Chapter 7
"Trials and tribulations build up walls/ In front of faces made of stone/ Yet we stand strong enough/ To break the walls down to journey on/ But I know if we just bond our hearts/ There will be nothing that will stand in our way/ And we'll be together forever and a day..." Boyz II Men (Trying Times)
"Hi? Mom?"
Sara asked into the phone. "Yes, I know I should have called a while ago.
Things got busy... Nick's doing OK. Listen, we um, we need to talk to you about
something."
"What is it, honey?" Mrs. Elizabeth Galen asked her daughter. "What's
wrong?"
"It's nothing I can really tell you over the phone. I'd rather tell you
in person."
"Sara, honey, North Carolina's quite a distance from Florida. You know
that we can't hop in a car and be there in five minutes."
"Mom I know, it's just that this kind of thing needs to be explained face
to face," Sara tried.
"If it's that urgent, then why don't you..."
"Hello?" Nick asked, picking up on the other phone. "Are you
there?"
"Nick...hi," Sara said relieved to have him help out with this.
"Hey babe. Have you told her yet?" he asked, already knowing the answer.
"Not yet."
"What is it you have to tell me?" Elizabeth asked without confidence.
She was suddenly very nervous. Her daughter was never secretive about anything
and the two shared a very open relationship.
"Mom, can you do me a favor and sit down?" Sara asked meekly.
Nick walked into the kitchen where Sara was, shifted the phone between his shoulder
and his ear, and enveloped Sara in a hug. She was on the verge of tears already.
"Sweetie, what's going on?" Elizabeth asked.
"I, we, went to the doctor because Nick's been sick for the past few weeks,"
Sara started. "The doctor wanted a blood test, so we complied."
"I don't see why I need to sit," Elizabeth started.
"Mom, please let me finish," Sara asked. She was met by silence. It
urged her to continue. "The doctor called us back to go into his office."
Sara closed her eyes in remembrance of the horror of it all. Nick tightened
his grip on Sara, and she did the same. "Mom, Nick's not going to get better."
Sara's voice cracked slightly with all of the emotion she was holding onto inside.
"That can't be true..."
"Nick's HIV positive," Sara said as tears started rolling down her
cheeks, "and so am I."
It was every mother's nightmare. Elizabeth started shaking violently as her
own tears rolled freely down her cheeks. "They must have read them wrong,"
she whispered. "There's no way..."
Nick readjusted his grip on Sara. "It's... It's a shock to everybody,"
Nick said unable of saying anything else.
"But Sara, you didn't do any drugs. You didn't need any blood transfusions.
You didn't go have unprotected sex."
"But I did," Nick replied sullenly.
There was a silence. "You little bastard," Elizabeth growled. She
was fuming. "How could you do that to my baby? Weren't you thinking at
all? Didn't you realize that your life had more value than a bunch of hookers?
Is that all you think about? My daughter's not one of your cheap whores, Nick!
She's not! For you to destroy her life because of your mistakes is selfish!
That's all you are! A selfish son of a bitch!"
"Mom!" Sara said in shock. "Don't talk to Nick like that!"
Sara said in a heated shock. "It's not his fault!"
"Then who else gave you HIV, huh? Who else? Who else destroyed your life
as well as his own? Answer me that Sara!"
Nick ran his free hand over his face in disbelief. This verbal barbing he was
receiving from someone who he considered to be a second mother felt like someone
had knocked all of the air out of his stomach at once. Thirteen years of a growing
commitment of safety and protection to Mrs. Galen had just been scrapped in
five minutes. Nick felt sick to his stomach.
* * *
"I think that
was the toughest phone call I've ever had to make," Sara said as she wiped
her eyes and tried to regain her normal breathing pattern. She had crumpled
to the floor in a mess of pregnant emotions as she hung up the phone. Nick,
as usual, had been right there with her to comfort and care for her, but most
of all to cry with her. This was one obstacle that neither was going to let
the other one deal with alone.
"But at least she knows now. Your family knows..." Nick said distantly.
"Nick, I'm not sure I can go through this again today," Sara admitted
defeatedly.
"We're gonna have to tell them sometime."
Sara started to think in the silence that followed. It wasn't fair for her to
admit defeat because of her own situation. She was being selfish thinking only
about herself and not even taking a moment to think about how Nick might be
feeling.
"How about this," Sara started. "Next weekend, we'll have your
whole family over for a get together. You said that everybody was going to be
home anyway and that you wanted to visit them, so why don't we have everyone
over? We can tell them then. That way we'll have a chance to recover and deal
a little bit more before we start this over again."
Nick mulled over the idea. He too felt that telling his family right now in
his state of mind wouldn't be such a wise thing to do, but he also knew that
the longer he waited, the more difficult things were going to be. He also knew
that Sara had a definite point.
"Sounds good," Nick said, still in the mulling process. "It'll
be easier that way anyway."
"When should we call them to let them know that they're coming over?"
"I'll call tomorrow," Nick said as he blinked away fatigue. "I'm
gonna go watch the football game."
Sara watched as Nick stood, helped her up, brushed both of them off, and headed
off to the TV. Everything was so normal that Sara couldn't even imagine that
things were going to change.
'They're not,' Sara thought as she tried to convince herself. 'People have lived
for years without succumbing to full-blown AIDS. Look at Magic Johnson. He's
still alive and well.'
Just as Sara convinced herself of her latest theory, Nick had a sneezing fit
and shattered the aura of calm around her. Sara knew then that her world was
forever flipped upside down and there was nothing she could do to stop it.
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