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She could hear them discussing her as she crept her way down the stairs, leaning on the bannister as she descended. She felt how she imagined her patients felt: like a sick person.
She didn’t dare say it out loud. She was a sick person, of course she felt like it. But it was a state of being she was trying so adamantly to deny. That she had tried so adamantly to deny, and that denial had landed her at Faith and Iain’s listening to them talk about her.
“I mean it Iain, you can’t let her pack up and go,” Faith said.
“No I know that, but if she decides to leave then I can’t stop her.”
“You can try!”
“Look, Faith, it’ll be fine.”
“Like it was gonna be fine the other day?”
Stevie dragged her top lip by her teeth, a pang of guilt hitting her. She’d insisted she’d be fine alone, she was certain she would. She’s a doctor, how hard can it be?
But in the hazy shadow of chemo, when the nausea was unbearable and her whole body ached with the weight of an insidious invader, she didn’t feel like a doctor. Hell, she didn’t feel much like a human.
It didn’t matter that they’d cut the cancer out, that they’d taken her ovaries and her fallopian tubes and her uterus. It didn’t matter that she was stubborn and tenacious and determined not to let it take her down.
It was still there, latched onto her peritoneum.
And now she was being pumped with chemicals to kill the cancer and more chemicals to kill the side effects of the chemo. So maybe she’d missed her antiemetic dose because she could hardly think through the headache and the sickness, and once she’d endured her first expulsion she couldn’t get it to stop.
Stevie had heard her phone ringing, a distant clattering of noise that infiltrated the confines of the bathroom. But she couldn’t unfurl herself from the ball she’d curled into, forehead pressed to the cool tiled floor as she waited for the next violent hurl.
Her heart was pounding, ringing through her ears as the bile rose once again through her throat.
She didn’t know how long she’d been there when she heard her front door open and a frantic Faith stormed her way through the flat, before finding the consultant half-conscious on her side with vomit down her chin, her cheek, her shirt, pooled beside her.
She woke up in the ED, hooked up to fluids in a side room in a bid to reduce the risk of infection. Faith was sitting across from her in a chair, eyes glazed, in a world of her own as she thumbed the lid of her coffee cup. Stevie wondered how long she’d been there, whether Faith’s coffee was hot or cold, full or empty. She hoped it was a fresh drink, but her friend looked drained and tired and consumed by worry. And Stevie couldn't help but feel the burden of being a sick person.
Faith insisted Stevie go home with them, and when she scoffed and turned to Iain, Stevie saw the same look of resolution on his face. They weren’t inviting her, they were mandating it.
They put her in Natalia’s room and for 2 days she hadn’t made it downstairs until the afternoon. Stevie wasn’t surprised that Faith was giving Iain strict instructions to keep her there.
“Morning,” she croaked with a smile as she padded into the kitchen, the couple turning to face her.
“Hey,” Faith replied softly. “I’m just heading out.”
“You trust him to babysit?” Stevie asked dryly, brows threaded as she nodded towards Iain.
“No but she does trust me to baby-stand.”
“Oh that was,” Stevie said in disdain as Faith groaned. “That was poor.”
.
.
Stevie wound up spread across the sofa. She’d started out sitting up but she continued to underestimate the exhaustion that hit her, by midday she was all but lying down.
“Here,” Iain said as he placed a cup of tea on the coffee table in front of her.
“Thanks,” Stevie said, propping herself up slightly. “I wonder if this is what retirement feels like.”
Iain frowned, and let out an inquisitive "hm?"
“Having a carer bring you tea at midday while you’re sofa-bound.”
“Yeah well, I cleaned up enough of your sick the other day Stevie, I ain’t signing on to be your carer in a hurry.”
“Well at least it was just vomit.”
“Was it?” He teased, but the flash of panic on her face sent regret through him. “I’m kidding,” he assured her and she scoffed and nodded in dismissal, insisting she knew that.
There was quiet for a minute or two, and Stevie felt exposed. Iain understood her, he always had, they were more similar than she'd ever freely and openly admit. She knew she couldn't pull the wool over his eyes, that he could tell just how deeply mortified she was by the thought of losing control of her body. She knew it could happen, and it terrified her. And she didn't have the mental strength to hide that.
“Riddle me this,” Iain began, peaking her interest. “Aren’t germ cell tumours more of a young person thing?”
“Are you calling me old?”
He gave a moment of false reprieve.
“Yeah, yeah I am,” he said smugly and Stevie unsuccessfully suppressed a smile. “And a pain in the arse. Of all the cancers, you go for a rare one.”
“I know, someone’s gotta keep these people on their toes though.”
“Oh you’re so generous,” he snarked and Stevie expelled a humoured breath.
“Thanks,” she said. “For being normal about it.”
(Because she was terrified that everything would change, and she couldn't stand the thought of that.)
“You mean funny?”
“No. If I meant funny I would’ve said funny.”
“Should’ve got some biscuits to have with this,” Iain said. “Want a biscuit?” He stood up, the thought of food luring him to the kitchen.
“No, I’m grand.”
“If you were a biscuit,” he began, pausing, and Stevie was certain she could see his brain entering a phase of rare deep thought. “Which biscuit would you be?”