The Prime Minister and Her

Results

Calm down, Cassie, calm down. He said it's not good, not that it's serious. Doesn't mean anything. Right?

"Cassandra Hansen," a nurse called. Cassie got up and followed her into the room she was in only a few hours ago. She sat on one of the available chairs and swiveled it in nervousness.

If it was the flu or a cold, he would have told her over the phone. She wasn't sure what to think of that. She wasn't sure what to think about any of this! She's always been healthy, never gets sick even when she's stressed. She has a very strong immune system.

Her phone started ringing, making her jump out of her thoughts. She saw it was Carlton and let out a huge sigh. He's going to be all pissy now because I've been ignoring him.

Unfortunately, she couldn't answer because Doctor Stevens walked in. He didn't look pleased by any means. He quietly shut the door and cleared his throat. "Please," Cassie said with a tired sigh, "just tell me. No need to sugar coat it."

Dr. Stevens looked uncomfortable, but nodded. He pulled up a chair in front of her and set his chart down on the counter nearest to him. He looked to the floor for a moment, then looked back up to her. "The tests came back," he told her. He cleared his throat once more and wrung his hands. He looked around the room, then back to her eyes.

"You have stomach cancer. I'm sorry." Cassie swallowed a lump in her throat and suddenly felt dizzy. This couldn't be happening. Shouldn't be happening. How is this happening? Why is happening? She wanted to ask but no words could seem to come out of her mouth.

She opened her mouth to speak, but out came nothing. The room was spinning, the lights suddenly seemed to bright, and the world unreal. Dr. Stevens quickly got up and got her a cup of water. He held it up to her, but she just blankly stared at it.

"Drink it," he told her, "it will help." With a shaky hand, she took the cup, but immediately set it down. Dr. Stevens shook his head and let it be. He took his chart of the counter and flipped through it. "I'm referring you to a gastroenterologist right away. They'll perform an upper endoscopy, but they'll do an endoscopic ultrasound first. This is all standard and it depends how early we caught it that we'll know how strong the treatment will be. Do you understand all of this?"

Cassie took a glance up at him and nodded. He told her, "Good. Now, I know this news comes as a shock, so if you need to talk you have my number, home and cell." She didn't say anything to him after that, except, "How?"

He flipped through his chart until it came to the last page. "I dug around your family history," he said. "And it looks like your father has it. It's genetic." This was the point that tears started running down her cheeks.

"Is?" She asked. "So he's alive?" He nodded and told her, "Yeah, apparently living in Oklahoma. According to this...he's not doing too well." Cassie scoffed and muttered, "Good." She sniffled and wiped her tears when her phone started ringing again.

It was Carlton.

She looked to Dr. Stevens and said, "I'm going to go home and...sleep on this." He quickly told her, "Of course! It's best if you do that and you might want to take a few days off work, spend time with family and friends. It's helpful to be in a stress free environment."

Of course, she's never in a stress free environment. And she never takes days off work. And she doesn't really have a family. There's Johnny and Carlton, but that's it. One she hardly talks to and the other is half a world away, running a country of his own.

Nevertheless, she nodded and said, "Will do." After that, she made a follow up appointment and left in a very shocked and very disbelieving state, while looking at her phone and waiting for Carlton to call again. Not surprisingly enough, his name popped up on the screen just a few seconds later. This time she answered.