Petra is still alive.
She’s now living in a palliative care center in Paris, and I’m in Cannes on holiday with my kids. I had planned the trip months ago…before she got her “only weeks to live” diagnosis. (You can read the previous post here.) I thought about cancelling my trip, but she told me she would be very cross with me if I did. And knowing how strong and stubborn she can be, I believed her and only made some minor adjustments to my trip. She doesn’t know that I was planning on going away for an extra week to write, immediately following Cannes. I had even rented my apartment out, so will need to stay with friends for a few days. But at least I’ll be in Paris and can visit her in person.
Following my last post, which was almost exactly a month ago, Petra declined rapidly. Since the cancer is in her bones, and seems worst in her pelvic region, it is hard for her to walk. And it hurts for her to lie down for more than a couple of hours. So she was basically living in her Ikea chair. One of these things…
…which she had placed in her living room (she has a separate living room and bedroom from Maurice), angled to look out the window. On one side was a low table with a mountain of medicine, mugs of various teas, a box with scraps of paper with doctors’ telephone numbers, her phone and computer for watching movies and lots of TikToks of cute animals. (She’s basically been using that alongside her morphine to feel better for the last few months.)
After hearing her prognosis, she went into mental overdrive, wanting to clear her belongings out of Maurice’s apartment. But she quickly discovered she was physically unable. So two days after the hospital visit, Sirius and I went over to her place and I helped her go through her kitchen cupboards. We cleared out three big shopping bags of food she knew Maurice wouldn’t use. She said she wouldn’t be cooking again.
She seems to take satisfaction from saying things like this, and then giving me a meaningful look. “I won’t be cooking again.” “Let’s get rid of my winter clothes. I won’t be needing them.” (Just a couple of days ago, from the hospice, she said, “I asked Maurice to bring me a bag of chickpea chips. Instead of one bag, he brought three! That’s enough to last the rest of my life.” Followed by a chuckle at her own joke.)
After the work in the kitchen, we walked across the street to the park, taking Burrow and Sirius with us. Slowly, painfully, I got us to a bench where she sat in the sunshine, and I walked the dogs. When we got back to her house, she insisted on feeding me an omelet. I wasn’t feeling hungry, but accepted. She pottered around the kitchen in a way that looked painful, and I had to force myself to sit there and let her cook for me. She made me a thin omelet with hot pepper, leeks and tomatoes, rolled up and dipped in ketchup (which sounds gross, but was really tasty). Then a chopped-up mango. She said she was happy to have been able to feed me. We both knew it was the last time. I left and wanted to throw up, but instead snuggled Sirius on the couch for an hour before my kids got home.
A few days later, I helped her walk to a podiatrist that I had gone to the week before, right around the corner from my house. I had told her about my experience, with the podiatrist scraping all of the dead skin off my feet, trimming nails, etc. resulting in baby soft skin. (The podologues in France give something between a pedicure and a medical procedure - they have 3 years training and hard-core tools, so it’s much more serious than at a beauty salon.) She said, “I need that!” and made herself an appointment. I dropped by ahead of time to ask if they could do a house call for her, and they said no. So on the day of the appointment, I walked her to their office. Afterward, we stopped for a rest in my apartment and had carrot cake and tea, then I walked her home. We both knew that would be her last time in my apartment. Another door shut behind us. Another step of completion.
After that, I went over every three days and helped her sort out her other possessions. Next it was clothes. She is smaller than I am, so I was only able to take a couple of big shirts she used as nightshirts and brought the rest to the clothes recycling bins. On my following visit, she was unable to stand, and sat in her Ikea chair directing me.
A few days later, Maurice and I walked her to the pharmacy so she could be measured for special compression tights. Her feet had swollen up so much she could only slip on tennis shoes without the laces and her doctor had said the tights could help. It took us a half hour to get to the pharmacy and a half hour to get back. (It normally takes 5 minutes, tops, since it’s on the next block.) We realized that was another last. She wouldn’t be going outside again.
By now, we had had the “vacation” conversation, and she had convinced me not to change my plans. The last two times I visited, she had to open the door for me by sliding along on her butt on the floor because her knees weren’t working. Although I did my best to act unsurprised, I couldn’t bear to see her like that and kept a set of keys so I could let myself in.
She had to ask Maurice to lift her up twice a day to use the bathroom. She taught me the nurses’ technique for lifting her without hurting my back. It involved wrapping my arms around her while her arms went around my neck. We pressed chests together with my legs bent and then I straightened them to lift us both to a standing position. It felt so intimate that each time we did it, once she was up, I had to turn away.
It was clear that it was time for her to go to the palliative care center. So the day before I left for Cannes, there was a feeling of urgency as I did the last of her chores. I made several trips to the dumpsters in the courtyard, throwing away several garbage bags full of shoes, hats and documents. I kept a couple of decorative boxes and threw away everything else. I had my daughter come help me with more bags of clothes, which she took to the recycling bins.
Finally, we were done with the clearing out. All that was left could fit into the bag she would pack for hospice. There was one last thing to do. The pharmacy needed further measurements for the compression tights. Petra sat in her Ikea chair, and I sat on the ground at her feet. Using the pharmacy’s instructional sheet, I got out the tape measure I had brought and began measuring.
There were eight measurements per leg, starting across the toes and moving up, almost to the crotch. I carefully pulled her sock off, took her swollen foot in my hands and began measuring, noting each number on the sheet as I moved up, having to lift her leg to wrap the tape around her upper thigh. It was an intimate gesture. A place I’ve never touched on anyone but a lover. But she needed me, and I felt a sense of honor in being asked to help her. In her trust in me, after just a year and a half of friendship. The Bible story of Jesus washing the disciples’ feet came to mind, and I remembered the message of humility the story conveyed. I felt no humility, but was struck by the intimacy it required to touch someone’s feet and legs.
Once I finished, I put her socks back on and sat on the couch across from her and tried to be cheerful. We did a test run doing a video call using WhatsApp. But when it came to saying goodbye, I felt my eyes stinging. “Oh no, I think I’m going to cry,” I said, wiping a tear away.
“Ah, I wondered if that would happen,” she said. She brushed a tear away herself. “This is not goodbye. It’s just the last time you’ll see me here. Once I’m at the hospice, it will take a while for me to go.”
I gave her a hug, then stuck my head into Maurice’s office to tell him I would be gone for 2 weeks, but that Petra had my phone number and I had his…in case. At that point, I burst out crying, and he looked a bit horrified, and I croaked, “Bye,” and left quickly. I made it home, sunk to the couch, and bawled for a good hour.
The next day I left for Lyon, met my friend El Lam who was signing books at a science fiction conference, jumped in a car with her and began driving south.
Continuing a habit I began a couple of months ago, I write Petra every morning for an update and again at night. I’ve been adding photos of what we’re doing, updating her on my kids’ arrival, and “brought her along” on day trips Monaco, Italy, and our other adventures.
Four days after I left Paris, she was able to get a bed in a palliative care center in Paris’s 15th arrondissement. “I know it’s all the way across town to visit,” she said, “but I was desperate.”
Friends, I can’t tell you what a relief it has been to me since she got there. She has her own room with a window looking out on a garden. Someone helps her get to the bathroom. She wrote me saying, “I took a shower! Hurray!” There were flowers in her room. Volunteers stop by to chat or to take her into the garden. And she’s eating regularly and well…when she’s hungry. More importantly, she’s on a morphine drip instead of pills and patch, so she said the pain is much better. But she still can’t sleep lying down, so Maurice brought her Ikea chair last weekend.
I return to Paris tomorrow afternoon, and will be going to see her. She keeps saying, “I don’t need to see you. Just knowing that you’re there is enough for me.” A few weeks ago she explained, “I can’t imagine how this would have gone if you hadn’t been here. I had no one…Maurice and I weren’t talking, and I cut all of my family and friends off years ago. I thought I was fine like that, but dying alone would have been unbearable.”
She is being taken care of. No longer struggling to wash herself and moving around her apartment on the floor. That felt like a huge responsibility and I worried a lot. Now I’m at peace about her physical wellbeing. There’s nothing I can do that someone else isn’t doing better. Now, as she said, I can just be there for her, whether in person or by phone and text.
Petra phoned as I was writing this post. Maybe she sensed I was thinking about her. She said she is feeling weaker. But as usual she sounded strong and positive and even cheerful that I braved the jellyfish-infested freezing cold Mediterranean for a swim yesterday. “You’re getting the most out of that vacation. Writing, art, swimming…you never stop moving.”
“I wish you could have come along,” I said.
“Ah, friend,” she replied, “but I have been along. You’ve brought me along with you the whole way with your pictures and calls and texts.”
And so, in her Petra way, she is making me feel better when it should be vice versa. And I am sitting here on the couch in Cannes crying from all of the beauty and sadness and grace.
Love never goes away. It remains. Amor manet.
Very moving. Conor x