more greens and garlic than she could ever turn her nose up at? Who will drive her to her latest boyband’s gigs and wait for her as she tries to get a selfie with them afterwards and then who will mop up her tears when she is broken-hearted because they didn’t have time to stop to say hello? Who will hug her and wipe away very different tears when she has her heart broken for the first time in real life?
My phone bleeps for the third time since I got here, disturbing my train of thought, and I give in and read my messages despite my need to switch off and absorb what I have just been told.
‘I still love you, today and every day,’ says the first one, sent earlier this morning and I bite my lip, knowing that it’s from Dan. De’s changed his number because of our ‘break’ but despite our agreement of no contact until I’m ready, or until he does what he needs to do, he can’t resist sending a message – so I have his number just in case I need him. Despite his troubles I sometimes think I don’t deserve him. I never did.
‘Are you okay? Please text me Juliette,’ is the next one, from my sister Helen who is undoubtedly sick with worry as she waits on me to give her news. She wanted to come with me to the hospital but I wouldn’t hear of it. Michael was right when he said I was stubborn but I can’t face breaking any more hearts just yet. I want her to stay ignorant for as long as possible, even if that’s just for another hour or so.
‘Hope you enjoyed your pamper day, Mum!’ says the last one and on reading this I burst into tears. I had genuinely forgotten it was my birthday today.
Rosie has been planning something, I just know she has. I didn’t have the heart to tell her not to bother, that all this turning forty nonsense wasn’t really on my mind. This time last year I had so many plans for how I would celebrate this milestone and I suppose I still should. I’m still here, aren’t I? I’m not dead yet.
I’d better get home.
I pretend that I had no idea there would be any big fuss and smile through my touched up lipstick when I am met with a small, but perfectly formed, surprise gathering in my kitchen.
The duck egg blue cupboards and the fridge which is covered in pictures, drawings and memories from Rosie’s playgroup days through to her secondary school life, now greet me like a warm hug. It’s so good to be home.
‘You little rascal!’ I say to my teenage daughter. ‘How on earth did you do this without me knowing?’
To be fair, she has done a pretty good job as I take in the banners and the show stopping cake. Wow. I guess this really is quite a surprise.
‘Aunty Helen helped me,’ says Rosie and I hug her close again, closing my eyes and praying for the tears to stay put. When I open my eyes I see my sister staring at me, that old familiar look of fear bursting from her soul. I can’t react. Not now.
The party consists of my sister, her three boys and my daughter. I want to ask where my mother is but my sister beats me to it with an explanation.
‘Mum couldn’t face it,’ she whispers to me as soon as the kids are distracted with phones and other gadgets. ‘She has a migraine and has gone to bed. She’s crippled with worry, Jules.’
I shake my head.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I tell Helen. ‘I’ll call her later. It’s probably for the best that she rests. The less fuss we have today, the better.’
My sister gulps back her biggest fears when I say that.
‘So, what’s on the menu?’ I ask, sniffing the air. ‘Don’t tell me? Is it Helen’s famous fish pie?’
‘You got it in one!’ says my oldest nephew George as the children now wrestle for seats around my kitchen table, eyeing up the cake that sits as its centrepiece. It has my name on it and a big ‘40’ candle. Shit, this is too much.
‘I hope you’re hungry, Mum,’ says Rosie with wide eyes. ‘This is just the beginning of the celebrations. We have your favourite sweets for after and prosecco and chilli crisps and I even made Aunty Helen get ice cream though we already have cake – but my teacher told me that life begins at forty so we’ve pulled out all the stops. This is going to be your best birthday ever and you deserve it after all you’ve been through with that horrible chemo.’
Ouch.
‘It’s not every day you turn forty,’ says Helen, still trying to catch my eye but I just can’t look at her. I keep smiling and wowing and making other over-exaggerated sounds of enthusiasm to my daughter and my three young nephews but I know that Helen can see straight through me. I dare not catch her eye.
She just nods and stares as I touch my synthetic wig and when the kids have settled in front of a movie later and I break the news to her, she slowly shakes her head in disbelief and shock.
‘There has to be something we can try.’
If anyone looked through the window right now and saw us with our prosecco and cake, they’d think we really were celebrating.
‘There are no more somethings, Helen,’ I tell my only sister. ‘I could try and fight on and spend the rest of my days vomiting and pumping my organs with chemo and radiotherapy but I’d rather spend them with you and Rosie doing nice things. I want to go out of this world with a bit of grace and dignity, if you can understand that. At home, preferably.’
Helen, of course, is having none of that and her eyes are filled with fear. My God, the agony I have caused her…
‘But there has to be some—’
‘There isn’t,’ I remind her. ‘There is nothing. I know, I know. It sucks, big time but please don’t cry, Helen. I can’t cope with any more tears and this mascara goes to shit when I sneeze, never mind coping with tears.’
But it’s too late. She is sobbing and finding it hard to breathe so just like I did with Michael earlier, I get up to comfort her.
‘I don’t want you to be sad, Hel,’ I say into her hair that smells, as always, of apple shampoo. I raise my eyes towards the ceiling and swallow hard. ‘I had a quiet suspicion, no matter how much I denied it to myself that this might be the news I’d get today. Yes, it’s crap and it’s unfair and it’s not what we want but we need to accept it because there’s absolutely nothing I can do about it. Nothing. I’m so sorry, Helen. I’m sorry.’
It’s as much as I can say to her as she tries to digest this latest blow because I think I may be in shock too. She gets up, wiping her nose on the back of her hand and tries to get busy.
‘But you were doing so well,’ she sniffles. ‘How can it be so far advanced? How?’
‘It’s called cancer,’ I say, and the very word makes me so angry but I will never let it show. ‘I am trying to make sense of it all too but I don’t really have time to contemplate or analyse so it’s time for me to take action and do the things I should have done years ago. I’m going to make some really nice plans.’
Now, Helen shakes her head.
‘Juliette, you don’t need to make any more plans!’ she says. ‘Your life has been one big long plan that never got completed.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘The
