That Elusive Cure 30

Freddie Mercury belted out the words to Somebody to Love as I settled into the MRI scanner. The earphones were snug on my ears and as always, I’d brought along my Best of British cd. The nurses had admitted to singing along to the songs before, and it had become a favourite of mine when I had to go in the machine.

My fingers twitched around the alarm bell and as the nurses inched the cot bed back and forth, searching for the ideal position to put me in, I fretted that the line into my arm would snag on something. But I needn’t have worried. One of the nurses muted my music and asked if I was okay.

“Yup, fine here,” I replied. I knew the drill. I’d had far too many of these.

The machine started up, clanging and banging over Freddie’s smooth vocals. I never opened my eyes in the scanner; I’d been warned about how claustrophobic the MRI was before my very first one. So I did what I always did. As Freddie faded out and Mick took over with Brown Sugar, I concentrated on the pattern of the bangs, swooshes, zaps and shuck-shucks of the machine and slowly fell asleep.

My sleep was thin and vague dreams tried to materialise. Cured. Remission. A doctor telling me I was a miracle. Me jumping around screaming and shouting in delight as Jimmy beamed with delight. A bright sunny day, a new beginning.

I woke up feeling the weight of the results on me already. I had an appointment for Thursday with my oncologist, and I had an odd feeling of the date being both too soon and too far away at the same time. Nerves fluttered up in my belly as the nurses reversed the cot bed out of the MRI scanner. As usual one of them was already talking to me even though I still had the earphones on.

“I can’t hear you,” I said and gave her a smile. The straps of the cot bed still held my arms down, so I waited for her to remove them.

She removed the earphones and put them away. “Sorry love. I’m just going to remove the restraints. She ripped the velco straps apart and removed the various layers of padding while I yawned and tried to wake myself up. Jimmy was waiting for me, a pre-celebration breakfast at our favourite pancake place planned. But pre-celebration wasn’t the right term, that was ripe for jinxing. It was an end of chemo reward. I’d tell Jimmy when I saw him. No point mucking everything up now.

“I’m just going to take the cannula out now, please stay lying down.”

I watched as she pulled the line out of my arm and pressed a wad of gauze on the hole. Without needing to be asked, I took over pressing it down while she got the tape. The nurse helped me sit up and I went through to the changing room to get back into my clothes. I held my arm up above my head, pressing on the padding in an attempt to stop any bruising. This usually worked, or at least limited the bruising I’d get. I sat down on the bench, staring at my pile of folded clothing and wondering what I’d do if the scan didn’t show what I wanted it to. For the first time in while I doubted the ability of the pod. Despite the energy I felt, the way chemo wasn’t turning me into a energyless zombie, that I wasn’t crouched over the loo emptying my guts out, that drizzle didn’t feel like acid on my skin from the nerve damage, I still couldn’t entirely give myself in to thinking the pod had been fixing me before Jimmy ballsed it up.

I got dressed slowly, wondering how on earth I was going to get through the next two days.

A rap on the door made me jump. “Are you okay in there?”

“Yes, I’m fine. Just moving slowly.”

“Okay, love. Let me know before you go.”

“Will do.” I just wanted to be alone with my thoughts. Have my fears and hopes mixing in my mind without distraction. I put my shoes on quickly, and left, giving a wave to the nurse as requested and going out to find Jimmy in the waiting area playing about on his phone.

“Get this.”

He flashed his phone past my eyes, like he expected me to read what was there in the two seconds he paused.

“Our mate Bob has been working all night. He’s sent me an update. It seems he loves this little particle of ours. He’s been breaking it down under the microscope and digging up the secrets.”

Jimmy looked pleased with himself. I sighed. Who knows, maybe this was how things were supposed to be, fate as it were. Jimmy breaks the machine. Bob figures out the machine. Bob and Jimmy make more machines and no one need be ill again. Could it fix old people? Make their organs like new again? Could the pod make a person live forever? I got a flash of an overcrowded world. Maybe it should be kept secret and safe.

We arrived at Pancakes ect in Moreton and sat in a table by the window. Neither of us talked much as Jimmy got his usual maple syrup pancakes while I went for the banana topping. The weight of the scan had silenced us both. I sipped my tea and stared at the people passing by on the street.

“Do you really think it’s worked on me?”

Jimmy didn’t reply. He just shrugged and pushed his empty plate back a little, patting his stomach while he did so. “It’s hard to hope, isn’t it?” He stretched out and sipped at his coffee. “You seem so well. That can’t be faked.”

“There’s been a ton of research on the effect of placebos. You know as well as I do that me being so well could just be in my mind.”

Jimmy joined me in people watching. I saw a fat woman go by pushing a pram with a squalling child. Why was it that I got ill when I tried to take good care of myself and people who ate rubbish and never exercised stayed healthy? I knew I was being a bitch, but it didn’t stop the thoughts from coming. I had no rights getting ill. I had plans to live to 101. I was going to write an essay about how the world had changed in my time, typed up on a keyboard and screen that I’d unroll and put wherever I felt like typing. I’d talk to walls with huge screens saying hello to my grandchildren, pioneers setting in on Mars. I’d tend my hydroponics garden, the type everyone had, growing the veg I loved most. And when I felt ready, that I’d said all I needed to, done all things I wanted to, loved to the limits of my ability, I could chose the time of my death, say goodbye in a big celebration and die with a smile.