Once Nick and Kara had sobered up some they climbed into Nick’s car and drove, just drove with no real direction in mind.
Oddly enough they ended up on the same road where Nick had witnessed the incredible sunset the night before. This time when he parked the car he was surrounded by billions upon billions of stars winking down at him like they knew some secret he wasn’t aware of.
He sat back enjoying the silence as Kara sat beside him now wearing his red hooded sweatshirt the hood pulled tightly around her face so only her eyes nose and mouth peeked out.
“It’s nice to be able to just sit here without saying a word. Most of the girls I know never stop talking.” He said pulling the seat latch so that he could recline.
“I know the type.” Kara said pulling her seat latch too so that they lay side by side staring up at the sky.
“Sometimes I just want to tell them to shut up and enjoy the silence.” Nick said with a small laugh.
“Why don’t you?”
“I dunno.” He shrugged.
Turning in her seat Kara gazed over at Nick taking in his profile from the top of his wild blonde hair to the bumps of his collarbone just below the collar of his t-shirt. She guessed he was handsome in a brotherly sort of way. Or maybe a best guy friend that you always had a crush on but never dared tell so you could stay friends-sort of way.
Reaching out a hand she tugged on his arm making him turn to face her.
“How come you haven’t made a pass at me?” She asked a serious look in her eyes. “I mean we’ve been together all day long, I’m vulnerable, you’re just passing through…”
“I haven’t made a pass at you because you would turn me down flat.” He pulled her arm to him pushing her palm out flat and tracing his finger along it like he was a palm reader.
“You don’t know that for sure. Why don’t you try your famous I’ve only got twenty four hours to live line on me and see how it works out?” She grinned enjoying how soft his hands were.
“Nah, I don’t want to.” He said crinkling his nose up as he folded her hand into a fist cupping it between his hands.
“Oh come on Nick why don’t you just want to give it a shot?”
“Because that line doesn’t seem so funny anymore.” He said letting go of her hand as he shifted in his seat.
“Why not?” She asked reaching out to tweak his nose with a smile.
“It’s not funny anymore because it’s true.
Kara’s mouth parted and her eyes widened as she searched his face for a smile or a laugh or anything to let her know that what he had just told her was nothing more then a stupid joke…... but there was nothing.
Nothing but his sad blue eyes, and the moon reflecting in the darkened centers opening the door to his soul.
“I don’t know what to say.” She whispered.
He smiled, “That’s what everybody says.”
Looking back he wasn’t sure when he truly knew that something was wrong with him? Sometimes it seemed like he had always known that he wouldn’t live long and maybe that was why he had been so determined to stuff so much living into so little time.
He guessed he would never know.
The headaches started right before he began to promote “Now or Never.” At first he thought they were from his Mother’s assault on him, then he thought they could possibly be tension headaches brought on by the stress of breaking away from his bandmates and beginning his solo career.
The violent pains would hit him at the strangest times, slamming around in his head until he felt like his teeth would rattle. When he would complain, the powers that be would fill him full of Tylenol with Codeine and push him on the stage for the interviews and performances. He knew that he sounded like an idiot as the reporters tossed question after question at him and he would fail to respond, trying to cover it with a goofy smile that made all the girls scream. But the loopy feeling of the Codeine beat the searing pain in his head that would often blind him once he would take the stage the band pulsating behind him as he ironically sang the words to the song “Help Me.”
By the time he took off on his first solo tour things were slowly getting worse. He had begun to tremble in the morning and he started to have weird tingling sensations in his right leg that caused him to trip occasionally.
His short-term memory had never been the greatest but suddenly he couldn’t remember things that he had discussed with people just hours before and he began to forget words to some of his songs having to have a teleprompter with the words installed below where he stood on stage.
He knew there were discussions going on backstage that he was drinking or on drugs and at one point his assistant Greg confronted him about the issue.
“Nick do you need some help?” Greg approached Nick backstage after one of the concerts, wearing his usual tattered Abercrombie and Fitch cap and black horn-rimmed glasses that made him look like Drew Carey.
“What do you mean?” Nick asked wincing as he bent down to tie his shoes.
“Well I mean look at you man, you can’t even tie your fucking shoes without pulling some face. The most simple things seem to be stressing you out man and I’m just wondering what’s going on?”
Sitting up Nick wiped a hand across his mouth and tried to smile.
“I’m fine Greg.”
“You’re on drugs aren’t you?” Nick was surprised by the bluntness of Greg’s words. It had been his experience that people only talked about you if you had a problem- not to you.
“No I’m not on drugs.” Standing up Nick grabbed for a t-shirt and pulled it on.
“Then are you drinking?”
“No.”
“Then what the hell is going on Nick?”
“I wish I knew.”
* * *
Brian came to Nick’s performance in SanFranciso in March casually lounging backstage before the show, ribbing Nick about not being able to get front row seats to his best friends concert. The two of them clowned around until the show started when Brian took his seat amongst the squealing girls, shouting right along with them as Nick took the stage.
Brian was disturbed by Nick’s appearance on stage, his lack of connection with the crowd as well as the way he seemed to stumble every so often on his feet as well as on the words to the songs. Nick had never been the most coordinated person Brian had known but he had never missed a lyric.
After the show Brian made his way backstage, flashing the pass with Nick’s picture on it to the big guy working the doors. He wandered from room to room before finally finding Nick in the bathroom throwing up blood before eventually blacking out.
When Nick came too he was lying on a ratty cot in one of the backstage rooms a cold cloth pressed to his forehead his mouth dry. He could hear Brian yelling in the background at somebody,
“What the hell is going on? I want somebody to tell me what is the matter with him.”
Nick smiled wanly to himself thinking how nice it was to have somebody in his life that cared.
“Nicky,” Now Brian was kneeling by his side turning over the washcloth to the cool side before placing it back on Nick’s forehead. “Why didn’t you tell me something was wrong?” He asked.
“I didn’t want to bug you.”
“I’m going to take care of things Nick, we’re going to figure out what’s wrong. Okay?” Brian smiled punching Nick lightly in the arm.
“Okay.” Nick whispered, closing his eyes. “Okay.”
* * *
Brian had taken matters into his own hands setting up an appointment for Nick at a well respected clinic in Boston that he himself had gone to when he first began having the reoccurring problems with his heart years before.
They boarded the plane early the next morning arriving in Boston late in the afternoon. Brian escorted Nick to the clinic waiting for hours while they went over Nick from stem to stern, doing x-rays, EKG, EEG’s, MRI’s, and numerous other blood tests, scans and probes before sending them back to the hotel to await the results the following day.
Brian tried to get Nick’s mind off of things by taking him to the movies, but the movie sucked and Nick was tired so halfway through they went back to the hotel and went to bed.
Brian stayed up all night sitting in a chair in the corner of the room watching Nick sleep. He couldn’t remember how many times he had shared a room with Nick over the years and in all those years Nick had always been the one to sleep like a log the whole night through. Where Nick dropped, Nick slept never moving until it was time to get up.
Watching him now Brian was disturbed at the way Nick’s body twitched and jumped, moaning every so often as he flipped from front to back and back to his front again.
Something was very wrong.
Brian and Nick returned to the clinic the following afternoon for a consultation with the doctor and possibly some more tests.
Nick sat on the table in the room dressed in the pale blue gown his legs swinging back and forth furiously.
“What if I’m dying?” He said gnawing on his fingernails as he glanced nervously around the room.
“You’re not dying.” Brian said thumbing through a magazine.
“What are you, a doctor? How do you know I’m not dying.”
“Look at you, you’re the picture of health. You’re probably just suffering from exhaustion or something.”
“You don’t puke up blood when you’re tired. What if I’m dying?”
Brian finally shot a hand out to still Nick’s legs as they pumped wildly back and forth.
“Stop it already-you’re not dying.”
Just then the Doctor knocked on the door entering, a serious look on his face. He shook both young men’s hands before pulling up a stool and sitting down a large folder in his hands containing the results from Nick’s test.
He tried to focus on the positive first going through the results of the EKG and EEG and then moving on to some of the bloodwork. After a few minutes of talking the Doctor paused, rubbing a finger over his upper lip as he studied the paperwork before him.
“All of those tests aside Nick I’m afraid that we have found something serious that needs to be discussed.”
Nick could feel his body tense as he broke the eye contact with the Doctor and began playing with a loose thread hanging from the sleeve of the hospital gown he wore.
“Nick you have a brain tumor.” As he said the words the color drained from Nick’s face and his legs began to swing back and forth again.
“So what does that mean?” He said looking over to Brian, as always, for answers.
“Well Nick,” the Doctor continued “What it means in most cases, depending the size and accessibility of the tumors, is that we do surgery to remove the tumor and then we can do radiation to treat it.”
Brian nodded at Nick.
“But…..in your case we have found that there are multiple tumors that have began to form and in addition to the mass of the tumors we also have the problem of the location of the tumors. They are in an inaccessible location for us to operate. Trying to remove them could mean any number of things, from possible paralysis, to death.”
“What are you saying?” Brian asked in an irritable voice as Nick turned his attention back to the loose thread.
“What I’m saying is that I’m sorry, there is nothing we can do.”
“Am I going to die?” Nick said looking down at the floor so he didn’t have to make eye contact with anybody in the room.
“Yes Nick. You are going to die.”
* * *
Brian and Nick sat at the table in the hotel room, silent. Curtains drawn, the hum of the air conditioner in the background.
“What do I do?” Nick finally asked.
Brian sat stone faced across from him drumming his fingers on the table “We get a second opinion.”
And so they did. Over the next month they got a second, third and fourth opinion from respected Doctors all over the country and the prognosis from all of them was the same.
He was going to die.
* * *
Brian and Nick went to see the rest of the guys one by one starting with A.J.
For some reason Nick thought it would be easy to tell A.J. the news. He was counting on A.J. to crack one of his jokes, pull him into a hug and tell him that they would fight the son of a bitch tumor that had invaded his brain. But that wasn’t what happened. As soon as the words left Nick’s mouth A.J. sat glassy eyed and silent, staring at Nick, taking him in as if for the last time before finally saying.
“Nick….I don’t know what to say.”
* * *
Telling Howie hadn’t been any easier with Howie breaking down and sobbing in the livingroom of his house in Maine. Nick stared out the big picture window focusing on the fishing boats in the distance, nodding to himself when Howie finally muttered the words
“Nick…I don’t know what to say.”
* * *
And it just got harder by the time they knocked on Kevin’s door. Just days before Kevin had just signed the papers for his divorce from Kris and was riding on a cloud nine after bailing from the marriage that had caused him so much misery.
Brian and Nick sat on the deck on Kevin’s Kentucky cabin listening as Kevin went on and on about his new girlfriend Anne and how perfect they were for each other. He was anxious to get married to her and start a family and he wanted Nick and Brian to be the first to know that he planned to ask Anne to marry him that very night now that the divorce was final. When he finally came up for air Brian spoke.
“Kev, Nick has something he needs to talk to you about.”
“Oh shit buddy I’m sorry. Here I am going on and on about Anne and you came here to talk to me about something.”
Nick smiled. “It’s okay Kev I’m happy that you’re happy.”
“I am man, I really am.” Slapping Nick on the leg Kevin smiled broadly as he tipped back a beer and glanced up at the blue sky.
“Kevin…..I’m dying.” Nick spit the words out and then paused waiting for Kevin’s reaction.
Looking back down at Nick Kevin had a small smile on his face as he looked over to Brian and back to Nick. “Is this a joke?” He said pointing at them both. “Because if it is it isn’t funny.”
“Kev, I wouldn’t come all the way to Kentucky to tell you I was dying as a joke.” This time when Kevin glanced over at Brian, Brian nodded to him letting him know that what Nick said was true.
“When?” Kevin’s voice became serious.
“Couple of months.”
“We’ll get a second opinion.” He said slamming his beer bottle down on the deck, anger in his voice.
“We already did Kevin.” Brian broke in.
“And a second, third and fourth opinion.” Nick finished.
“Fuck that, then we’ll get a fifth opinion.” Kevin said standing up pushing his hands through his hair.
“Kevin there isn’t anything they can do…..I have a brain tumor, I’m gonna die.”
Kicking at the beer bottle Kevin sent it sailing off of the deck as he paced back and forth before finally turning tears pooling in his eyes.
“God Nick….I don’t know what to say.”