Guts: The Endless Follies and Tiny Triumphs of a Giant Disaster (12 page)

You gotta know Jackie. This information was like setting an atom bomb off in her brain.
“What?????”
she screamed.
“What are you talking about!!!!!”
The entire ward stopped and looked over, except the “funny” uncle, who was clearly in the middle of a punch line and kept right on going (good man, I would have done the same myself).

I glanced smugly at the German man.
See? I’m not creepy. I have a friend in New York who screams into the phone at the mere mention of my demise!
But he was ignoring me.

I did my best to explain to Jackie what the doctor had said, and when she finally calmed down, she told me about this friend of a friend of hers who had the
exact
same surgery, and he was
fine.

Much later, she would admit that the guy had burned a hole in his intestines from doing too much coke and he wasn’t fine at all. He was, in fact, dead.

“Whew,” I told her.

“What do they think caused it?”

Don’t even pause. Go with. . .
“Cigarettes, I guess.”

“Wow, really?”

“Well, that’s what the surgeon thinks. I mean, what
else
could it be?”

Jackie, so sweet and trusting, was completely unaware of my torrid romance with M. She fell for it hook, line, and sinker. The tiniest squirt of guilt and it was gone.

Much later, I’d find out that she, along with my closest friends Laura, Joe, Andy, and John, had all suspected that I had a serious problem for the last few years. They had all wanted to say something, and a few of them had kind of danced around it, but it seems I had surreptitiously forced all of them to sign some sort of ironclad, unbreakable contract, which could be summed up thusly:

“If you ever attempt to discuss the elephant in the room, Kristen’s head will explode and you will be held responsible for her death and spend the rest of your life in a Siberian work prison.”

Anyone who’s ever loved a drug addict or alcoholic knows how impossibly difficult it is to address our disease with us. It doesn’t help matters that while protecting our disease, most of us are incredibly crafty, manipulative, demanding, and just plain old scary. Or maybe that’s just me?

Let’s just say I wouldn’t have been terribly receptive to their concerns, and they knew it. In fact, I would’ve most likely had a full-scale meltdown that rivaled Chernobyl. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Back then, unbeknownst to me, I was spending my last few weeks in my beloved Schultz-ville, an adorable, quaint, old village where Jackie thinks I’m perfectly healthy except sometimes I drink too much, and where cigarettes make your stomach blow up.

“Jackie, please tell me I’m full of shit.”

“Umm, okay. You’re full of shit.”

“For once, you’d be right.”

This is why I love Jackie. Toss her a crappy joke like that and she’ll still give me one of her gut laughs, my favorite sound in the whole world.

Time lost here in Morphine cuddle.

Suddenly, my bed seemed to crash-land in some sort of anteroom outside the “operating theater.” Which sounds much more exciting than “operating room.” It made me feel as though an audience were going to ooh and aah at every deft move my swarthy surgeon made. I hoped he’d have a good show today.

This thought sent a shiver of terror down my spine, and as I waited and waited (for the audience to find their seats?), I suddenly knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the anesthesia wouldn’t work properly and I would be one of those rare people who feel everything during the entire surgery, yet can’t say anything. I remember truly believing this would happen, with every fiber of my being. Panic began to overwhelm me. I suddenly realized they must’ve told Mr. Morphine he had to stay in the waiting room.
Oh, no. . .

Just then, an older man in scrubs walked into the anteroom to grab a vial of something. As he turned to go back onstage, he saw me lying there. “Well, hello
you
!” he said, as if we had bumped into each other while having tea at the Dorchester.

“Are you a doctor?”

He must have picked up on my abject terror and walked over to me. “Why, yes. I’m Dr. Blankety-Blank. I’ve just finished a small operation, and now I’m helping them prepare yours. Why do you ask, darling?”

I love how in England a complete stranger can call you “darling” and somehow you’re charmed and flattered, even in the scariest moment of your life. I began to weep like a little girl as I told him I was certain I’d be awake during the operation.

He then did one of the kindest things anyone has ever done for me (up until then, that is). He gave the object he’d come in for to a passing ghostlike nurse, took his gloves off, and held my hand. His was large with salt-and-pepper hair on his knuckles. His grip was strong and reassuring. I began to calm down as I let his confidence pour into me. I’d no idea how desperately I needed it, the simple, caring touch of another human being.

Even though his name was immediately lost to me and I never saw him again, I’ll never forget what he did as long as I live. He stood there with me for a long, long time, soothing me. Then he removed the last of my fears by saying the magic words: “Don’t worry, love, you won’t remember a thing.”

Which immediately relaxed me; after all, that pretty much described my average evening. Some ghosts came in then to take me, and he had to let go of my hand. As I was pulled into the theater, I’m almost certain I heard him say,
“Break a leg, darling.”

I tried to thank him for his kindness, but at that moment a ghost put a mask on my face. I felt something wet and cold on my belly just as I saw my gorgeous surgeon, and suddenly I realized I needed to tell him something impor. . .

. . . and
I was someplace else now, in a hallway full of beeping machines and someone saying my name. I wanted to tell my surgeon something but I couldn’t see him.

Blink. I was immediately somewhere else, a curtain drawn around me, and I looked to my left and saw my English friend Joanna.
How the hell did she get here? I didn’t call her.
She appeared upset. I tried to say,
What’s wrong?
—but some object was in my throat.

Blink. Joanna was gone.

Blink. This time Malcolm, my stage manager from the play, was there.
Hey, Malcolm!
But he was busy arguing with a harried-looking Asian man in scrubs.
This should be fun. Nothing better than a good Malcolm scrap.

“At least three weeks,” the man said.

“Oh, dear God,” Malcolm said as he slumped into a chair. Well, that wasn’t entertaining one bit. I was tempted to blink again, but my mouth was drier than it had ever been before and I was suddenly overwhelmed with a desperate need for water.

I tried to talk, but that weird thing was still in my throat.

“Wat. . .,” I croaked, and that tiny syllable was all it took for Malcolm to turn into Shirley MacLaine from
Terms of Endearment.

“My God, man,
hurry
! Can’t you
see
she needs water?”

The Asian man said, “I’m sorry, sir, I’m not allowed.”

If I could’ve moved my diaphragm, I would’ve gasped in amazement.
Oh, no you di’int!
You don’t ever tell Malcolm no. Malcolm is a tall, elegant, imposing man with a wonderful laugh who would be as comfortable on a yacht as he would in the merchant marine. He’s the kind of gentleman who could run six blocks to catch a purse snatcher without losing the ash on his cigarette.

He drew himself up to his almost-seven-foot glory, and with an icy voice that could scare the crap out of the queen mum’s corgis, he said, “Young man, either you get her a cup of water,
imm-edjate-ley
, or I shall.”

“Well. . . I’m not supposed to, but. . .”
Do it! Do it, man, if you want to live!
“I suppose she could have a few ice chips.”

At the word
ice
I perked up. Ice turns into water, doesn’t it?

“Well?”
Malcolm said imperiously. The man scurried off, dignity destroyed but balls intact.

Malcolm winked at me and sat back down. “There there, dear,” he said as he awkwardly petted my foot. I’m not sure he’d ever actually touched anyone before. “The ice will be here before you know it.”

Thank you, you don’t have to touch me anymore—

Blink. Malcolm was gone. The very relieved Asian man was offering me a cup of ice chips.

“Hello there, miss. Have a nice nap? I’m Eddie. You’re in the ICU, and I’m keeping watch over you tonight.”

He held out a Styrofoam cup full of little scrapings of ice, and I almost didn’t recognize the trembling hand that slowly reached out to take it from him. My skin was greenish, as if I’d been in prison for a year, and my wrist was shockingly tiny, with pinpricks and IVs everywhere and a medical ID bracelet.

I relished the ice as it drizzled into my mouth, but seriously,
What was in my throat?
Pointing to my throat, I signaled
What?
to Eddie.

He explained (and I paraphrase here) that it was a tube that was draining my stomach hoo-ha out. It started at the surgical site in my tummy, continued from there, and traveled all the way up my throat and through my right nostril, which is where it exited my body. It was attached to a clear pouch that hung with a bunch of other pouches two feet away. The tube was unfortunately transparent, and you do not even want to know the hibbidy-gibbidy craziness I saw move through that tube over the next few days.

Now, I’m the kinda gal that if you say, “I think my sore is infected,” my first question would be “Does it smell?” My second would be “Is there a lot of pus?” And my third and final question would be “Please let me see it?” But this was actually way too gross, even for me. At that moment, all it was draining was brown stuff, which looked rather harmless.

Eddie was continuing his cheerful explanation of all the tubes and wires I was hooked up to, which got rather boring. Just as I was about to blink, he said the magic word:
morphine.
He saw that it caught my attention, so he went into detail, saying that the enormous catheter jammed into my neck artery (okay, that kills) was how they were getting essential antibiotics and morphine directly into me.
On second thought, it doesn’t hurt
that
much.. . .

Blink.

Eddie was holding a phone to my ear, saying, “Miss? Wake up, it’s your mum. She’s anxious to speak to you.”

“Ma?” I squawked.

“Oh, sweetie, are you okay?” My eyes welled up at the sound of her voice. I could picture her in her kitchen in Milwaukee, her beloved shar-pei puppies at her feet.

“Oh, I’m fine.” (I hoped I pulled that one off. Let me tell you, it’s harder than you’d think to sound fine with a tube draining sordid nonsense through your throat.)

“Really? Do you want me to come back?” She had just left London two days ago. I could tell she was crying. I despised making my mother cry. In fact, there might be no worse feeling on earth.

“No!”
She can’t come. No matter what, convince her she can’t come.

“Sweetie, are you sure?”

“Yes!” I croaked cruelly, and handed the phone back to Eddie. Otherwise I knew I’d burst into tears, which would not only be painful, but disastrous.

You see, for some reason, ever since I was a kid, it had always been of the utmost importance to me to convince her, and anyone else dumb enough to love me, that I didn’t
need
them. That I wasn’t
needy
. I was pathologically obsessed with appearing as
unneedy
as possible.

I can’t tell you how many of my past romantic relationships started off with the guy thinking,
This is the coolest, most independent chick ever!
and ended with him shouting, “Why are you sobbing? You said you were cool with us dating other people! You’re fucking crazy!”

What they never seemed to grasp was that I wasn’t
lying
as much as I was presenting the person
I wished I were.
I can’t tell you how many miserable mountain climbs I’ve been on (“I love mountain climbing!”), or how many endless monologues I’ve sat through about subjects that meant less than nothing to me (“I’m completely fascinated by chess!”). Thankfully, this unfortunate habit ended when one of my best friends, John Benjamin Hickey, watched in amazement as I earnestly uttered this doozy to some hot guy: “I can’t believe it! I’m totally obsessed with fly-fishing, too!”

We laughed our asses off later, but underneath, it made me feel uneasy. I wondered why I felt this need to lie about myself to attract a man. Or why I thought that the real me wasn’t nearly enough. So, many years ago, before I even got sober, I managed to stop lying to guys (except about my drug and alcohol consumption). I hate football, and I will never, ever care about it. Sorry.