to keep the shovel handy.” His comment brings me skidding to a halt, and I turn to see him rubbing his hands together, as if the cold suddenly bothers him.
The man isn’t above using his ailing body as a means of sympathy, but I’m not like the women he brings home who want to take care of him. Baby him. I know better than to fall trap to his manipulative crap. Except, a few months back, he did something out of character, by going to have his cough and some headaches and dizziness he was having checked by Doc Reece. That’s when he found out about a nodule in his lungs.
“It’s spread, then?” I refuse to let the worry exploding inside of me touch my voice.
With a sniff, he looks around the forest and nods. “Ride’s about to get a little bumpy, kid.”
Russ and I have this game, one where we pretend like we don’t give a damn about each other. He tells me the nightmares I suffer every night are my own fault for watching those crime show documentaries, all while holding my hand, and I tell him I don’t care that he’s dying, all while holding back tears.
The cold in between keeps us from feeling any pain, but today, it isn’t working so brilliantly as before. Could be that losing my dog has rattled loose emotions that I typically keep in check.
Or maybe I’m just really fucking scared of being alone.
Flames lick the edge of the burner when I light the old, outdated stove, and set a pot of broth and meat on top. Just one of the many antiquated appliances in the cabin Russ and I have called home for the last few years. Miles out from the downtown area, it sits smack in the woods. Not a single neighbor within walking distance.
Mind lost to the cataclysm of thoughts in my head, I slice through a carrot, nearly adding the tip of my finger to the pile. “You could beat it, you know. This cancer. If we lived closer to civilization. A hospital.”
“Doc says it’s stage four. I’d sooner have them cut every one of my limbs off with a butter knife than sit in some hospital bed all day long and go through their treatments.”
At the sound of his lighter, I twist around to find him lighting up a cigarette, and I swear it takes sheer willpower not to stab him right now. See, Russ believes that his exposure to agent orange during the Vietnam War is what led to the diagnosis of small cell carcinoma, and not the millions of cigarettes he’s smoked over the last four decades since then. “Really?” It’s a miracle I haven’t chopped my fingers off, as forceful as I’m cutting the vegetables for the stew. “Why do you have to be so goddamn stubborn?”
“What do you care, Angeltude?”
Angeltude. ‘Face of an angel with a fuckton of attitude,’ he used to say, when I was younger. My name literally means celestial, or heavenly in French, which has become a mocking contrast to the last near decade, during which I’ve been somewhat hellish, bitter and angry. About everything, really. Where we live. How we live. He’s been bitter, too. But it seems the nickname has become more of an endearment for him in the last few months.
Teeth grinding in frustration, I stir the vegetables I’ve chopped into the pot of broth and meat.
“So, how long is it? A year? Six months?”
“Doc says I’ll be lucky to make it to spring.”
“That’s … that’s like … four months away!” Heat pulsing behind my eyes and in my nose tells me it’s only a matter of time before the dam breaks and all these real feelings come pouring out of me.
“I know. We got a lot of shit to do before then, kid. Lot of affairs to settle.”
Keeping my back to him is all I can do from breaking down. “I don’t want anything to do with your affairs.”
“I’m not talkin’ ‘bout women. Just tyin’ up loose ends.” A long pause follows, and he’s picking at his fingers when I shoot a glance over my shoulder. “I don’t want to leave you alone by yourself.”
“I’ll be fine.” Somehow, hearing him say it aloud, though, sends a shudder of fear through me. “Don’t you … worry about me. Just … worry about yourself. Maybe stop smoking those things, while you’re at it.”
“I know you’ll be okay. You’re strong. Always been strong. A survivor.” He isn’t talking