"So, Jaime, Mr. Wentz," the doctor said, coming into Jaime's room Monday morning with files and papers and... stuff.
Jaime had had an MRI Friday evening after his seizure and had spent most of the weekend in bed. I'd managed to get him to get up and walk a little bit, but he complained of a headache and went back to bed. Meagan had brought the kids to visit over the weekend. Ashlee said she'd wait until Jaime was feeling better to visit again. She seemed apologetic and I hoped Jaime would hear her out.
But, here we were in the here and now, about to find out what path Jaime's life was about to take. Ashlee had the boys and Marvel was with friends, so Meagan could be here to find out what we were dealing with.
I looked over at my son. Again, he looked so much younger than his almost 16 years. I knew he was scared. We'd talked over the weekend. I couldn't take his fear away, but hopefully I'd reassured him that no matter what, we would be with him all the way through.
"I have the results of your MRI on Friday and your biopsy last Monday," the doctor said.
Jaime was silent. He didn't want to know. But he knew we needed to know.
The doctor put the images up on the light box on the wall in Jaime's room.
"It looks like the seizure didn't cause any structural damage, no bleeding, everything looks good from that perspective," the doctor said. "The biopsy, however..."
A sense of dread came over me.
The doctor sighed.
"The biopsy shows the mass was malignant. Now, we are confident we got the whole mass. We were very careful about that. But, considering the results, we're going to do a full body scan to make sure there are no metastases and that it was the primary tumour and not a secondary metastasis."
Jaime's jaw was set. He wasn't showing any outward emotion but I could see the fear in his eyes.
"Once we're certain whether the tumour is primary or secondary, we'll come up with a treatment plan," the doctor said.
"Wait," Jaime said. "If you got the whole thing, then why would I need any treatment?"
"We would need to make sure that any stray tumour, cancerous cells that may be waiting to activate so to speak, are eradicated," the doctor said.
"So, I-I have cancer?" Jaime whispered and looked over at me.
"I'm afraid so," the doctor said. "The good news is though you have an aggressive type, it's very treatable and has a very high survival rate. Nearly 90%."
Jaime had shut down again.
Meanwhile, Meagan and I were sitting in stunned silence. Jaime has cancer. My son, who I was still getting to know, has cancer.
"I have the imaging booked for tomorrow morning and I'll get those results as quickly as I can. I put a rush on it because we want to start treatment as soon as possible."
I nodded. Meagan nodded and took Jaime's hand. I'm not sure he even noticed. I could see he was trying not to cry.
"I'll leave some literature here with you. I wish I had better news. Jaime, I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"
He nodded once, but didn't look at the doctor. The doctor left and Meagan and I moved beside Jaime.
"Jaime, talk to me, to us," I said. "What are you thinking?"
"Leave me alone," he said, pulling his hand away from Meagan and pulling the covers up and curling up on his side, closing his eyes and covering his head with his blanket.
"I don't want to leave you alone, Jaime," Meagan said. "We don't want to leave you alone."
She reached out and touched his back. He stiffened.
"Please," he said, his voice shaking. "Please just leave me alone."
"Jaime," I said. "We aren't leaving you alone. What we will do is go get a cup of coffee and look over some of this paperwork. But we're coming back in a little while. You don't have to talk to us, you don't have to say a word. You don't even need to acknowledge us. But Meagan and I will be back and we will not be leaving you alone."
Jaime didn't say anything from under his covers. I indicated to Meagan that we should leave him for a few minutes. I gathered up the pamphlets and printouts the doctor had brought and took them with us when we left the room.
We got to the elevator and so far I was holding it together. But as soon as the elevator doors closed and we were the only ones, I broke down.
"Pete," Meagan said, wrapping her arms around me. "Pete, he's going to be okay. He's strong. He's young. He'll fight. We'll fight."
"Tanya's cancer was brain cancer, too. I don't know if I told you that," I said through my tears. "I can't lose him, Meagan. I'm just getting to know him. I can't lose him."
I sobbed into Meagan's shoulder as I held tightly to her, afraid to let go of her.
"We aren't going to lose him," Meagan said. And I could hear tears in her voice, too. I knew she loved my oldest son like her own, just as she did Saint and Bronx. "We won't let it win."
I wiped my eyes as the elevator stopped on the main level and excused myself as I walked around the people getting on the elevator. People stared at me and I didn't know if it was because they recognize me, saw I was crying, or both. There had already been some press about us being at the hospital. Which led to speculation, which our management was dealing with on my behalf.
Meagan steered me towards a table and went to get us coffee. She came back with two coffees and a muffin.
"I don't know why I got the muffin. Food always seems to be, I don't know. Soothing?"
I started reading through some of what the doctor had given us. I read about what we could expect Jaime to experience with chemo and radiation treatments.
The thought of what my son was about to go through turned my stomach.