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THIRTY-THREE
Cole
I turnedoff my phone as soon as I got in my truck.
I was glad I didn’t have social media or anything else that would make it easy for anyone to get a hold of me or even spy on what I was doing. I wanted to be alone. I had so much to think about, I wasn’t sure where to even start. I didn’t want to go through chemotherapy.
I didn’t want to go through radiation treatment.
But, I also didn’t want to have cancer, and sadly, I wasn’t given a choice in that. The fact of the matter was that I had the disease, and now I had to figure out how to deal with it. I still hadn’t heard a thing from Maveric’s owner, and that bothered me, too.
I couldn’t let Maveric linger with the infection in his leg. I knew he had to be in pain, too, and I felt bad for him. I knew what it was like to be struggling with pain in my leg, but I wasn’t facing death for losing it. I would go on to be okay. Maveric, on the other hand, was facing his own mortality. Not that he knew.
It was just a matter of getting a hold of his owner and laying out what was going on to him. I was frustrated with the fact his phone was disconnected and he didn’t leave another way for me to get a hold of him. I often required people to place two phone numbers in the file to make sure we had some way to reach them in case of an emergency, like now.
Without any way to reach him, I had to weigh my options. It would be a tough call to put down another person’s horse. But then, if they weren’t around and didn’t leave a way for me to reach them, what was I supposed to do? At that point, it seemed to me like the horse was abandoned, and there wasn’t much else to do for it than to make the best choice possible for his comfort.
But, it was still a tragedy in my mind.
Maveric wasn’t very old, and he was so full of spirit, it was hard to end his life. But, it would be merciful to him rather than letting the infection linger, and I was all about doing what was best. My mind refused to stay on the horse, however. For as much as I tried to think about other things, including my cancer, all my mind wanted to dwell on was Raya.
I knew I broke her heart, and I was sorry for it. She deserved better, and I wasn’t going to hear otherwise. Like Maveric, she was young and full of life, and that made me want to give her the best chance possible. To do that, I was going to fall on the sword and end the relationship. It would hurt for a while, but she would find someone else, and she would fall in love again.
She would forgive me for dumping her after taking her virginity, I knew that, and she would go on to have a happy life. A life with someone who could really take care of her and live life to the fullest alongside her. Things I wasn’t able to do for her without both my legs. I was sure of that.
I headed home and for the next couple days, I ignored everyone who tried to get a hold of me. The only person I made contact with was the vet, telling him it was best to get on with the euthanasia, and to go ahead and put Maveric down. I felt somber after making the call, so I poured myself a glass of lemonade, adding a splash of vodka to it before heading to my porch to sit down.
It wasn’t at all like me to drink in the afternoon. I was the kind of guy who liked to wait until at least dinner, if not after, to have a drink. But, I was dealing with cancer, so I felt it was my right to have a glass of alcohol to help take the edge off of how I was feeling.
There were some things that just didn’t seem to have rules anymore, and I was okay with that. I wasn’t giving up, but did I really have to work that hard to take care of the little things in life when it was all fleeting? It seemed like most everything I had worked for all this time had been pointless all along.
I knew I was dealing with a level of depression because of the diagnosis and the fact I was going to lose my leg, but still. It was hard.
Ham pulled up in front of the house, and I grimaced. I couldn’t send him away since he had taken the time to come to the house directly, but I also knew it meant we were about to have the conversation I had been avoiding with him. It was time to tell someone else the truth about me and what I was going through, and make it real to the entire world.
“Haven’t heard from you in a few days. I thought you were with your girlfriend, but then when I tried to call you last night, your phone was off,” he said as he walked over to the porch. “So, naturally, I decided to come see if you were okay, or if you managed to get yourself kicked in the head or something.”
“You know, I might take a good kick to the head over what I’m dealing with,” I told him. “And we aren’t together anymore.”
“What?” Ham looked genuinely surprised. “Why? I thought she was the woman of your dreams?”
“She is,” I said. “But sometimes love means you let someone go when you know you aren’t the best there is for them. I can’t drag her through the hardship that’s going to come with being with me right now. I care for her too much to do that to her. So, I let her go.”
“Now you’re not making sense,” Ham said. “Care to explain?”
“I wish I didn’t have to,” I said. “I have cancer.”
Ham stared at me, his eyes growing wider.
“I’m serious. It’s in the leg I broke. The doctor says I’m lucky that I broke my leg when I did, considering it made me pay attention to how it’s feeling, and that’s probably why I was able to catch the cancer early. But there’s a catch,” I said.
“You have cancer, and you’re telling me there’s a catch?” Ham asked in surprise. “Go on, because I’m not sure there’s much more you can tell me right now that’s not going to add to the fact you could knock me over with a feather where I stand.”
“I’m going to amputate,” I announced. “They say it’s bone cancer in my leg. It hasn’t spread anywhere else yet, but it’s going to if I don’t get treatment or remove the limb. I don’t want to go through radiation or chemo or anything like that, so I’m going to have them take my leg.”
“God almighty,” Ham said with a shake of his head. “I don’t know what to say, bud. I’m sorry you’re going through this, and you know I’m here for you. I don’t care if you have one leg or two. I’m still your best friend, and I always will be.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I’m not sure how life is going to change when I have it removed. All I know right now is that it will. I don’t know how I can handle more horses like Maveric if I only have one leg. I could do more animals like Romeo, but he wasn’t as bad as Maveric. You know how I care about all the horses who come through. I would hate to be that person who turns someone away because I just can’t do it anymore.”
