“Sure, I’ll have some, as well.”
She goes to the kitchen, and after putting my laptop on the coffee table, I follow her. This is so very odd. Rachel has been part of my life for the last year, and yet I don’t know her at all. And she doesn’t know me. I don’t know if we should try to get to know one another now, or just conduct the business we’re both here for. I don’t know what Rachel wants.
“I’m glad you decided to go ahead with this,” I offer hesitantly and she shoots me an uncertain look from under dark brows.
“I still don’t know why you’re doing all this.”
“I know.”
She turns to me, leaning back against the counter, her arms folded, as we wait for the coffee to drip through. “So there is a reason. Something you haven’t said.”
“I told you, I can’t stop thinking about Emily…”
She shakes her head. “A personal reason.”
I am shaken and trying not to show it. “Can’t someone do something good without having a personal reason?” I try to sound curious rather than defensive, and she shrugs.
“It’s just a feeling I have. But if you don’t want to tell me, you don’t have to. God knows I don’t like being asked questions. I’m not going to press you for information you don’t want to give.”
“Thank you,” I say humbly, and she nods.
We lapse into silence, the only sound the drip and hiss of the coffee machine. Outside the sunshine is burning off the morning clouds, although it was forecast rain this evening, perhaps one of the spectacular summer thunderstorms that lights up the night sky.
I picture curling up with James later to watch the lightning fork the sky, his arm around my shoulders. I want that moment; I just need to get through today and I’ll have it. I’m not going to think about what being here might mean to James, or for him and me. I can’t go there in my mind, not yet.
Finally the coffee machine beeps, and Rachel pours us both large mugs. We take them into the living room and sit on the sofa side by side, because there is nowhere else to sit. This is starting to feel really weird now, and yet also surprisingly comfortable at the same time.
“So, how do we start?” Rachel asks. “I looked at some of the kind of pages you were talking about the other night, and some of them seem a bit… saccharine.” She makes a face, half grimace, half apology. “Which sounds a bit mean, I know, considering, but…”
“I understand,” I say as I put my coffee down and reach for my laptop. “We don’t want to go for something schmaltzy and sentimental.”
“Absolutely not.” She shudders, or pretends to. “I’m not referring to her as my little angel, even if she is. That’s just not me.”
I smile, and Rachel’s lips tremble as she smiles back. “Noted.”
“Good.”
After Rachel gives me the password for her wifi and I am on one of those pages, I see what she means. Some of them look a bit sentimental, as heartrending as they are. The language is too flowery; the emotions too gushing, although it feels mean to think it. These are expressions of people’s pain, personal and important. And Emily’s page needs to reflect her, as well as Rachel.
As I click through the pages, I start to feel more in control, more prepared to handle this situation, with my computer open and my fingers on the keyboard, my mind starting to leapfrog through ideas. This is my world. “In any case,” I say. “you can decide how to design the page, Rachel. You don’t have to put in anything you don’t want to. It can be as simple or as flowery as you want.”
She sighs and takes a sip of her coffee. “I don’t even know where to begin, which is a bit ridiculous, considering I am—at least, I used to be—an English teacher.” I realize I didn’t know that. “But this feels too personal. Too close. I don’t have any perspective. I can’t even think about what details to put in. And I’m not sure I can write it, even if I did. I think that would just about…” Her lips tremble a little until she presses them into a line. “It wouldn’t be good.”
“I understand.” I’d feel the same if I were in her position. Detailing all the milestones of grief and loss for any stranger to read? It would be like prodding exposed nerves, pain radiating out with every word you typed. “Would you like me to try to write something?” I ask, flinching inwardly at the presumption of the question. “And then you can edit it?”
Rachel doesn’t answer for a moment, and I see the conflict of her emotions on her face. Neither of us can quite forget that I am her husband’s second wife. That he left her and found me. That her child is gravely ill, not mine. I’ve never even met Emily. I barely know Rachel. And yet I’m going to try to tell her story?
“All right,” she says finally, sounding a little reluctant. “We can give it a try.”
I pause, my fingers poised as the enormity of what I am doing hits me all over again. How can I presume to tell Rachel’s story? How can I dare? I shouldn’t even be here.
It’s been thirty-six hours since I started lying to James, deception by silence, and every one of those hours has eaten me up with guilt. I need to tell him what I’m doing. I need to explain why I’m doing it. I know that. I just haven’t yet.
Cautiously I begin to type. Emily Harris is almost six years old. Nearly three years ago she began to develop symptoms no one, not her family and not even her doctors, could understand. Nothing helped, and her symptoms became worse and worse. Today she is in a state of unresponsive wakefulness, a step down from a coma, and we her family would do anything to help her, even just a little. Just to see her smile again, or open her eyes, would be the most amazing thing for us, as well for her. There is a very new experimental treatment available in Italy. We are hoping to take her there, even though we know it is risky and it makes no promises. We believe it’s still Emily’s best chance at a little more of life, and we want—we need—to take it. For her sake, and for ours, because every child should be championed and fought for.
I pause, letting out a shaky breath, feeling emotional about what I’ve written, and yet without any real right to. “What do you think…” I begin, turning to Rachel, only to see tears streaming down her cheeks. I am jolted, horrified that I’ve hurt her with some insensitivity I didn’t even realize I had, and so I simply stare as she shakes her head, wiping her damp cheeks with her palms.
“Sorry… sorry,” she mutters.