Chapter 1 - THE BOTTLE
For the first time in nine months, Daniel Harper's family was raising glasses for something other than bad news.
His sister had brought the wine.
Emma's boyfriend had been banished to his own family's Thanksgiving after Linda declared this dinner “just immediate family.”
A turkey filled the center of the table.
Sweet potatoes crowded one side.
Stuffing, cranberry sauce, green beans, two kinds of rolls.
The dining room was too warm.
Daniel liked it that way.
He had spent most of the year cold.
Cold in waiting rooms.
Cold beneath hospital blankets.
Cold lying awake at three in the morning trying to decide whether the ache under his jaw meant the lymphoma was back.
Tonight was supposed to be different.
Linda stood beside his chair with one hand on his shoulder.
“To Daniel.”
Everyone raised a glass.
Daniel smiled despite himself.
His younger brother Mark said, “To never hearing the word oncology again.”
A few people laughed.
Linda didn't.
Daniel noticed.
He had gotten good at noticing when his wife expected bad news.
Then the front door slammed.
Footsteps.
Fast.
Daniel turned just as Emma entered the dining room.
Nineteen.
College sweatshirt beneath an open winter coat.
Hair pulled back badly, as though she had done it while driving.
Her face was flushed.
Not from cold.
“Emma?”
She looked at him.
Then Linda.
Whatever Daniel was about to say disappeared.
Emma crossed the room.
Grabbed the tablecloth with both hands.
And yanked.
The Thanksgiving table came apart.
The turkey slid first.
The platter struck the hardwood and broke.
Glasses tipped.
Red wine spread across white cloth.
A plate spun off the edge and shattered near Mark's chair.
Someone shouted.
Linda jumped backward.
Daniel stayed seated for one stunned second with an empty dinner plate in front of him while almost everything else lay on the floor.
Emma stood breathing hard.
Her eyes were wet.
Linda recovered first.
“What is wrong with you?!”
Emma ignored her.
She walked straight toward Daniel.
He looked at his daughter.
“Em?”
She pulled a folded hospital document from inside her coat.
Then slammed it onto the remaining bare section of table.
“You were never sick.”
Daniel stared at her.
The room seemed to lose sound.
“What?”
Emma shoved the page closer.
“Read it.”
Linda stopped moving behind him.
Daniel unfolded the document.
St. Matthew Medical Center.
Patient:
Daniel Harper.
Pathology reference.
Billing adjustment.
Then a line in bold beneath an amended diagnosis code.
FINAL PATHOLOGY: REACTIVE LYMPHOID HYPERPLASIA. NO EVIDENCE OF LYMPHOMA OR OTHER MALIGNANCY.
Daniel read it twice.
Then a third time.
His chest tightened.
There had to be another page.
Another diagnosis.
Something.
He turned the document over.
Nothing.
He looked toward Emma.
“Where did you get this?”
“Mom's printer.”
Daniel slowly turned toward Linda.
His wife had gone pale.
Not confused.
Pale.
Daniel felt something inside him become very quiet.
He looked down.
Beside the place where his dinner plate had been sat the amber prescription bottle he'd brought from the kitchen because Linda always reminded him to take his evening medication with food.
Daniel picked it up.
Metoprolol succinate.
50 milligrams.
One tablet nightly.
He had seen the words a hundred times.
He had never asked enough questions about them.
Linda took one step backward.
Emma noticed.
Daniel noticed Emma noticing.
May you like
He looked from the bottle to his wife.
“Then what have I been taking every night?”
