Hell Fire

38

The cancer had really started to ravage her body. The pain increased, especially in her bones, and she continued to lose weight. She still hadn’t said anything to Eddie. There was fear in his eyes as he watched his mother getting thinner and thinner, but Mass reassured him that it was just age.

“You know,” she said, “old people are never fat.”

“But you’re not old.”

“Yes, I am. I will be soon enough anyway.”

One day, when Eddie was sitting at the computer, Mass came into the living room with two plastic bags of food and drinks, newspapers, and fruit. And chocolate for Eddie, even though it wasn’t good for him. She had been out for some time because she’d had a few errands to run. She was suddenly reminded of the winter she turned thirteen. She had nagged and nagged her parents until they let her get a perm, because other girls in the class had curly hair. She had straight hair. It was long and thick, to be fair, but not even a wave in a single hair. So after going on and on about it, she was eventually allowed to do it — only to come back from the hairdresser with what could only be compared with black sheep’s wool. When she went to school the next day, the boys in her class flopped over their desks, howling with laughter. They shouted and yelled and pointed, baaing like sheep. They punched her and threw erasers at her. After the last class, she slunk home, burning with embarrassment. She sat down at the fireplace in despair and cut off all the curls as close to her head as she could. She threw them into the fire and could still recall the smell of burnt hair. When she looked in the mirror afterward, she looked like a plucked chicken. And as if that wasn’t enough, she then tore off her clothes and threw them on the fire too. She remembered the episode now, standing in the middle of the room with a green scarf around her head. Eddie looked at her in astonishment because she had never used a scarf before.

“Is that in fashion now?” he asked.

“Yes,” Mass said. “Let’s hope so.”

“But you’ve got such lovely hair, you shouldn’t hide it.” He turned back to the screen, his fingers racing over the keyboard.

Mass collapsed into her chair; she looked at her son’s broad shoulders and his brown hair that curled so beautifully at the neck.

“Where have you been?” he asked, turning around again. “You were gone for ages. If you’re going to be that long, you have to say. Otherwise I just sit here waiting and not knowing.”

“I went to the hairdresser,” Mass said in a feeble voice.

“What?” Eddie couldn’t believe it. “But you’ve got a scarf on. Did she make a mess of it?”

“No.” She turned away. She knew that she couldn’t avoid it any longer. It was as if there was a wolf between them, snarling. Get to the point. Coward.

“I don’t have hair anymore,” she said and looked straight at him.

“What do you mean, you don’t have hair?”

“I’ve shaved it off,” she explained, “because it was starting to fall out.”

“But why?” he asked, horrified. “Are you ill? Will you get a wig?”

“I’m not going to get a wig, Eddie. It’s the medicine I’m taking that makes my hair fall out.”

Finally Eddie understood. He gasped once, took a deep breath, then two, three more. His voice, which was usually so loud, was thin and reedy.

“Right, but it will grow back, won’t it?” he asked nervously. “I’ve heard that it does.”

She shook her head. “No, that’s not going to happen.”

“But why not? You’ll get better again.” He tried to stay the panic that was rising.

“Cancer?” he said slowly.

“Yes,” she said, “cancer. It started in the pancreas and has now spread everywhere.”

“Seventy percent of people who get cancer survive,” he said doggedly. “That’s what I read on the Internet.”

“Yes,” she said. “I know. But I don’t belong to that seventy percent. I’m going to die, Eddie, and quite soon.”

“No,” he said feebly.

“Yes.”

“The doctors often make mistakes,” Eddie suggested. “And you’re strong. I know you’re strong. You’re like an ox.” He punched the table.

“But the cancer is stronger. You’re going to have to live on your own, Eddie, and you’ll need help. You will have to accept all the help that’s offered. People will come to the door, and you must cooperate. You know, home health aides and people like that. People from the council.”

He got up without turning off the computer and just stood there in the middle of the room.

“I’ve got some savings,” Mass continued. “But from now on, you’re going to have to get by on your disability. And that means you can’t live on Coke and cinnamon rolls. You’re going to have to make yourself proper food or you’ll get ill. Are you listening to me?”

“You’re wrong,” he said, desperate. “People get it wrong all the time.”

Mass struggled to get up. The pain in her bones was intense, and she knew it would only get worse. That it would spread to every single cell. She couldn’t bear to look her son in the eye. Everything felt so heavy, her heart, her head.

She went into the kitchen and opened the fridge; she had thought of frying some eggs and bacon for them both. Eddie followed her in his tartan slippers. He sat down and put his hands on the kitchen table. He swallowed hard. Every time a thought started to form in his head, it was interrupted by another — just like when a bonfire burns at night and the sparks fly up into the sky, a shower that will only last as long as there are flames. His mother dead and buried. Strangers coming to the door, people demanding impossible things of him: that he should get out and meet people, that he should try to find a supported workplace. He thought about all the things his mother had done for him over the years, all the things that he had taken utterly for granted. She had cleaned and tidied and made food. She had done the shopping and kept things in order and changed the beds. She had made sure there was toilet paper and had taken the car in to be serviced. She had paid the bills and done the tax returns, about which he knew zero. She had kept a check on his spending.

“Do you have to go to the hospital?” he asked anxiously.

“Yes, soon. I’ve thought about it long and hard, because at first I wanted to stay in my own bed. But you can’t look after me here; it would be too much for you.”

“But I can do the shopping and things like that,” he said, “and I can go to the pharmacy for you. And you can tell me how to do things from the bed, and I’m sure I’d manage.”

She went over and stroked his cheek. “I would do anything in the world if it meant you didn’t have to go through this,” she told him. “You are my greatest joy and have been my greatest comfort, especially after Anders left. But now you have to be stronger than ever before. You simply have to manage. You just have to take one thing at a time, and you will have to get people to help you. You’ll have to arrange the funeral and all that. Don’t use Jølstad, they’re too expensive.”

Eddie couldn’t speak anymore. His father had left him and now his mother was about to do the same. “To be honest, Mom,” he whispered, “I don’t think it’s going to work.”

“Don’t say that,” she said in anguish. “That’s not what I need to hear when I’m dying. You went to Copenhagen on your own. Just remember that.”

“Maybe there’s something after,” he said, trying to be hopeful. “We don’t know for certain.”

“That’s one thing I know for sure,” she said firmly. “I will not live on, neither here nor there. Only in your thoughts,” she added, to soften it. “You will have to manage alone.”

They ate their eggs and bacon in silence. Eddie dipped his bread into the egg yolk, his feet fidgeting under the table. After they’d eaten, he went back to the computer and started to search. He got lots of hits. He sat for a long time reading about pancreatic cancer and how it spread to the bones and marrow. The symptoms were described in detail, and he recognized them. Some people could be operated on but not everyone. And often it went unnoticed until it was too late. The last thing he read terrified him. Among doctors, this form of cancer was known as “The Silent Killer.”