In Danger

who had arrived in accident and emergency. No worries, I said. I was inside a large, quiet room. The lights were low and before she left the sonographer grabbed a blanket to throw over me; she bustled out of the room swinging her ample hips. I had the whole place to myself. No one could contact me. I went into a heavy sleep and woke later to my sonographer apologising for the delay. Then she squirted some warm gel onto my chest before wielding the ultrasound probe to see if this tin woman had a heart.

Chemotherapy: are genes us?

I felt my life with both my hands

To see if it was there –

I held my spirit to the Glass,

To prove it possibler –

I turned my Being round and round

And paused at every pound

To ask the Owner’s name –

For doubt, that I should know the Sound

Emily Dickinson

I was in the day oncology unit at the RBWH in Herston. It had taken some juggling for B to get some time off work, and for us to organise carers to travel from interstate to look after Celso. My mobile rang. Celso doesn’t need to be admitted, so we’re heading home now to put him to bed. Call me before you finish today, said B. Relief flooded through me, but the memory of Celso’s phlegmy chest sucking for air on our sofa at home and his sweaty face from a high temperature stayed in my mind. The danger to his small, lethargic body trumped everything on this day – my first chemotherapy day.

Our son’s godparents, partners Ngaire and Mieke, were in Brisbane to assist us as a family through that first chemotherapy session, and responsibility for the two patients was split between B and our friends. B with Ngaire had prepared for the possible admission of Celso and all that entailed: overnight bag, toys, medication, vomit rags, books, his favourite owl with a bell in its belly that jangled when he shook it. B then sat in the Royal Children’s Hospital accident and emergency department, ten minutes’ walk away from the oncology unit, with Celso and a GP note.

Mieke was with me, likely girding her loins against the emotion of walking into the hub of cancer care, with all its reminders of life’s frailty. So used by then to repeat visits to accident and emergency with Celso, B and I clicked into automatons. B phoning with the news that there wasn’t another admission decelerated the carer-train thoughts of What next, what next, what next? Despite those sticky memories of Celso’s distress, I could focus on what lay ahead.

The hospital and medical research complex in Herston was so vast it had its own postal code. B’s engineering company had one report that estimated the air-conditioning units there alone used enough energy to fan 30,000 homes.

The walk to the RBWH took 15 minutes. We’d crossed the road from my house and walked up the steep street; either side was lined with Australian ivory curl trees, their young leaves split and splayed like storks’ feet. On my left were two houses dedicated to the families of children going through intensive cancer treatments. Often a parent stood outside smoking and staring at the ground. I turned right and away from these houses and walked up a steeper road to the back entrance of the hospital complex. This was the business end, with delivery docks and energy towers piping out mist. One dock near my turn-off to the day unit had the ominous title ‘neonatal collection’; the doors were always shut and smoke billowed out of a furnace. I saw the smoke as ashes of dead babies, even when I tried not to.

While we waited inside, my concern for my son’s health still took my mind off my own. I kept my mobile in my hand in case B phoned with a scary change.

Will you wear a wig? Mieke and I chatted about whatever came into our minds as we sat on the crammed waiting-room chairs. After decades of making Australia her naturalised home, she maintained a Dutch stress on words and said I sink instead of I think – a charming pronunciation.

I nodded. I’ll buy one before I go bald.

I think it’ll suit you. Mieke smiled with her entire face, her bright blue eyes twinkly.

A chubby nurse with badges on her shirt called us both down the hall to the oncology rooms. The chemotherapy preparation room had a DVD player, pamphlets on every subject to do with cancer and its treatments, and two floral print couches.

Everyone starting chemo watches this video, she said.

Okay! I got across to the nurse that I didn’t want to talk any further, so she left Mieke and me alone.

I turned to Mieke. I’ll be fine in here. Would you mind going home to help B?

Are you sure? Ngaire’s with B. Mieke held my gaze and saw that I really was okay with her leaving. She hugged me and I closed the door behind her. In fact I wanted to be alone. Inside I was about to crack.

It was my habit to retreat inside myself at times of intense stress or emotion, and I preferred to do it without an audience. It was as if I needed to shut the noise off – of conversations or communicating with someone else – to inhabit my inner world. I looked up at the ceiling to try and stop tears falling out of my eyes. I planted my hands on my hips while I slowly paced around the room, thinking, I’ll survive this, I’ll survive this. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the video about other people’s stories of chemotherapy and how they’d coped with it. The footage of patients reflecting on their cancer treatment was a way of stepping through a door from one reality into another.

Before this first day, I’d searched hungrily through The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer for Barbara Bradfield’s name. Dr