"Please hand me a bottle. I think I'm going down..."

[emilywhereverimayfindher]

Who? Emily Cole and Angela Ashwood
What? The terrible truth
When? After this
Where? Mt. Sinai

How had one fucking night started off so amazing and ended up like this? That was all Emily could think to herself. She had come home to her future wife, been treated to some amazing sex and had assumed that she would be spending the night in bed with Ange... making love and cuddling and sleeping by turns. But this? This wasn't at all what she'd expected. Ange had called Tara, and they'd come to the hospital for a mammogram that revealed what they already knew... There was a lump in Em's breast. A mass, Tara called it. It could be nothing. A lot of the time, it was nothing. But she needed to do a biopsy to be sure.

Emily had been checked into the hospital for a needle biopsy, something that she wasn't thrilled about, but knew was necessary. This had all happened so fast, and she was fucking terrified. Still, as they waited in the hospital room, Em felt Ange's hand wrap around hers, and that in itself was comforting. Emily wasn't just scared for herself. She was scared for their baby. It had happened so quickly... the sperm had taken the first time, and she was carrying a baby that she and Ange were already in love with... that they were going to raise together, and love together, and she couldn't seem to find her head when it came to what would happen to the baby. Tara and Ange were both focusing on her... on her health and safety. She wanted to scream at them that she wasn't the only fucking person to worry about right now, and that they needed to be making sure that the baby was safe, too.

If she weren't pregnant, right now she would have Clitty on the phone to get her good and boozed up, but that wasn't exactly on the menu at the moment. "Ange," she said softly, turning to look her fiancee in the eye. "What... what if it is cancer?"

Comments

[americanskin]

The only reason Angela was focusing on Emily right was because if she thought about the baby, she was going to be sick all over the place. It wasn't that she was shoving it aside and forgetting it, it was just that it was impossible for her to think about the baby without completely losing her shit. "Just... just think about Billy," she murmured, giving Emily's hand another squeeze. Billy was incredible. He was such a trooper. He had battled and beaten testicular cancer. He had to kissed goodbye to one of his balls, and even if he admitted he only really wanted Ajay to see him naked these days, he had gotten through it.

"Fuck, why are they taken so long?" she soon added, clearly agitated and trying to keep it together. What was going to happen if it was cancer? What would happen to the baby? There would be chemo, and depending on what the biopsy said, probably a procedure... maybe even a mastectomy. She felt sick, but this wasn't about her. Now she knew exactly how Ajay had felt when he discovered the lump in Billy's testicle. She remembered so clearly what Ajay had said about it. Something along the lines of, 'I just had to get him to the doctor. That's all I was thinking about'.

[emilywhereverimayfindher]

There was nothing in the world that could've prepared Emily for any of this. It had only been a few hours earlier that she'd been basking in her love for Angela, in the fact that they'd made a baby together... In the fact that they were going to be moms. Now all of that was up in the air, no matter how much she might try to deny it. "Billy wasn't..." pregnant, but the word died on her lips. It hurt too much to say it when they didn't know what the answer was going to be. If it wasn't cancer, there was no point in being this freaked out about it. But how did you turn off being scared to death until you knew without a doubt that you were okay?

"Your guess is as good as mine, babe," Emily said, trying to keep herself calm, because she wanted to comfort Angela as much as for herself. "I mean, how long could it possibly take to stick a needle in my tit?" She gave Ange a smirk, but a weak one. It wasn't very convincing, but fuck if she didn't have to at least try. "At least we're here, right? And if it does turn out to be bad news, Tara's the best in the business. And if not, we're really just sitting here worrying ourselves over absolutely nothing. Which would honestly be totally okay with me, too."

[americanskin]

Angela had all faith in Tara. Perhaps even beyond faith because of what she did for Billy. Billy's cancer had began to spread and he had surgery to try to remove the cancerous cells as well as the testicle. He had chemo and radiation, but all along the way, Tara had been an amazing doctor who really knew her stuff. There were no other better hands for Emily to be in, and that was probably the number one reason Angela hadn't completely lost her shit here. What she couldn't deny, however, was that the lump she had felt was quite large. She was battling with herself inwardly, worrying if she should have found it sooner. But their sex life had been on the back-burner with the baby making business. That was why she had planned to make that night so special. This wasn't special, this was a nightmare.

"You can't just not get treatment because the baby," she finally said, throwing the words out that had been roiling around in her head. "I... we don't know what is going to happen or what they say. It might just be the minimum treatment, and we have to keep everything crossed for that. But if it's not, you've got to come first. You're the most important thing. I'm not doing any of this without you."

[emilywhereverimayfindher]

This was such a fucked up twist. Emily had expected to spend the rest of this night home with Ange, naked and warm and wrapped up together in bed, talking about their future and their baby and the life they were creating together. Instead, she was in a hospital, facing the fact that her boob could very well be trying to kill her. There was comfort, though, in the fact that Angela was here... that they were holding hands and facing this together. She found herself even more thinking back to all that Angela had gone through alone, and the fact that she should've been there, too. All of these thoughts were running through her head, and all of them were incredibly painful. She didn't want any of this. She wanted to go to sleep and wake up and have this all be a dream. She wouldn't let go of Angela's hand... she needed that connection with her to know that she wasn't alone.

Her eyes widened as she looked at Angela, the words from her partner hitting her hard in the chest so much it felt like a physical punch. "What if... What if the treatment can be postponed until the baby comes along?" she asked, tears coming to her eyes. "I can wait. We... We got pregnant the first time, Ange. This baby's like... a one in a million chance. I mean, it could be nothing, and maybe they'll just take the lump, and I'll be fine without needing any treatment." But those last words... I'm not doing any of this without you... They stopped her in her tracks, and she looked at Angela with tears streaking her face. "I don't want you to do anything else alone. Not anymore."

[americanskin]

Angela had nearly gotten on the phone to get Beau here to try to explain what this whole process would be. Mostly how long things would take. But they had learned from Tara that Beau was actually working that night, and tied up with a terminally ill child on the other side of the unit. That had been sobering for her. With the job Angela did, she saw terrible things all the time, but right now, on some level, it was a timely reminder for her that there were a lot worse off. Babies, even. They still had their life, and that child Beau was with wouldn't very soon. She thought of Elliott, and once again knew in her heart being a surrogate was what she had been meant to do. No, it hadn't been easy, but it would forever be a part of her now and had led to getting things back on track with Emily. That took time too. She hoped they now had what it took to go the distance and whatever didn't work before was fixed now. Or they would never make it through this.

"Nine months? Wait nine months? No fucking way," she insisted, shaking her head. Nine months could mean the difference between terminal or not. "You can't wait on something like this. Do you think cancer just agrees to go on hold until something happens? It doesn't. If it's a cancerous lump, it could double, triple, quadruple in size in nine months. You can't wait. That's crazy. It's not one in a million chance. It happened the first time. We can do it again. We can't wait if there needs to be treatment."

[emilywhereverimayfindher]

"They can do surgery and not do chemo," Emily countered, angry at the world, but not at all angry at Ange. She just needed her to understand. "It's not even nine months anymore. It's like eight now. Can't we just... at least see what the options are? If I have to terminate the pregnancy to get treatment, then so be it, but there's got to be at least another way we can look at first, right?" She was grasping at straws, and even as she said it, she knew it. If it was cancer and she had to have treatment, then she would have to. That would just be the end of that. She couldn't wait until the baby was born to begin to care for her own body. It just wasn't going to work that way. As much as she would consider choosing that if there was no one else in the picture, in this case, there was. She had Angela to consider, along with Lincoln, Clint, and everyone else they treasured as family. This choice wasn't just about her.

She felt sick to her stomach. Maybe it wasn't cancer at all, but it seemed like too much to hope for at this point. The lump was big. And that was saying something, because Emily didn't exactly have big boobs to begin with. At the moment she was hating herself for not noticing. If it was that big, it had to have been there before she got pregnant... And if it had been, she had effectively gotten pregnant for no reason but to have to end the pregnancy. "We can do it again," Emily said softly, her voice catching. "But... but what if I can't carry a baby again? What if the chemo fucks everything up? What if I can't do it, Ange? I know it's only been a short time, but I've gotten really excited about carrying our baby and being able to do this for us. It's just... if this takes all of this away from us, it's fucking bullshit."

[americanskin]

"No." Angela's reply was sharp. "You're talking craziness. Surgery without chemo might spread it. This is cancer. It's awful and it's serious. You can't half-treat cancer. It doesn't work like that. It is still the better part of a year. What if you do that and it gets worse? It spreads through quickly and the baby dies when we're seven or eight months along and you have to give birth to it dead? How would that feel? We can't do this. Sometimes, life just does horrible shit that makes us have to do things we don't want to. But that means it's not meant to be. This was our first try, but this here now? It's telling us it's not meant to be. There's no other way to look at it. We have to do whatever it takes to get you better," she said and her tears were then flowing in earnest. She couldn't stop them. She felt sick and like someone was sitting on her chest. Fuck, she had never quite believed she and Emily would get back on track, but they had somehow. Now this. She hoped Emily listened to her. But at the same time, she was scared this might shake them so hard, it ruined them. She was scared of so much, but didn't want to say any of it out loud.

She wiped at her eyes and face with the backs of her fingers. "If you can't, I will," she finally added. Even if Elliott's birth was still very fresh to her, and it had been a long and hard labour, she was pretty sure she could do it again. Maybe. Now she was doubting absolutely everything, but that had to be natural in the face of something like this, right? She was pretty fertile. She knew that from getting knocked up from the first turkey baste with Austin's sperm. They had been going to give that a few tries and then resort to IVF if it didn't work. It never had to get to that. "A-And I've gotten excited about you being alive and wanting to marry me. Do I have to throw that away too?"

[emilywhereverimayfindher]

This was all coming at her so fast, but Angela... Angela was the person that she loved here. Angela was the woman that all of this had changed for, and Emily knew that, if she died, Angela would be all alone again. And once again, it would be her fault. She couldn't do that to the woman that she loved. She had changed her life in all the best ways, and Emily couldn't return the favor by bringing her pain and suffering beyond her wildest imaginings. All of these questions were too real, and this was their life. Emily knew about cancer, but it was always something happening to someone else... someone they loved, but someone who wasn't her or Ange. "This... this sucks..." Emily croaked through a failed attempt not to cry. She was going to fucking cry. That was just all there was to it. The tears were rolling down her cheeks as she roughly brushed them away with her hand. "Ange, I'm scared," she confessed, looking her fiancee in the eye. She was. She was terrified. And she wanted to be the strong one, but right now, maybe it was more important that they just break together.

She looked up at the other woman with tears still streaming down her face. "You'll... You'll get pregnant again to have a baby for us? Are you sure, Ange? I don't... I don't want you to go through it again so soon if you're not sure." She paused, Angela's last question standing between them for far longer than Emily intended to let it. It was a valid point, and this decision, no matter what decision it might be, didn't only effect Emily. It would change the lives of everyone who loved them, and that just wasn't fair. "No," she finally said softly. "No, you don't have to throw it away or give it up. I'll fight, Angie. I'll fight with whatever treatment they tell me is best. I'll fight for as long as I have you by my side fighting with me. Okay?"

[americanskin]

Sitting here in the cancer unit was never something she felt she would have to do in her life. Not as anything but a visitor. She had come to visit Euan numerous times when he had been going through chemo. He had an aggressive form, and she knew he had been waiting on a terminal diagnosis at any minute because he thought it was karma catching up with him. Euan was one of those tough hardass bastards who should never look as weak and broken as he had when she visited him. But he had gotten through it. They had success stories to hold onto. Hope wasn't immediately lost if a diagnosis of cancer came. As cliche as it was to hear, cancer wasn't an immediate death-sentence anymore. It just felt so fucking hard to be rational. "Me too," she finally agreed in a tiny voice.

"I..." she continued, but she found herself hesitating. Clint's protesting was suddenly driving to the forefront of her mind. She was doubting now whether he had just been joking or indifferent to the whole process, or if he really felt inside that he was going to give them one bite at the apple and that was it. They couldn't just ignore his participation in this. They couldn't have gotten this far and this quickly without him. "I will if Clint agrees. I mean, he might not. I don't want to assume he will. We just have to talk to him. If we can pin him down, which has never been an easy feat. He's just... got shit in his own life he's dealing with, and he only deals with shit in his own way. Lincoln's still recovering. I don't know..." She felt defeated and dropped her head into her hands with her elbows resting on her knees. It all suddenly felt too much.