody wants to fire the girl who is playing the martyr, caring for a very sick husband. Not the image most managers are going for in establishing themselves as the cool manager, the one who supports work-life balance.

But I don’t say any of that to David, not now. Instead, I say, “I know. I really don’t mind. I think it could be good for us to meet some other families who are in the same boat.”

He offers me a tentative smile and leans against the doorframe. It would look casual, but I can tell from the pained look on his face that it is actually excruciating for him to still be standing after all this time getting ready. He moves so slowly but refuses to use the stool that I placed in the shower specifically to help him conserve his energy. It makes him feel geriatric. It makes him feel as if he has lost his dignity alongside his immune system and bodily autonomy.

“Can we just get to the car?” He is starting to weave on his feet, a sign that he has been on them for far too long. I grab his hand because it looks like an intimate gesture but is a sneaky way for me to support him if he is going to go down. It wouldn’t be the first time he fell on our floor, resulting in me having to scoop up his withered frame and giant purple bruises.

I grab my keys and purse from the console table by the front door without breaking stride. The touchless deadbolt locks behind us with a touch of my finger on the black screen. This was a necessity for us so that other people could come and go from our home during times when David was resting and I had to be at the office or tending to something in my own life. He limps on toward the car until I catch up with him and gently lower him into the passenger seat before I slip behind the wheel.

I always hated driving, but David no longer has a valid license so I drive for both of us. I drive us back and forth to the hospital for treatment and ER visits and follow-up appointments and scans. I drive myself to work and the grocery store and the gym – on the days that I’m capable of getting away for more than fifteen minutes at a time. This is usually on days when David is weak enough that he can’t leave the bed and we have rallied the troops to surround us as best they can. Needless to say, it has been a while since I scanned my badge and indulged in a little sweat therapy. As it stands, the shower and walk to the car has drained David’s reserve. The car ride to the hospital where the support group is hosted is quiet with nothing but the radio on. David still loves music, even if he can’t sing along without getting winded.

We pull up in front of the hospital and I secure a wheelchair from the pool just inside the revolving door while I leave our car idle in the carport. Quickly, I support David’s weight as he gets out of the car and into the chair. As usual, he apologizes to me for not having the energy to walk through the hospital. This meeting is on the seventh floor at the far end of the cancer wing. There is no way he will make it from the parking garage across the street all the way to our final destination. I park him by the curb, far enough back that he isn’t in the way of other patients doing the same dance but still in the sunshine so he can enjoy a little vitamin D. Then, I go park the car and jog back to him.

“One last chance to turn around,” I tell him jokingly when we get in the elevator. For once, it’s just the two of us because it’s afterhours for most of the clinics here at the hospital.

“This feels like a second home,” he mutters. “I wish we could turn around.”