Duncan's Cure

Jane pulled into the parking garage and quickly found a spot. Pulling down the visor, she fluffed up her raven hair before applying lip balm and smiled brightly at herself. Exiting her vehicle her cell rang. She answered, “I’m here. Just parked. Meet you at the entrance.”

She moved quickly, her sundress swirling around her legs. Coming upon a fairly busy street, she stood on the sidewalk waiting to cross. “There you are,” a voice yelled out.

On the other side stood a tall but stocky man with dusty brown hair and angular features. She waved back enthusiastically before stepping off the curb. Down she went. She found herself frozen half in the street, short of breath. Suddenly, she was yanked up and herded across to the other side.

“You alright?” he asked. Thank goodness he still held her shoulders or else she felt she might collapse.

“Yeah, I’m alright.”

“Jesus! I don’t remember you being that clumsy.”

“Gee, thanks.” She dusted herself off, her hands trembling. He pulled her in for a hug. “I said, I’m fine.”

“I know. But when you haven’t seen a friend in a while you hug.”

She returns the embrace. “Yep friends…hug.”

“Okay,” he pulled away but took her hand. “Let’s go eat. I’m starving.”

Now seated at a table he hums while looking over the menu. “I know you want the mojito.”

“No alcohol for me.” His eyebrows disappear into his hairline. “Don’t look at me like I’m a lush.”

“I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just, you know, your favorite.” She’s preoccupied with rubbing her calves. “Are you feeling okay?” She nods and hides her face in her menu. He grasps her left hand, getting her attention again.

A bubble gum-popping waitress interrupts, “What can I get you, lovers?” The two laugh awkwardly, detaching from one another, and give their orders.

He bounces in his seat. “Duncan? What are you doing?”

“I need the bathroom. Be right back.” She laughs and waves him on. On the table, her cell lights up with a message: How’s it going?

Jane sighs before typing out a quick reply, Fine.

You haven’t told him, have you?

She immediately deflates and locks her phone before sliding it to the far end of the table. Duncan returns and she excuses herself to the bathroom as well. She washes her hands but takes a moment to compose herself. He’ll understand. Don’t worry. She smiles brightly but it disappears quickly. The food had arrived by the time she returned to the table.

“Mmm smells good.” She opens her silverware giddily. Duncan doesn’t reply, alerting her attention. He sits looking at her. “What?”

“So what do you need to tell me?”

“Huh?” Came her dumb reply.

He holds up her phone revealing a notification, another message that states, You have to tell him.

“Reading my texts? Not cool.” Snatching her phone back she tucks it into her bag.

“How long have you known me?” When she doesn’t respond, “Tell me already.”

Her eyes roam his face, “It’s nothing.”

“It can’t be nothing. I mean…your face says it all.”

“My face,” she panics for a split second.

“You make the same facial expression when you’re hiding something. C’mon, tell me what it is.”

“I…” she takes a breath. “I’m going to Ireland.”

“Oh? Is that all?”

“And South Korea. Canada too.”

He laughs, “All three? Wow. Awesome.” Mockingly, but friendly.

“I’ll be gone for three months.”

He laughs again but it dies at her somber look. “You’re serious?”

She turns her attention to her food, “I don’t have the luxury of time,” she looks him in the eye, “like some people.”

He looks a bit offended. “Three months is more than enough time. And what about your job?”

She pushes her plate away, appetite having left her. “That doesn’t matter.”

“Doesn’t mat— Look, I know you’re a bit of a free spirit but this… Why now?”

“I want to travel.”

He looks confused, not fully believing her words.

“Wanna come with me?”

“You’re joking, right?”

She stares at him before a forced grin spreads across her face. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.”

*******

Two weeks later

Jane is sitting on the floor of her bedroom packing when the doorbell rings. She gets up with some difficulty. Giving her legs a shake she took careful steps to the front door.

“Hi, Madge.”

Her best friend gives her a once over, “What have you been doing?”

“Organizing for my trip.” The two women go back to the bedroom and Madge eyes the two large suitcases.

“Were you on the floor?”

Jane sits on the bed and runs her fists down her calves. “I’m almost done.”

“Are you absolutely sure about this?”

A small white alarm on the bedside table sounds and Jane starts to go for it.

“Sit. I’ll get it.” Madge leaves and returns with a large glass of water and a pill organizer. The silence is still dominating even as she shuffles to take the large dosage of medication. “Maybe you can write a letter.”

Jane drains the glass completely before responding, “Please don’t start that again.”

“It isn’t fair to him, let alone you. Just tell him.”

“Tell him what exactly? That I love him? That I’m sick? Or that I love him but waited to tell him once I got sick?”

“Tell him both! Tell him everything.” Jane shakes her head as she flexes her feet back and forth. “You’re leaving next week and then…”

“I’m sick but not dying. Not really.”

“If you put off getting the treatments for too long you won’t be able to walk. You need to understand that!”

“Understand this!” Jane’s anger is apparent but so is her sadness. “Some things just aren’t meant to be. Okay?”

Madge lunges and pulls Jane into a tight hug. “Don’t talk like that.”

“I promise, once I’m back, I’ll start the treatments. But I gotta do this.”

*******

Duncan parks in Jane’s driveway and rushes over to her car, peering in the windows. Marching up to the front door he knocks impatiently. Then again harder. “Jane?” He knocks incessantly, albeit childishly, with both knuckles.

A neighbor steps out from the house to the right. “We got a problem, buddy?”

“Sorry to disturb you but the woman who lives here—”

“Yeah, what about her?”

“Have you seen her?”

“She’s not here.”

“Well, I can see that.”

“I don’t have to tell you anything.”

“Look here,” he stepped toward the neighbor.

“You stay right there!” The neighbor bolted back into his house.

Duncan stood stupefied, “The hell?”

Minutes later, Duncan finds himself explaining to a pair of police officers who he is and why he’s there. Thankfully, Madge shows up, eyes large at the scene before her.

“What is going on?”

“Madge! Oh, thank God. Tell these numbskulls that I know who lives here.”

She winces at his word choice, “It’s alright, officers. He’s a friend.”

“Best. Friend,” he narrows his eyes at the officers.

Unbothered, one officer responds, “Sure.” To Madge, “Ma’am, are you the owner?”

“No, but I’m house-sitting for the owner while she’s out of the country.”

“Out of the country?” Duncan sounds legitimately flabbergasted.

Madge continues as if he hadn’t spoken. “I have the key here,” she pulls it out of her pocket. “But I can call her—”

Duncan claps loudly. “Yes! Call her. Now,” he demands but goes unheard.

“No need ma’am. Just let us know if you need any assistance.” The officer flicks a look at Duncan. “Y’all have a good day.”

Duncan looks on angrily as the cruiser departs then turns his glare on Madge. “Out. Of. The country?”

“You already said that.” She turns and goes into the house. He follows, finding her in the kitchen filling up a watering can. “Why are you acting like you didn’t know? She told you that much.”

“She’s not returning my calls.”

“She’s…she’s probably busy.” Madge manages to turn her worried face away from his view.

“Yet she has the time to send me this text.” He pulls out his phone holding it up close to Madge’s face. “‘We’ll talk later.’” Madge sidesteps him heading for the front room. “I still don’t understand why she suddenly left to go travel the globe! Three whole countries all at once.” He stopped his rambling suddenly. During his entire spiel, Madge had watered all the plants but her lack of response didn’t go unnoticed. “Wait…a minute. You said ‘She told you that much.’ That. Much,” he repeats. Madge looks at him but stays silent. “What didn’t she tell me?”

Madge immediately looks away guiltily. She tries to lose him by going through the hallway but he blocks her path.

“Spill it.” She tilts the water can and the contents leak onto his shoes. He snatches the can from her hands placing it back in the kitchen. “So did she swear you to secrecy?” Madge sighs and gives him a broken look. “Don’t tell me she’s not coming back.”

“No, it’s not that.”

“Then what is it?” he waits, watching as Madge struggles to make a decision. His patience now exhausted he raises his voice, “Damnit, Madge!”

“She's sick!” she yells back, overlapping. He stands there mute.

Neither thinks to move. Neither can move. For Duncan, the world stopped, tilted, and shattered in a matter of seconds. His reaction to the news surprised him just as much as the news itself.

“She’s sick?” he parroted. Madge nods. He returns to the front room and begins walking a figure eight, over and over. “Okay. Enough joking. Tell me the real reason.”

“That is the real reason.”

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is. Why do you insist that everything is a joke?” Madge is mad now, which gets Duncan’s attention, and her following words even more. “When she said she was leaving, you thought she was joking. When she asked you to go with her, again you said she was joking. Nothing was ever a joke from the moment you guys met for lunch that day.”

A sob catches in his throat before his face goes stoic and he drops onto the couch. “I knew it. Deep down I knew something was going on. You know she fell that day but it wasn’t your normal fall. It was like her legs just…gave out.” He turns to Madge with eyes glazed over; recollecting. “I almost didn’t get to her fast enough. She wasn’t getting up…”

Madge begins crying quietly.

“How sick is she?”

“She has Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy, a rare form of Guillain-Barre syndrome. It affects the peripheral nervous system—”

“In English, Madge.” She sits down next to him.

“An autoimmune disease that attacks the body’s nerves, mainly the arms and legs. As they weaken she can lose her balance and possibly be unable to walk.”

“So, that’s what I saw that day. The symptoms have already progressed.” He sounds astonished, his voice cracking. “She’s been sick for a while. When was she diagnosed?” Meeting Madge’s gaze, “Oh no. No.”

“She was going to tell you right then but…”

“But what? Huh? I’m her best friend!”

She takes his hand, “No. You’re the love of her life.” Duncan’s face twists up in concentration, his eyes damp. “You love her, don’t you? You both have been dancing around it for years.”

“I’m a fool. A complete fool.” The tears finally fall.

“Listen. You have to go get her and bring her back home. Her condition is going to worsen. I tried to make her stay but she was determined. We both know how Jane is; independent and strong. But I don’t think she’s fully ready to handle this on her own.”

*******

Jane stands feebly in the shower of her hotel room. She manages to shut off the water but finds that’s only as far as her body can go. Luckily, she is able to grasp the edge of the tub to ease her fall. The weakness in her legs has hit a peak and fear has found a place in her mind. Already exhausted she resigns herself to the tiled floor to wait for her limbs to wake up. She’s able to pull a towel from the rack and wrap it around herself. 

What am I doing? The sobs wrack her body as she tries to stifle the pathetic noise with her hands. The sound of the hotel door unlatching alerts her. “Hello?” She tries to get up but her legs aren’t ready. “Who’s there?” A pair of shoes come into her view. She lets her eyes trail up to find the owner.

“Duncan?”

He says nothing and instead crouches down putting one arm behind her back and another under her knees. She puts one arm around his neck and wraps the other across her chest to secure the towel. Standing, he cradles her to his chest, and their eyes lock.

Back in the suite, he places her near the headboard, propping pillows up behind her. Still, no words are uttered. There is no need for any.

Tossing his jacket on the nearby chair he goes to the dresser and takes out a pajama set. Returning to the bed, he gently inserts her legs into the bottoms letting her tug them on before she does the same with the top. He climbs onto the other side of the bed but makes no move toward her.

The tears begin flowing once more for Jane. Duncan scoops her up onto his lap and they hug his face buried in the crook of her neck. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispers.

“I’m sorry, too.”