Hold My Hand Read online

  Bethany’s frown only deepened, but she nodded. “I will.”

  She grabbed a broom to clean up around the chair when the small glass door swung open and Amber came into the salon. She was carrying a huge tray covered with aluminium foil.

  “Hey, baby.” She balanced the tray on one arm and hugged her with the other. Then she kissed her on the cheek. “You done yet?”

  With a bright smile, Bethany nodded, then rubbed Amber’s back. “Almost. Just cleaning up. How are you?”

  “Good. I brought us some canapés from work. Made sure to save you some of your favorite shrimp cocktails.” She beamed at Bethany. “Thought we could take them to my place and pop in a movie?”

  “Sounds good.” Bethany nearly threw her scissors and combs back onto the shelf, then grabbed her jacket. “Bye, Anna. Have a great night.”

  As they left the salon, Amber wrapped her arm around Bethany’s waist and leaned her head against her shoulder. “And how was your day? Anything special happen?”

  Bethany thought back to Savannah. Then she looked at Amber, the woman she had grown to like, maybe even love, more and more in these past two months. Bethany really wasn’t a friend of lying.

  She sighed. “Actually…yes. I’ll tell you over dinner, okay?”

  Amber’s eyes drew together, and she studied Beth’s face.

  “Okay,” she said. “Tell me everything.”

  Savannah was so used to needles that she didn’t even blink anymore when a particularly long one slowly disappeared inside her arm. She stared at the wall in front of her while Dr. Valentini took her blood sample.

  She wasn’t much older than Savannah, maybe only by a couple of years. “How are you feeling?” she asked.

  “Like shit, honestly.” She avoided meeting Loredana’s gaze.

  “I’m going to send these to the lab.” Lory inched out the needle and put a cotton ball on the bleeding spot. “If everything’s fine, we can start the next round very soon.”

  “I don’t want another round of chemo,” she said.

  Loredana paused.

  “What do you mean you don’t want it? What are you talking about? It’s not a matter of wanting, Savy. It’s important.”

  Silence followed, punctuated finally by an ironic chuckle. “I’m done with it, Lory. Seriously.” She grabbed her hair and tugged on it. The wig fell off in her hand. “You see this?” she said. “My hair’s gotten longer again. It’s almost covering my ears. I’m slowly getting back to my old self. I was at the hairdresser today, looking for a new wig, a slightly different one. But then I thought, what for, you know? It’s pointless.”

  “Savy…” But Savannah waved her off.

  “If I get a chance to feel normal again during my last days, then I want to take it. I don’t want to go through all this shit again just so you can tell me that there are new metastases everywhere a few weeks later. It’s a fucking joke. I’m so done with it.”

  Loredana closed her eyes and let out a deep breath.

  “Savannah, where is this coming from? You’re so mixed up today. I haven’t seen you this way since…”

  Savannah looked the other way.

  “Are you talking to her again?” Loredana asked.

  More silence. Loredana sighed again. “How? When? Where?”

  Savannah toyed with her fingernails in her lap. “The salon. She’s working there now.”

  “Did you tell her the truth?”

  “No, I certainly did not tell her. And I’m not going to.”

  “You should,” Loredana stated matter-of-factly. “You know you should.”

  “That’s what you told me the last time.” Savannah rolled her eyes.

  “Yes, and I’ll tell you over and over again. You should have listened to me back then. You’ve been feeling miserable. Before you broke up and after, not telling her didn’t make anything better for you. Not at all.”

  “It wasn’t supposed to make it better for me. It was supposed to make it better for her,” Savannah half yelled, close to losing her temper.

  Loredana shook her head. “Savannah, this logic, it’s… Oh my, she’s going to find out anyway sooner or later.”

  “Yes, when she reads about my death in the newspaper.”

  “Savy!”

  “What?”

  For a long moment, Loredana seemed at a loss for words. “Okay, so even if I don’t want to contemplate it happening that way, let’s talk hypothetically here,” she finally said. “So she reads about your death. What then? Do you have any idea how that’s going to make her feel? That you completely shut her off? She’s going to think that you didn’t trust her, that you’d rather deal with all of this alone instead of having her by your side.”

  “I wrote her a letter. She’ll get it after I’m gone. It will explain everything,” Savannah said.

  “I think you’re punishing yourself with this behavior, though I don’t know for what reason. But then, why would you listen to me? I’m just your doctor, not your therapist or your confessor, right?”

  “Right,” she replied in a bitter voice.

  “So? Are you going to meet her or what?”

  Savannah nodded. “One last time…” she paused. “To say good-bye.”

  When Savannah arrived at their old favorite café downtown, Bethany was already sitting at a small table in the corner of the room. Her blonde, wavy hair hung in wide curls around her shoulders and shimmered in the dim light of the lamp above her. She stared at the table as she drew circles with her index finger on a napkin. She looked so innocent and beautiful, it broke Savannah’s heart.

  Bethany looked up, and their eyes met. She gave Savannah a warm smile, and Savannah returned it. They exchanged a brief hug when Savannah walked over. She sat down opposite her and folded her hands on the table, not sure what else to do with them.

  “I haven’t ordered yet because I wasn’t sure you’d actually show up,” Bethany said shyly.

  “Can’t blame you,” Savannah mumbled.

  They both ordered hot chocolates with marshmallows.

  “So tell me,” Bethany said after the waiter had left, “what have you been up to these past months?”

  That question was one she’d expected. She pulled out her list of plausible stories.

  “I’ve tried to change my life a little bit. Tried to live a little healthier, to see things, to travel.” She tried to read Bethany’s now-faltering smile. Her empty gaze carried a hint of sadness now.

  This was awful. What on earth was she saying to her? It probably sounded to Bethany like Oh, when you were gone, I started enjoying my life and travelling the world, doing all those things that I couldn’t do with you.

  But what should she tell her? I’ve been through chemo. Still, I’ve got metastases everywhere. Some days I’ve been too weak to leave the house, and the meds make me throw up all of the time. I’ve tried to prepare myself for the fact that I’m gonna die. I’ve gone through hell. I’ve missed you every single fucking day.

  Yeah, that would be accurate. But not exactly helpful.

  “I’m glad to hear you had a good time.” Bethany sat up straight and pushed her shoulders back. She cocked her head at Savannah. “What places did you visit?”

  Doctor’s offices. Hospitals. Therapists. “I’ve been to Europe. Paris. Barcelona. Very pretty.”

  Bethany smiled again, wider this time. “I still want to see Paris. Is the Eiffel Tower really leaning to one side?”

  “No, that’s the one in Pisa,” Savannah explained, but not in a snappish or lecturing way. In fact, it made Savannah smile. She would have loved to have seen all of those places with Bethany.

  “Oh.” Bethany blushed. “I always confuse France and Spain.”

  Savannah grinned. The tower was obviou
sly in Italy, but she didn’t feel like correcting Beth. Geography had never been her strongest suit. “Me too,” she said instead.

  “So, Loredana has been with you?”

  Damn. Oh well. It had been nice for a moment to pretend that there had been no chemo, no CTs, no nervous breakdown. “Yeah, we visited her family in Italy. Beautiful landscape down there.”

  These lies were ridiculous. Just change the subject. “How did you meet your girlfriend? What was her name again?”

  “Amber.” Bethany smiled again. “I met her at the salon. But we haven’t travelled anywhere, at least not yet. She’s often at work. She has to cater events and stuff. She’s an awesome cook; always brings home leftovers. It’s nice.”

  “Sweet.”

  Bethany reached out over the table to capture her hand with her own. Savannah recognized it as one of Bethany’s typical attempts to comfort her.

  “I’m glad we are finally talking again,” Bethany said. “I have to say, I was really sad that you cheated on me, but I’m not mad anymore. If this is what you needed to be happy, then I’m okay with that. I wasn’t at first, but I am now.” She emphasized her words with a nod. “You’re special, Savannah, and I hated not having you in my life. We used to be so close, not only when we were dating but also all those years before that, you know? We were a team. Losing that really hurt me. I didn’t feel complete.”

  Savannah nodded. She felt her hand get sweaty where Bethany touched it and felt the tears swell up again, tears she definitely could not let Bethany see.

  “Remember when we were in high school? You always protected me. You’ve always been there for me, always made me feel safe. When I think back to all this, it still makes me smile, you know? We were best friends. Don’t you think we can go back to that? I mean, not now, not right away, but…slowly? Maybe?”

  Her voice sounded hopeful. Savannah almost sighed. Bethany was still that little girl she had always known, still the same Bethany whom she had fallen for a long, long time ago, the girl she’d always wanted to protect because she was just too trusting and gullible for her own good. She couldn’t stand the thought that people would take advantage of that now that she was out of her life. She sure as hell hoped this Amber chick treated her well. She might be weak with disease, but she’d still kick that woman’s ass if she had to.

  “I don’t know.” She slid her hand from underneath Bethany’s. “But I missed you too.” She knew it was probably a bad idea to say this. It wouldn’t help her get out of this situation, but it was a truth she couldn’t deny.

  “Would you like to see me again?” Bethany finally asked. “I mean, you could bring Lory. It could be like a double date. You’d meet Amber and I’ll meet Lory, and we’ll do something fun, like, I don’t know, miniature golf? Sound fun?”

  Now her eyes were practically glowing, and she clapped her hands together in excitement at the idea. Savannah cursed herself for ever having considered this could work out.

  “Please, Savy. Say yes!” Bethany gave Savannah her best puppy-dog eyes.

  She shouldn’t have agreed to any of this. She shouldn’t have walked into this café. Where would this stop? They couldn’t become friends again. It wouldn’t work. She wasn’t even dating anyone, especially not her doctor.

  “Just once,” Bethany insisted. “If it gets too uncomfortable, we don’t have to repeat it.”

  Fuck this. I can’t deal with this. I can’t see her with another woman. I can’t convince her I’m in a long-term relationship. This is a dead end. I can’t agree to this. I won’t. I will come up with an excuse now.

  “Savy?” Bethany asked carefully. She already looked a little sad again.

  “Yeah…” Savannah closed her eyes. “Okay.”

  Okay? Savannah mentally threw her hands up in the air to tear at her fake hair. Even after all this time, she was still whipped. She couldn’t believe herself.

  “Awesome!” Bethany bit her fist, probably to tamp down that wide grin that threatened to overtake her face.

  “Awesome.” Savannah tried to sound at least a little cheerful for Bethany, who was emptying her cocoa and looking so happy and relieved, damn it.

  Savannah dug into her bag to grab her cell and opened her text app. She shook her head as her fingers flashed over the screen to choose Loredana’s name in her contact list and type a message:

  I need your help.

  Chapter 3

  “No way!” Loredana held her hands up in front of her body. “No way I’m going to pretend to be your girlfriend. Not only because I’m your doctor, Savy, but mainly because I will not encourage your lies. Nope.”

  “Lory, come on. I’m begging you here, okay? What am I supposed to do? Seriously, I need you to do this for me,” Savannah said.

  “I’ll tell you what to do—you’ll call Bethany and tell her that you changed your mind and that you want to talk to her, alone.” Loredana looked Savannah straight in the eye. “And then you’ll meet somewhere quiet, and you’ll explain everything. And you’ll see she understands and how you can finally be honest with her.”

  Savannah’s teeth clenched. “I thought I could count on you.” Her mind was already racing. People were obviously right when they said lying always got you into trouble, but it had worked out for so long, for over a year. She wasn’t going to blow it all up now.

  She flipped through the contact list on her phone. What was Plan B? She needed a female desperate enough to play her date—someone she could pay, someone Bethany didn’t know. As she strode toward the door, Loredana’s voice trailed behind her.

  “Savannah, seriously, don’t make this more complicated than it already is. And do me a favour and stop stressing yourself so much; you need to get some rest, I don’t like seeing you so—”

  The door slam cut off the rest. Already she was sending out texts to random ex-coworkers, but she and Bethany had been so close they basically knew all the same people.

  The more she thought about it, the more she realized she was running straight into a dead end. This was a ridiculous plan. It was mean.

  She had told many white (and not-so-white) lies in her life, mostly for her own benefit, but this was bad, even for her. What had started out as a plan to protect Bethany was transforming into a massive act that’d be impossible to keep going forever. She should simply cancel. Why couldn’t she call her, tell her she was sorry, tell her that they should stop seeing each other? She had typed the text saying as much five times already and had deleted it each time. Five times she had tried to hit the damn send button, but she always backed out.

  The truth was, after even a few minutes spent talking to Bethany, Savannah felt alive again for the first time in a year, but the feeling made her hands go clammy. Bethany reminded her of a time when her world was still perfect. When it was everything she ever could have hoped for.

  But now, her life was falling to pieces, slowly slipping out of her hands. She had wanted to be the selfless lover who spared her girlfriend the pain of losing her. It had made total sense to her back then. But seeing Bethany had turned everything upside down again. How had she not anticipated the flood of feelings that would come back in that damn café? It had reversed all her selflessness into a cruel, selfish need to cling to Bethany, the person she still loved. She wanted to revel in the comfort of being near her when the whole of existence felt dark and senseless. Life was fucked up. She hated it.

  Then again, what if fate really existed? What if it had been her goddamn fate to run into Bethany in that salon? Maybe somebody up there was telling her she was foolish for trying to get through this on her own?

  No. Fate could go screw itself. It had made her sick in the first place. Fate was a bitch.

  Savannah collapsed onto a bench in a nearby park and let herself rest a few minutes. A few children played hide and seek under the watchful eyes
of their mothers. There was probably no way out of this, she thought. Either tell Bethany the truth, or shut her out of your life once and for all.

  This fucking helpless feeling was eating away at her. Meeting Bethany’s new girlfriend, getting Loredana to play her date—she had actually managed to tell herself that it was possible, that she could handle it, that it would go well. But now that date wasn’t going to happen, and there was nothing to look forward to anymore. She’d have to go back to this emptiness, and the thought gutted her. She had been so used to it, so used to pretending she was okay without Bethany. Why had Bethany pushed for this? Why did she have to remind Savannah that she wasn’t okay at all?

  For the first time since their meeting, tears were running down her cheeks, hot and fast.

  Her fingernails dug into her palm. Fuck her life, fuck Loredana, fuck Bethany, fuck her own body, its weakness. Even those stupid women watching over their kids pissed her off. Savannah decided she didn’t care she had no right to feel this way; she certainly couldn’t help it. In another reality, it could be Bethany and her over there in the play area. She would have made a kickass mother, strict but loving. And Bethany would have been an even better one. Hell, Bethany was going to be a great mother, only with someone else.

  Her cheeks were completely wet by now, and she’d sort of forgotten that anyone else could see her. So she winced at the unexpected touch to her shoulder.

  “Are you okay, sweetheart?” A tired-sounding, raspy voice interrupted her pity party. The old woman’s hair was gray, and her wrinkled face twitched with concern. Savannah told herself that she would never look like that; she would never age. The sentiment sounded mean even in her own head, she thought.

  “Can I help you somehow?” the woman asked.

  Savannah jabbed at her tears to wipe them away. “No.” She cleared her throat. “No thanks. Unless you’re my fairy godmother and can grant me three wishes, I guess there’s nothing you can do for me.”