“She was irreplaceable.”
“You know what she was?” Micah reflected. “She was like the center of the wheel in our family, and we were all the spokes. And once she was gone, we didn’t have our center anymore. I think that’s why the loss hit us so hard. Not only was mom gone, but we had to become a new kind of family. I think that’s why you, me, and Dana started to get close again.”
“What about dad?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Part of it was losing mom, but I still think dad was manic-depressive. When mom was around, I think she was able to keep his mood swings under control. But after she was gone—well, dad didn’t have a center either.”
“Do you think he was a good dad? When we were growing up, I mean?”
“In some ways. Not so good in others. But you know, in the end, you have to give them both credit for being good parents simply because of the way their kids turned out. We’re happily married, successful, ethical, and we remained close as siblings. If your kids can say the same thing later in life, won’t you think you did a good job as a parent?”
“Without a doubt,” I conceded.
In the morning, we flew to Agra, where we’d visit the Taj Mahal.
Agra held the same sights outside our bus windows as had Jaipur, with two major differences: There was far more pollution in the air, and far more roads were unpaved.
Because of the pollution, we had to change buses; to reach the Taj, we’d ride the last couple of miles in electric buses, and ended up stopping a quarter-mile from the gates.
From where we parked, it was impossible to see the Taj Mahal. What most people don’t realize is that the Taj is actually part of a massive compound. Again, we waited in a long line—this one to check our bags for explosives or weapons—and we finally entered the compound. Even then, we couldn’t see the monument.
Instead, we filed along a sidewalk, flanked on either side by what had essentially been apartments for guests of Shah Jahan. Up ahead and to the right was a large brick structure that served as a massive ornamental gate, and again we had to wait in line and be checked before passing through.
On the other side, however, we finally had our first glimpse of what some regard as the finest monument to love ever constructed.
The Taj Mahal was begun in 1631 by Shah Jahan, a Mughal emperor, in memory of his second wife, Mumtaz Mahal, who died after giving birth to their fourteenth child. It is, in other words, a tomb. The cenotaph honoring Mumtaz Mahal inside the Taj is inlaid with jewels and lies near that of her husband’s. The Taj is one of the most symmetrical buildings ever constructed—the cenotaph of Mumtaz is directly in the center of the dome; the four corner towers are exactly the same distance from the dome; and exactly the same height.
The Taj took twenty thousand workers, one thousand elephants, and twenty-two years to build, and material was brought in from all over India and Central Asia. It is regarded as a symbol of eternal love, yet Shah Jahan spent little time there. Soon after it was completed, Shah Jahan’s —and Mumtaz’s—son deposed the emperor and imprisoned him in the Great Red Fort, a few miles away. While Shah Jahan could see the Taj from his prison cell, he was never allowed to set foot in the Taj Mahal again.
From where we stood, it didn’t look real; set against a murky, polluted sky, the marble shone brilliantly, and the image was reflected in the long, rectangular ponds before it. Most people, when seeing pictures of the Taj Mahal (which means “Crown Palace”), believe it’s constructed of white, unadorned marble; only up close does the detail of each marble block become vivid. Like the Hall of Mirrors—only on a much larger and grander scale—the Taj Mahal is adorned with precious and semiprecious stones, inlaid in the shapes of flowers and vines. After taking pictures, we made the walk to the monument itself and studied the ornamental facade.
“Now that’s a lot of marble,” Micah offered succinctly.
We spent a little more than an hour at the Taj Mahal, which surprisingly sufficed. The Taj, after all, is a crypt; there is not much inside other than the small room where Mumtaz and eventually Shah Jahan were buried, and most attention is directed to the detail of the marble blocks used in the construction. And it is amazing; yet, because the Taj had been built with such mathematical precision, the artistry seemed curiously uninspiring. If you found a design on one side, the exact same design was mechanically replicated on the opposite side. While a marvel of construction, it was strangely repetitious.
Both Micah and I were fascinated by the fact that the son had imprisoned the father and never let him set foot in the Taj Mahal—the crypt of his own mother—during the last years of Shah Jahan’s life.
“You see,” Micah said, with a knowing nod. “That’s exactly what I was talking about. Dad was a lot better father than old Shah Jahan must have been. His kid hated him.”
I nodded in agreement. And yet, as I stared up at the massive monument to Mumtaz, I found myself thinking not about my father, but about my sister.
In January 1993, less than three weeks after I moved to North Carolina, I was back in California.
Right after the new year, my sister had gone to see a new physician; he had ordered a new MRI from a different hospital. MRI scanning machines, at that time, were undergoing rapid technological change, and the newer machines were able to provide images that their predecessors were not. Dana’s image, we were told, had been taken on a dated machine; a new image might provide the answers.
She lay on the bed, put earplugs in, and was rolled into the machine. The machine makes loud clanking noises—like someone banging a pan with a spoon—and within a few hours the scans were ready. And there, plain as day, was something that wasn’t supposed to be there. Dana, we learned, had a brain tumor.
She was scheduled for immediate surgery at UC San Francisco, and I flew out to join Micah and my dad. In the hotel the night before, Micah and I tried to keep the mood upbeat, but my dad was extremely tense throughout the evening. It was only when Micah and I were alone that we felt comfortable enough to talk about our own fears and worries.
Our sister, our younger sister, had a brain tumor. As if losing our mother hadn’t been hard enough, we now had to confront this.
The surgery was scheduled for early in the morning and we brought Dana to the hospital a little before seven. Because of tight schedules, however, the surgery didn’t begin until nearly noon, making the day one of the longest in our lives. It wasn’t until after 7:00 P.M. that the doctor came to talk to us.
He told us the surgery had gone well and that they’d removed as much of the tumor as they could. It hadn’t been possible to remove it all. Parts of the tumor had spread to areas deep within her brain and other parts were intertwined with areas of the brain that performed vital functions. To have removed every speck of the tumor, the doctor informed us, would have left Dana in a vegetative state.
It took a long time for the doctor to explain Dana’s condition to us in a way that we’d eventually understand. We wanted specifics—how much of the tumor is left, where is it located, what does it mean in the long run—but brain surgery, we would come to learn, is often more about judgment than rules.
“When she recovers,” the doctor said, “she’ll start her antiseizure medication and begin radiation. Hopefully, that will kill whatever was left of the tumor, the parts we couldn’t get to.”
“What if the radiation doesn’t work? What then? Do we do surgery again?”
The doctor shook his head. “Let’s just hope the radiation does work. Like I said, I couldn’t get to parts of the tumor without making her a lot worse.”
“What are her chances? Is she going to make it?”
“It depends on the type of tumor. We’re having it biopsied now. Some tumors are more susceptible to radiation than others. Some grow quickly, and some don’t. We won’t know for sure until the results come in. But if the tumor’s susceptible, the radiation should take care of it.”
“So there’s a chance she can still lead a normal life?”
The doctor shifted. “For the most part.”
We waited, wondering what he meant, and the doctor finally went on. “The antiseizure medication is contraindicated in pregnancy because of possible birth defects.”
The doctor paused. Micah and I glanced at each other, already knowing what was coming.
“More than likely,” the doctor added, “she’ll never have children.”
None of us said anything for a long time.
“When can we see her?” I finally asked.
“Tomorrow. She’s sleeping, and it’s probably best if she rests for a while.”
That night, Micah and I slept in the same hotel room. Or rather, tried to sleep. For the most part, all I could do was stare at the ceiling, thinking about a conversation Dana and I had had on our birthday long ago. “I want to be married, and I want to have kids . . .” my sister had said.
“That’s it?”
“That’s it. That’s all I want out of life.”
The memory nearly broke my heart.
My sister’s head was heavily wrapped in bandages when we saw her. Mostly she slept, and when she woke, she was groggy. Her gaze was unfocused, her movements lethargic.
“Did it . . . go . . . okay?” she stammered out. Her voice was a whisper.
“It went great, sweetheart,” Micah said.
“Oh . . . good . . .”
“I love you, sweetie,” I said.
“Love you . . . both.”
And then she slept again.
A week later, we had the results of the biopsy. My sister had essentially three types of cancerous cells in her brain: oligodendroglioma, astrocytoma, and gliobastoma multiforme; all are fast-growing tumors that spread in spiderlike fashion; they are only partially susceptible to radiation and chemotherapy. As we learned what we could about it, only one fact about the tumors stood out in our minds.
Though all could be deadly, one form of her tumor was essentially so. After five years the survival rate for those with gliobastoma multiforme was less than 2 percent.
My sister had just turned twenty-six.
I returned to North Carolina three days later, the morning my sister was to be released from the hospital. In addition to learning that she’d need radiation, my sister was put on the antiseizure medication. With her head bandaged, she began the slow process of healing. The guilt I felt about not being with her left me aching for weeks, and I threw myself into work.
Yet, life eked on, bringing with it additional sources of stress. My new boss immediately began exerting pressure on me to perform; Cat and I bought our first house. In the span of three months, we’d moved, changed jobs, bought a house, began the process of remodeling, and worried incessantly about my sister.
That wasn’t all. My sister’s diagnosis was almost too much for my father to bear, and my relocation to North Carolina only seemed to feed the anger and guilt he felt inside. Again, I was the outlet for his rage and sense of helplessness. When I told him about our new house, for example, he responded by tersely informing me that I better not expect any help with the down payment. When he called, he spoke only to my wife; usually I stood by waiting for my chance to visit only to hear Cathy say, “Well, Nick is here. Do you want to say hi?” There would be a long pause before Cat would go on. “Oh, well, okay, then. ’Bye, Dad. Love you.” Then, ever so quietly, she’d hang up the phone.
“He didn’t want to talk to me?” I’d ask.
“It’s not you,” she’d whisper, taking me in her arms. “He’s just scared.”
With Dana, my dad kept up a brave front. He brought her to her appointments, and in April, when the radiation started, she moved back into the house. The radiation made her sick and caused her to lose a good deal of hair on the side of her head, but she sounded upbeat whenever I’d call. My sister, always an optimist at heart, knew she’d be okay.
“I’ve been praying, Nick,” she told me once. “And I think it’s working. It’s like I can feel the tumors dying. I like to imagine them screaming in agony as they’re dying.”
“I’m sure they are. You’re young and strong.”
“Will you pray for me, too?”
“You don’t have ask, Dana. I’ve been praying for you every day.”
“Thanks,” she said.
“How’s dad holding up?”
“He’s been great. You can’t believe how helpful he is. He cooks me soup and even bought me a television with a remote so I don’t have to get up to change the channel.”
“Good. I’m glad.”
“So how are you doing? Anything exciting going on?”
I hesitated. There was something more, but part of me didn’t want to answer. How could I tell her? At the same time, I knew my sister would find out eventually; others in the family, including Micah, already knew.
“Well, we just found out that Cat is pregnant again,” I finally said. “The baby’s due in September.”
For a long time, my sister was silent.
“That’s wonderful,” she finally said. Her voice was subdued. “I’m happy for you two.”
“Did you tell her?” Micah asked me a few minutes later. I’d called him immediately after hanging up with Dana.
“Yeah, I told her.”
“How’d she take it?”
“About like I expected.”
“It’s terrible, isn’t it? I mean, she’d be a great mother. She’s just like mom was.”
I said nothing; there was nothing really to say.
“I’ve been thinking about you,” Micah finally added. “And the way things have been happening lately.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m talking about the highs and lows. First, you get married and you’re on an incredible high. Six weeks later, mom dies, and it’s impossible to get any lower. Cat gets pregnant for the first time, then has a miscarriage. You and Cat make the decision to move and you’re excited about starting a new life; a month later, Dana has a seizure and we find out she has a brain tumor. Then, you learn that Cathy’s pregnant again; at the same time, we find out that Dana can’t have kids and she isn’t likely to live more than five years. It’s like you’ve been living on a roller coaster that’s racing up and down, without hitting a level area. For you, it’s been the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.”