The Legacy: Making Wishes Come True by Lurlene McDaniel Read Free Book Online

been eliminated for fear that someone might try to crash through one in an attempt to escape.
    Jenny stretched out on the curved chair, and when a nurse offered her an assortment of magazines, she experienced a sense of melancholy. Some of the titles were for small children, and it struck her profoundly that little ones, kids much younger than she, had to face this same ordeal.
    “Ready?” a nurse named Lois asked.
    “I guess so,” Jenny mumbled, although her brain screamed,
Never!
She was glad that when her grandmother had asked to come to the session with Jenny, Dr. Gallagher had said, “Jenny’s an adult. This is her disease. You’ll be needed later, after she returns to her room.” Instinctively, Jenny knew this was something no one could help her do. She must go down this road alone.
    Lois prepped Jenny’s arm for the needle that would be inserted into her vein so that the powerful chemicals could drip slowly into her bloodstream. “The treatment takes about forty-five minutes,” Lois said. “If you need anything, just holler. I’ll be right over there at my desk.”
    Jenny nodded and swallowed a lump of fear. She felt the tip of the needle slide into her flesh, and Lois tape it down. Her heart hammered.
The worst is over
, she told herself, attempting to relax.
    Lois adjusted valves on tubing leading from two plastic bags on the IV stand and patted Jenny’s shoulder. “This will regulate the flow.” The nurse stepped away.
    Panic seized Jenny as the first dose of medicine hit her system, for it burned like liquid fire. The sensation was so intense that she stared at her arm, certain that it would burst into flames. Suddenly, extreme nausea gripped her. Her stomach heaved, and she choked back bile.
    Instantly, Lois was at her side. “Feeling a little shaky?” Lois handed her a beige plastic basin. “Don’t hold back. If you want to throw up, do it.”
    Horrified, Jenny grabbed the basin, struggled in vain against the relentless waves of nausea, and finally gave in to them. She vomited over and over. Each time, Lois emptied the basin, washed Jenny’sface, and handed the basin back to her. Soon, Jenny was trembling and shaking from head to toe. Tears ran down her cheeks. How could she endure this torture?
    “You will adjust,” Lois said softly.
    All Jenny could do was silently beg God to let it be over—even if it meant dying right that moment.
    Jenny didn’t die, but when the procedure was over, she was so weak that she had to be lifted onto a gurney for the return trip to her room. Once she was back in her bed, Mrs. Kelly and her grandmother fussed over her, and even though Jenny could see how pinched and white her grandmother’s face appeared, she could offer no words to comfort her.
    “Don’t think about the bad parts,” Mrs. Kelly counseled as she placed a cool compress on the back of Jenny’s neck. “Think about how millions of cancer cells are dying inside your body because of the medicine. Think about how the chemo is hunting them down in your bloodstream and blasting them into oblivion.”
    Jenny tried to focus on the positive, but had trouble. Yes, the bad were being destroyed, but what of her good cells? Weren’t they in danger too? How could she endure this kind of agony three times a week? She closed her eyes, certain that if the cancer didn’t kill her, the treatments would.
    “Why can’t I see her? Why won’t she let me be with her?” Richard paced on the fine Oriental carpet in front of the ornate Louis XIV desk in Marian Crawford’s Boston mansion. Marian sat ramrod straight behind the desk, allowing him to vent hisfrustration. “I won’t upset her, Mrs. Crawford. All I want to do is see her. It’s been over three weeks.”
    “Richard, please try and understand how physically and emotionally demanding her chemotherapy regime is. She’s really not up to having any visitors.”
    “Visitors?” Richard fairly spat the word. “I’m not a visitor, Mrs. Crawford.