HONORIA
This is another of Tracy’s stories. It is about Honoria, Mr. Roberts and Al, who was angry. They all met in the therapy suite and we all learned, again, from our patients. They say nurses teach patients but I think it’s often the other way around.
She always came in with her little bag of talismans as she called them. Inside a small leather drawstring purse were several bits of pottery, a little picture of her family in a frame, a green statuette that looked very old and grainy, and a bunch of dried herbs. She lay them out on the Mayo stand and settled into the recliner, and wrapped Peg’s handmade afghan around her. When she did that, when she was settled and secure, then we knew we could start the IV and get her treatment going. Before all the little objects were laid out to her satisfaction, she wouldn’t let us touch her.
“These represent love, Tracy,” she would tell me. “The people I love can’t be with me every day of the treatment, so they sent these along to surround and protect me.” .
And then she would smile and put her head back and doze, while Peg and I looked after other patients and kept a close eye on her. I watched her sleep, her head with the salt and pepper hair back on the pillow, her face at ease, wiped clean of the stress lines at her eyes. She was about my height, five six or so, slim and wiry. She had been very active in her life, liked to garden and repair things, and work on her projects around the house. .
She was a breast cancer patient, of a special kind. She had something called ductal carcinoma; a high percentage of these patients end up getting the carcinoma a few years later in the other breast, after the first one was removed. She was told the odds, and she made the decision to have both breasts removed at the same time. It was a brave thing to do, but she didn’t seem to think so. .
“I want to live, and if my breasts will keep me from living, I don’t want them” That was the simple fact, according to Honoria. Her name was old fashioned, “like me,” she said, laughing. .
She came in over many months in the middle of Mr. Robert’s treatment. He was tall and wrinkled and brown, very much the rancher, from the southern part of the state. He had been diagnosed with leukemia and was astonished that something had invaded his body when he had fought with weather, snakes, bad tempered cows and an evil tempered wife. .
“Snake mean, she was,” he shook his head in wonderment. “Anything she could do to hurt people, she would. Never know it to look at her. Big shining eyes like bluebells, little thing, yellow hair, small hands hat would bunch up in fists in a heartbeat.” She had died several years before of cancer of the ovary, and Mr. Robert was still battling snakes and dust storms and those bad tempered cows. .
“Easier, though, than fighting with her.” He shook his head again over the image of a slight little woman putting him, big as he was, through a wringer. He was a pet, one of those courtly old men who move slowly and remind you of Gary Cooper. .
He was there getting his treatment when Honoria started coming in, shy and quiet and reserved. He watched carefully as she learned the routine, as he had, and came in with her statuettes and pictures. The routine was always the same, first came the blood draw in the little lab next to the therapy suite, where Joe worked. Then came the scan over at Nuclear Medicine, and then the visit with Dr. Kazu, who had the results of the blood work by then. After a visit with him and the decision aout the dosage, she came into the therapy suite with her satchel full of love. Mr. Roberts smiled when she wouldn’t let us touch her until everything was secure and settled. .
“Good for you, Mrs. Anaya! Do it your way, keep you going longer, that’s what the books say.” He looked around at us and added, “at least that’s what my daughter says. Took after my sister, thank god, not her mother.” .
We never met his daughter, she was busy looking after the ranch many miles away, down in the southern part of the state. The man that brought Mr. Roberts to us was a Hispanic man named Mr. Atencio, silent and smiling, who sat in the chair in the corner and watched his old boss with bright black eyes set into a sun-wrinkled face. All he ever said was “I’ll go bring the truck around,” when Mr. Roberts was done. .
It was Day 21 for Honoria, and her hair began to fall out from the chemotherapy. For a week or so she had talked to us about what to do when that happened. .
“Get a wig, or wear scarves?’ she asked. “Or just shave it off and not have that wispy look, hair in some places and gone in others?” She frowned, looking at a brochure of wigs. .
“Whatever you want, that’s what you ought to do.” I said. “Whatever makes you comfortable. It’s your head and your life, after all.” .
The next time she came in she was bald, shaved clean bald. She wore a pair of dangling wooden earrings, colorful and bright. She put her head up and grinned at us while we cheered and clapped. .
“My friends did it yesterday. We all sat in the yard and sang songs and they took turns shaving my head. And do you know what my teenage daughter’s friend said?” Honoria shook her head in wonderment. “He said it was ‘rad and bad’ which I guess is high praise, coming from a teenager.” She smiled and climbed into her recliner. “Let’s get the rad, bad, treatment over with, hear me?” .
“You keep it up, little lady.” Mr. Roberts shook Honoria’s hand with delight. “You keep it up and don’t let it get you down, and you’ll do fine.” He made a little bow and walked away, long legs steady, his brown ropy hands at his side. He looked like an old piece of leather that had been left out in the rain and the wind too long. But Honoria smiled after him and said, “He’s an angel, that’s what he is.” .
He was there like a comforting friend every time she came, and then when his treatment was over, she gave him a hug. .
“You be well, you hear?” she told him, with tears in his eyes. “You helped me so much, these past few weeks. You just take care of yourself.” .
He smiled and patted her head, and ambled off with quiet Mr. Atencio to the truck. At the door he turned, and said, “Find someone to help, that’ll be the ticket for you, little lady.” .
The next time she came in we had a new patient, a fifty year old man with prostate cancer. He was short, burly and angry at the world. His name was Al Diamante. .
“Why this had to happen to me, I’ll never know.” He growled at all of us and had a permanent frown on his forehead, so his eyebrows stuck up all bushy like stickers on a cactus. “I’ve got too damn much to live for to let this stupid disease get me down. Been fighting all my life; got to keep fighting.” .
He glared at Honoria and she smiled back, arranging her talismans on the Mayo stand. .
“What’s that? Some kind of magic?” he snarled. .
She looked at him with a peaceful sort of look, and nodded. “Some kind of magic all right. Some kind of loving magic.” .
He snorted, and stuck his muscular arm out for me to start the IV. “I’ve heard this called poison, it can kill you quicker than the damn cancer.” He motioned to the bag of chemotherapy fluid over his head on the pole. I clucked at him and Honoria kept smiling. .
“They’re trying to help, you know. You have to let them help,” she spoke quietly, firmly. .
“Don’t need help, never did.” He growled and his frown grew even deeper which I didn’t think was possible. “Going to beat this damn thing all alone, and get on with it.” .
Honoria sighed and looked at the ceiling and then at her little figures on the Mayo stand. She lingered after he left, head down as if to batter down the door, hands balled into fists at his side. .
“He’s going to be difficult, you know,” she said. “Maybe I can’t help him, but maybe he isn’t the one I’m supposed to help. Even Mr. Roberts would have had a hard time with him, difficult and angry as he is.” .
“Difficult?” sniffed Peg. “Impossible, more likely.” She was fussing with IV tubing, and had a sharp look on her face. “I know that type.” She didn’t say any more, but we figured she did, after twenty-five years at the cancer center. Probably knew all the types, good, bad and indifferent. .
He came in for a few more times, lost what little hair he had, and then quit, just like that. His doctor was an Indian gentleman named Chatterjee, and he was mighty perplexed. .
“Said he didn’t want to be here anymore, too many…” the good doctor looked down at his shoes. .
“Too many women?” Peg said, sweetly. Only when she was really upset did she sound that sweet. .
Dr. Chatterjee nodded, carefully. “I think he has problems with females,” he said, slowly, watching Peg. She finished what she was doing at the sink and washed her hands and wiped them with a flourish. .
“His hard luck.” And she went to the back where we had two patients getting antibiotics. Dr. Chaterjee smiled his careful smile and left the treatment room. Left it to us women. Honoria laughed and then was serious. .
“You know, that’s really sad,” she said softly. “To let a bias like that come between you and a necessary treatment. Maybe it was just an excuse; he was afraid, you know. Afraid of it all, and leaving was all he could do.” .
She sighed, and settled into her recliner for the second to the last treatment. “Where’s Dr. Kazu, is he here today?” .
I nodded, “He’ll be in soon, he wants to see you.” .
It was quiet in the unit, the IV’s made little beeping noises once in a while, and I could hear the clicking of computer keys in Kate’s pharmacy. She poked her head out at one point and asked if we wanted anything from the hospital, she was making a run. We all thought for a minute and then Peg said “one of those sticky buns from the cafeteria would be nice,” and Kate grinned. It was a ritual about once week; any more often and we’d be sick of them, but once a week was fine. Kate bustled off, on her errand. Honoria looked after her and back to us and said, suddenly, .
“I’m going to miss you, do you know that?” with a surprised sort of teary sound in her voice. .
I went over to her and gave her a hug, and she held my hand and looked into my face. “I never thought I would say such a thing, I wanted to be out of here and home, and healthy, but I will, I will miss you.” .
We stood there for a minute, and then I sighed. “We do get attached to you guys, you know.” .
“Even the old docs, too.” Dr. Kazu walked in and smiled, seeing us standing there together. “We get attached to you guys, even if you don’t get attached to us all that much.” His eyes smiled, brown and kind. .
Honoria laughed. “Have I been all that difficult?” .
He smiled some more. “No, just difficult enough. I worry about patients who just go through treatment without any problems, no anger, no tears, as if they almost expected it. They bury all their anxieties and carry more burden than anyone should bear.” .
“Oh, I shared my burden, that’s for sure!” Honoria laughed. “With my family and my friends and the butcher down the street….”.
He laughed. “Share it and carry only what you need to.” Then his eyes grew serious and solemn. “But poor Mr. Al Diamante couldn’t do that, and so he left.” .
“What will happen to him,” asked Honoria, frowning. .
“You never know. He may survive another twenty years, running on anger. Who knows?” Dr. Kazu wrote in some charts, and got up to leave. .
“So tomorrow is the last day?” he asked Honoria. .
“Yes, the last day. I swore I would dance out of here, and I will.” She put her head up as if to challenge him. .
“Good. I’ll be there.” .
He was, and she did. She was weak and wobbly, but her husband stood at her side and she did a little jig down the hall, bald and tired and beautiful and inspiring. Raffie from Medical Records and Emily and Jeannie from the clinics applauded as she ‘danced’ down the hall. We were all in tears, of course, and Peg added another icon to her list, a little card with all our signatures on it for her last day celebration. She didn’t want cake, she said the idea of a cake would have made her sick, so we brought some flowers and a card, and there were hugs all around. And then we watched her dance out the door, past the cheering security guard, James, and went back to the treatment room and wiped our eyes and checked on the next patients in the waiting room. It was time, and we were still on duty, after all. .