wife has become meaningless. It sure as hell won’t help her in any way.
Kelsey puts the folder on my desk and opens it to reveal a letter on university stationery.
“I can take over your seat on the Admissions Committee,” she says. “The provost already approved it, so you’ll have at least one less commitment.”
I scan the paper, my jaw tightening. “I didn’t ask you to do this.”
“I know.” She rests her hands on her hips, eyeing me with that all-knowing stare of hers. “But the last thing you need right now is to deal with more committee meetings.”
I crumple the letter into a ball and toss it in the trash. “What I need is for you to leave me the hell alone.”
“Whoa.” She holds up her hands, unfazed by my snapping. “You really think I’m going to leave you and Liv alone right now? You don’t have to be nice to me, but you do have to realize you can’t do it all, no matter how much you tell yourself otherwise.”
Goddammit. I don’t want to hear this.
“Thanks for the concern,” I tell Kelsey evenly. “But I can handle it.”
“By throwing yourself into work and research, I know,” she replies. “And you really think that’s the best thing you can do? Not only for yourself, but for Liv and your children?”
“Kelsey, get the fuck out of my office.”
The order fires out of me, harsher than I’d intended. She blinks and takes a step backward. Guilt slams me like a steamroller, but before I can say anything else, she turns and strides out, closing the door behind her.
I drag a hand down my face. There’s a cold, hard knot right in the middle of my chest. I know I should go after Kelsey and apologize, but instead I turn back to my computer.
A framed black-and-white picture of Liv sits right beside my computer—and the sight of her is both a torture and a comfort. Because she looks like she always does—soft, pretty smile; warm, brown eyes, and her tumble of dark hair spilling over a white, button-down shirt—but only I know that the shirt is mine and that Liv is naked underneath.
Only I know what happened right before I took the picture.
Only I know that Liv had been gasping and writhing underneath me, that she’d wrapped her legs around my hips and bitten down on my shoulder when an orgasm shuddered through her beautiful body.
Only I know how she’d arched her back and stretched against me when I slid my palms over her thighs, her torso, her breasts…
Only I know the jagged fear of how different things are between then and now. Back then, I’d never have imagined anything evil could ever again happen to the beauty on the other side of my camera lens.
And if it did, I’d battle heaven and earth to protect her.
But now? I don’t know how. I don’t have a single weapon I can use to defend my wife. The realization runs through my head like a sick refrain: Nothing you can do, nothing you can do.
What the hell do I do when there’s nothing I can do?
More goddamned research.
Even if I don’t come up with any answers, at least I know how to look for them. And I’m still not convinced Dr. Christopher Anderson is “the best” doctor we could find for Liv—he’s definitely not the most experienced—but she’s adamant he’s the one she wants.
We meet with him again to discuss the possible outcomes after surgery, and he supports Liv’s decision to have a lumpectomy. I watch my wife say something to the doctor, her hair falling over her shoulders to her breasts, which look soft and round beneath her sweater. My throat burns.
We don’t yet have a surgery date, but I want it over and done with. Not until the tumor is taken out will we get the complete pathology report telling us the exact kind of cancer, the size of the tumor, if it’s invasive and aggressive, if it’s spread to her lymph nodes, if she needs chemo, if…if…fucking if.
The comment from another doctor slithers into the back of my mind.
“If we discover the cancer has spread…
I rip the thought apart, crush it to pieces. Can’t go there. Won’t.
…the game changes.”
A bolt of remembered anger fires through me, a welcome relief to the terror. The game.
As if my wife is a pawn on a chessboard. To that fucker of a doctor, she obviously would have been.