Love Is Not The Enemy

I'M COMING, BABY

Cari's PoV

Today is the day in which its date should never have been one out of the ordinary. Today should have been any other day with no specific memory attracted to it. Many years back, six days ago was just any other day, like this one should have been as well. But then, one day passes and suddenly cancer is a family's entire world. A world that, for two children who had never even heard of that term before, should have to be told that term is taking their daddy away very soon. They were told they had to spend time with their daddy and say goodbye to their daddy, because in not very long, cancer would take their daddy away.

For one of those children, cancer still haunts her every year. From the date of the day she was first told there was a terminology that could just drain another human of their life, as if it was eating their daddy from the inside, cancer is all there is to think about.

Then only five days are to pass by until cancer wins and said child is to be woken up in their neighbor and best friend's bedroom, only to be told said child's daddy lost the battle. And no matter how much the neighbor slash best friend screams at cancer, who blames cancer for the tears running down the silent child's cheeks, their daddy is still eaten up by cancer.

As everyone already knows; that child is Shannon, her neighbor slash best friend and now also girlfriend is me, and that day, that's today.

Today is the day Debbie had hoped never would come and had therefore chosen to keep it from her two daughters that today even was a possible date the girls would remember forever. Not until a doctor explained to her that there could be only hours left until there was no Jim anymore, did Debbie realize a date in the near future would be one her daughters would hate forever. That was five days before the date actually arrived, and the day Shannon and Casey knew there was no saving their daddy. A daddy they hadn't even known was in danger and fighting world most dangerous fighter in the first place. A fighter some people were lucky and met at his weaker days. Other people found his weaknesses. These were people who managed to defeat cancer. And even if cancer found them again, they had defeated him once, so they found power to do it again.

Shannon's father hadn't met him at one of his weak days. No doctor had found one of his weaknesses either. They had tried every weapon they could find and every trick in the medical books, but cancer was stronger. He wasn't giving up this time. He wanted to win. And he did win.

They say; sometimes winning for you, is failure for someone else.

Surely cancer's win is failure for everyone but himself.

Cancer's win marked itself on the calendar forever. His date of great success, marks Shannon date of complete darkness and the date of her daddy's passing. From today on, many years back, Shannon would never see her father again and she had only been given five days to understand what that even meant, before it became reality. A reality that's so unfair not even the most sadistic person could ever wish it upon their worst enemy of all.

Only cancer deserves the pain he himself is the one to inflict in all his victims.

But that's my own girlfriend's reality.

The thought process of one term causing so much pain and black holes in so many calendars all around the world, in Shannon's included, has me chocking up as I gently close my bedroom door after stepping out in only a pair of jeans and a bra, swallowing deeply to myself to keep another round of soft, approaching sobs from reaching the surface. How can one term wish so much hatred upon itself and own such a desire to cause so much pain? How unfair is it to have such desire; a desire to kill?

Slowly, I make my way down the hall and towards my brother's bedroom, pushing my hair out of my face as I reach up to dry my tears and inhale deeply to settle my breath, which keeps getting stuck in my throat. How can cancer wish to do so much emotional damage to an already fucked up society? Was he there to show us how little and trivial we all were compared to his power; to show us a pimple or a lost leg was noting against the pain he could inflict?