I sat and waited for her on the bed. “You okay?” I said, when she emerged and sat down next to me.
She shrugged, her face wet with tears, her eyes red.
“We’re going to get through this,” I said, putting my arms around her.
She nodded and turned away from me, not wanting me to see her tears.
“Really, we are. Remember, 90 percent cure rate,” I said, stroking her back.
“I still can’t believe it,” Anna said. “I couldn’t bear it if something happened to him, I just couldn’t bear it. I just want...” Her words trailed off and she wiped her eyes.
“We’re going to fight it and beat it, okay?” I said. “When Jack’s at the play center, let’s do some more research on the neurosurgeons.”
Anna chewed on her lower lip and shook her head. “I don’t want him going to soft play today,” she said.
“Why?”
Anna looked at me, narrowing her eyes. “We can’t... I don’t want to risk anything.”
“Anna, have you seen him this morning? He’s charging around downstairs. We have to carry on as normal.”
Downstairs, I could hear the voice of Ryan from Ryan’s Toys videos on Jack’s iPad.
“I’ve told Emma he can’t go.”
“You spoke to her already?”
“I texted her.”
“You didn’t tell her, did you?”
“No, of course not.”
“But Anna, we have to carry on as if nothing is wrong. For Jack’s sake. I don’t want him to know that he’s ill.”
“I agree, but he’s not a baby anymore,” she said. “We have to tell him sometime. He’s going to wonder about all the doctors’ visits and why he’s feeling poorly.”
I went into the bathroom and got her a tissue to dry her eyes. “He’s not feeling poorly now,” I said, sitting back down next to her and putting my hand on her leg. “He wants his cheese on toast. Special cheese on toast.”
Anna laughed sadly, sniffed and wiped her face. “I just don’t want him to bang his head,” she said and she started to cry again, and this time no amount of tissues or hugs or words would stop the tears. I pulled her close to me, feeling her body tremble, her frantic little breaths.
“Why is Mommy crying?” We turned around, and Jack was standing at our bedroom door.
Anna wiped her eyes with her sleeve and sniffled a little.
“Well, sometimes people get upset, just like you get upset sometimes,” I offered.
“Did you do something bad to Mommy?” Jack said to me, moving closer to Anna.
“No, not at all,” I said.
“Are you angry, Daddy?”
“No.”
“Is Mommy red with anger, like the man in the fireman book?”
Anna laughed a little, her sobs subsiding.
“Daddy, can I show you something?”
“Okay, let’s go and Mommy will come down in a bit.”
We walked downstairs, and on the table there were bits of broken bread, torn off from the loaf, topped with hard clumps of butter and a large uncut block of cheddar.
“I made special cheese toast.”
“You did,” I said, ruffling his hair. “That’s impressive, Jack.”
“Are you happy, Daddy?”
“I’m very happy, Jack,” I said. I watched him eat his bread and cheese, the morning light making columns of glitter dust, halos in Jack’s hair.
* * *
In the afternoon, the doorbell rang. Jack was napping and we were sitting in the living room. I looked out of the window and could see Lola’s little Fiat parked outside. “Did you tell her?” I asked Anna.
“No, I didn’t.”
“So what’s she...”
Anna stood up. “I don’t know. You know sometimes she just pops by.”
“Can you tell her to...”
Anna was already opening the door. “Hello, poppet,” Lola said, and I could hear the sound of her air-kisses and then silence. “Goodness, why the glum face, darling?”
Anna didn’t say anything, and I could imagine Lola trying to read her, the girl she knew so well, adjacent beds at boarding school, roommates in Halls.
“Hello, Rob,” Lola said as they walked into the living room. She looked at me quizzically, her eyebrows raised almost as an accusation.
“Where’s Jack?”
“He’s napping upstairs,” I said.
Lola looked at Anna, who was stone-faced, motionless. “Anna, darling?” she said and then looked back at me, and I thought I could detect a slight annoyance in her face, as if she felt she was being excluded. Lola always had to know everything.
I swallowed and took a deep breath. “We had some bad news yesterday, with Jack,” I said, my voice beginning to shake. “He’s been having a few problems with his balance, so we went to get it checked out. There is something on a scan that they think is...is a...” Tumor, tumor. I couldn’t say the word out loud. “...a lesion, yes. He has a lesion...”
Lola looked confused. “A lesion. What do you mean? Like a tumor?” Of course, that word meant nothing to her: it was just vowels, consonants, not something that was growing in my little boy’s brain.
“Yes, they think it is.”
“Oh, God, poor Jack. Will he need treatment?” Lola moved next to Anna on the sofa and put her arm around her.
“Yes,” I said, steeling myself. “He will have surgery to remove the...you know, to get everything out, and then we’ll know more. But the doctor thinks that will be it, he won’t need any more treatment...”
“And then he’ll be okay, right?” Lola said, looking at Anna and then me.
“Yes, we hope so,” I said.
“God, how terrible. I can’t imagine what you’re going through.” Lola took a deep breath and started speaking again to break the silence. “There was a little boy at India’s nursery who had something similar. He had the tumor removed, and he’s absolutely fine now. Made a full recovery...”
Lola pulled Anna closer to her. “Oh, sweetheart, I hate seeing you like this. It’s all going to be okay, I promise.”
Anna nodded, stiff in her arms, and Lola didn’t know what to say. She looked around the living room, as if, for a moment, she thought other people besides us were there.
“Actually, there’s a woman I follow on Twitter, and she was diagnosed with a brain tumor, and then I think another cancer. Well, she
