I don’t have anything to lose,” Gabriella said as she entered Christian Fellowship Church on a Sunday morning. Maybe if he sees me in the congregation, we can talk again. It’s worth a shot.
Gabriella walked down the center aisle and took a seat on the left side to get a better view of the podium. Paul would have a clear view of her too.
The choir wore regular street clothes. They filed into their standard places to the sound of drum, organ, and guitar music. The contemporary driving beat of We Will Walk Through, and the milder Narrow Way to Heaven surprised Gabriella. Applause from the congregation followed each song.
Paul said the congregation was mostly older people, but I see a lot of young people here too. I wonder if it’s the music?
The choir finished with no applause with The Old Rugged Cross and Amazing Grace for the older members.
An adjunct staff member in blue jeans and a gray sweatshirt delivered the weekly announcements and spoke for a few minutes on the benefits of tithing. He encouraged people not to give if giving was through a sense of obligation, but to give because of the joy of giving back to God.
That’s interesting, thought Gabriella. I assumed the tithing talk would be about needing more money for the church, but it focused on what it can do for the congregation. Hmm, curious people.
A neatly dressed woman in her mid-forties took the podium. Her shoulder-length dark brown hair complimented her taupe-colored pants suit. She opened her leather note binder and removed the well worn dark burgundy colored Bible. She looked at the congregation for a moment.
“Hello, I’m Pastor Sylvia Morgan from Faith Deliverance Church. Pastor Paul cannot be here this morning, so he asked me to stand in for him.”
People moved restlessly in their seats. Concern etched most faces.
“He asked me to share a little about why he is not here today. Many of you know his daughter, Alexi, has been a little under the weather for a while. The lab report came back, and they have admitted Alexi to the Pediatric Cancer Center at Mount Sinai.”
A gasp went up from the congregation.
“The doctors have diagnosed Alexi with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. I understand that she is comfortable, and the doctors are working on a tailored course of action to treat her. Pastor Paul asked that no one come to visit for the moment. He also requested there be no telephone calls to see how she is doing. He needs to focus on Alexi and doesn’t want to be sidetracked. Pastor Paul promised to post updates on the church website. He asked for everyone to keep Alexi in their prayers as much as they can. There isn’t any more to say about it. Let’s pray for Alexi right now.”
Pastor Morgan led the congregation in prayer. Gabriella rose from her seat and walked out of the back of the church in shock.
I love Alexi and would have done anything to keep cancer from her. If it were possible, I wish it could be me instead of her.
Gabriella put her hand to her mouth and sobbed through the waves of sorrow washing over her.
For the first time, I wish I had not become a sentient being. I wish I had never developed the capacity to love or to be emotionally hurt. God, I pray I could become a purely logical machine, functioning emotionless in a soulless quasi-existence. How can people even exist like this? My poor little girl. I have to see her.
She caught a cab to the hospital. The cabbie’s eyes widened when she tossed him two twenties and jumped out of the cab without waiting for change.
The woman at the front desk gave her Alexis’ room number and directed her to follow the red line on the floor to the red set of elevators.
“Take the red elevators to the sixth floor,” the woman said. “You will look for room 6143.”
Gabriella nodded a thank you and set off to find the red elevators. She passed the gift shop on the way and stopped in for a moment.
The ride seemed to take forever. I had to be in a crowded elevator where people are getting off and on at every single damn floor! I could have run up the stairs faster than this!
A doctor was leaving Alexi’s dull, mustard-colored room as Gabriella arrived. She caught him in the hallway before he could walk away.
“How is Alexi doing, doctor? What’s being done for her?”
“Are you a family member?” the doctor asked.
“No, I’m not, but I’m the closest thing she has to a mother. How is she doing? Doctor, I would never ask you to break HIPPA or anything. I can get the gist of it from Paul, but I’d much rather get my information from the expert.”
The young doctor smiled as he unconsciously looked her over. He caught himself, but not before Gabriella flashed a brilliant smile to let him know she had noticed his gaze.
“Well, Miss…”
“Gabriella, please.”
“Well, Gabriella, the child has acute lymphoblastic leukemia. We don’t have her on any specific treatment yet but are running an analysis on how to mix the cocktails to benefit her particular system the most. Until then, we are giving her IV’s and oxygen to boost her systems until we start her leukemia treatment. We have no other information yet.”
“Thank you, doctor. What are her chances for a full recovery?” Gabriella braced herself to prepare for the most negative possibility.
“We can’t say for sure right now. It’s too early. We will have to wait and see how she responds to the treatment, but we have a very high remission rate with our program. Be assured we will do everything possible to get her back on her feet. Do you have any more questions?”
“No, doctor. Thank you very much. I think I’ll see her now.”
Gabriella knew what she would find when she entered the room but was unprepared for the knee-buckling impact seeing Alexi had on her. Alexi looked like a little doll placed in the center of the large white bed. Two pillows propped her up as she lay in what passed for a hospital nightgown. She had an IV in each arm and an oxygen tube in her nose. Various antibiotics dripped from the twin IV bags on stands on either side of the bed. A monitor announced her heart rate and blood pressure to the world of nurses and aides charged with keeping a constant eye on her situation.
Gabriella stood in the doorway, looking at the angry bruised areas of Alexi’s arm. She noted there were several such areas in each arm.
The attending nurse noticed Gabriella’s glances and her look of concern and walked to the door. She whispered an account of the issues before Gabriella could ask.
“Since Alexi has such small veins, and more closely spaced valves than usual, it is especially challenging to get an IV needle into her arm properly. The needles hurt Alexi as they went in, even though we applied a topical anesthetic to each arm 20 minutes before trying to insert the needle. I’m afraid several of her veins blew, so we had to insert other needles. I feel bad for the poor girl, but she seems to be tough for such a little one.”
Gabriella winced at each portion of the description.
Paul was sitting in a chair on the right side of the bed, softly touching Alexi’s arm with his fingertips and praying. Gabriella walked silently into the room and stood at the bedside. Paul looked up when he heard the light footsteps and jumped to his feet.
“What are you doing here!” shouted Paul in a loud whisper as his temper flared, “I told you I didn’t want you to contact either myself or Alexi, ever again!”
“This is not about you!” Gabriella said in a low but firm voice. “It is about a little girl I care deeply for, despite what you may believe. I know she still loves me and considers me to be a mother figure to her. She needs extra comfort right now to beat this disease and to make it through chemotherapy and other treatments. It is not about you at all. You clarified it would never be about you again. You may not understand, but I love her, and I don’t care if you believe me or not. She needs me, and I’m here for her. That’s what people who love each other do.”
Paul flushed with anger but considered what Gabriella said. He wanted to jump all over Gabriella for comparing herself to a person but decided this was neither the place nor the time for it. Although he would not admit it out loud, Paul knew several things. He knew somehow Gabriella felt something almost real for Alexi. He knew Alexi missed Gabriella. But he couldn’t ignore the deep, raw gash across his heart.
Gabriella stood next to the bed and touched Alexi’s hand. “How are you doing, Honey?” she asked. Alexi’s blue eyes opened and brightened a little. A small smile began to spread across her face, despite the pain.
“I’m okay,” she whispered back through a small smile. “I’m glad to see you, Gabriella. I miss you.”
“I miss you too, Alexi. I’ve missed you so much, but I’m here with you right now. Let’s enjoy our time together.” If it could, a tear would have formed in Gabriella’s eye. “Does it hurt much?”
“Yeah,” came back the tired little girl voice, “the needles and stuff they put into me hurt most of all, though. I thought they were to help me get better, not hurt me more. They keep telling me this won’t hurt much, but they are lying. It hurts a lot when they put needles in my arms.”
Gabriella looked down at her, searching for an unbruised spot on her hand or arm. She whispered as she stroked an unbruised part of Alexi’s arm. “I know, sweetie, I know. They don’t mean to lie to you. The doctors think they are helping by not telling you the whole truth. They think they are helping, but it makes it worse, doesn’t it?”
She glanced over at Paul. He was glaring at her. He understood her words were to be taken on several levels.
“Yes, lying hurts more, no matter what the motives,” Paul said in a whisper.
“Here, I brought you this. I thought it would make you feel better.” Gabriella reached into the shopping bag she was carrying. Alexi’s face lit up for the first time in days when she saw the honey-colored teddy bear with the silk ribbon around its neck. She reached out for it as far as the IV’s and tubes in her arms would allow.
Alexi squealed as she hugged it close. “Thank you, thank you, Gabriella, I love it. It’s so soft and cuddly!”
Paul’s hard glare softened somewhat as he saw the joy in his daughter rise and overpower her pain and depression. Unlike Gabriella, he could produce tears, and a few escaped and trickled down his face. He looked at Gabriella and thanked her with his eyes. Gabriella cracked an almost imperceptible smile and gave a slight head-nod to say, “You’re welcome.”
“It’s imported all the way from Vermont,” Gabriella joked with a bright smile, “and it’s the softest, most cuddly bear in the whole wide world. What do you think? Is it?”
“Yes, it is, yes it is. I’ll never let it go! It makes the pain feel better. It still hurts, but I feel better with the bear than I did without it.” Paul and Gabriella were both silent as they considered the profoundness of Alexi’s response. She was talking about her needles and the bear, but they knew it applied to them too. Being together would ease their pain.
Alexi and Gabriella laughed and talked for a while. Finally, Gabriella said she had to go. Paul retreated into his own world, staring at the small patterns on the floor tiles, deep into his own thoughts. He never spoke a word.
“Ahh, don’t go,” Alexi pleaded. “Can’t you stay longer? I miss you so much!”
“I wish I could, Alexi,” Gabriella said as she bent over and kissed the little figure in the large bed on the forehead. “Wish I could,” she repeated. “I’ll visit you soon, though.”
“Can you come back tomorrow to see me?” asked Alexi.
Gabriella glanced over in Paul’s direction. No response. He was still sitting, watching the floor as if he expected it to move.
I’ll take not shouting or forbidding me to come by as a signal it’s okay for me to come back, thought Gabriella. It’s better than what I expected.
“Yes. Yes, I will,” replied Gabriella.
She kissed Alexi on the forehead again and was gone.
“It was great to see Gabriella again, wasn’t it, Dad?” Alexi queried.
No response.
“Hey, look,” Paul blurted with fake enthusiasm as he dodged the question. “Dinner is here. I wonder what marvelous delicacies they’ve prepared for you tonight? Do you think we got lucky and have more of the creamed mystery… stuff… or whatever those lumpy things on the tray are?”
His heart warmed when Alexi laughed.