The Hole Within

CHAPTER 53

Dr. Tuber followed me a little closer than Dr. Gerace did. I was losing weight as well as being fatigued and not feeling good. He did another scan in a month and the cavity had again increased in size. He ordered another bronchoscopy. I cried at the thought of going through that again and told him of my experience with Dr. Gerace. He assured me that it would not be like that, and I believed him. True to his word, Dr. Tuber performed a bronchoscopy and achieved my sedation. Once again, the results came back negative. I was despondent. I was not truly living. My illness was a living death.

Mel resented me for being sick. She resented that I had no energy to do things. Not wanting to displease her, I took whatever pills necessary so that I could make it through a trip to Pier One or Cost Plus to find a certain glass ball for the basket in the living room. I was to look for it too, but I had no idea what I was looking for. Trying to be helpful, I chose several glass balls of differing colors and sizes and brought them to her. "Well that is fucking ugly!" she would sneer or "That one won't fit, the other one is just totally wrong for what we are doing. Do you not have any fucking design sense?" I stood there in the middle of the store, stupefied, trying to understand what she wanted and found I had no idea what she was talking about. They were just glass balls to me. Since I could not see in Mel's head to see what she was looking for I was at a disadvantage. I asked her to tell me what she was looking for; what size, color, clarity, etc. This would only frustrate her, "If I have to tell you all of that then I might as well look for them myself!"

I hated those trips to find the elusive things that only Mel saw in her head. I could only guess at it. I learned early on to keep my opinion to myself. I had tried to make contributions to decorating our place by walking around the store and picking out with I thought might look good, things I liked. I would find Mel and show them to her, "What do you think of this in the living room?" Mel would laugh cruelly and then she would get that look. It was a look of disgust almost. Like the look you get when you stepped in a steaming pile of shit. "I'm not putting that in my house!" (Note: it was always Mel's house.) "That's really fucking ugly!" or "Are you fucking kidding me? Lys, you have no taste at all. You pick out the ugliest shit possible. You actually like that?" She asked me with incredulity. I knew better than to say that I did like it, so I would just not answer. Obviously, I had no design sense. I had no taste. Things I liked were fucking ugly.

Another layer of my self-confidence fell away. Then I stopped participating in looking for that elusive thing; that glass ball, that whicker ball, that plate, that basket, etc. But Mel would have none of that either "Don't you even want to participate in making the place nice? Am I the only one that cares? Then we can live in a dump if that's the way you're going to be. The place can look like shit and it will be your fault!" I was caught between a rock and a hard place, damned if I did and damned if I did not.

I decided to go look again. Having her tear me down in the store was better than the hell I would catch at home for not caring if the place looked like a dump. I never understood why, if she thought my taste with so god-awful, she would want me to go look with her. But Mel was very concerned with image. She would pick a theme for a room and once it stuck in her mind she would become single-minded. Everything had to be changed now. Suddenly she would hate everything we had used to decorate before and she would strip the rooms bear with ferocity. This seemed to happen about every six months, sometimes less sometimes more. Tuscan theme, modern black and white theme, French theme, etc. All the baubles we had just spent hard earned money on came down. Pictures came down, curtains came down, our bedspread came off. Then the hunt would begin again. Back to Pier One, back to Cost Plus, back to the little antique shops. I had mentioned that glass ball earlier. That damn glass ball. We spent about a month every weekend searching for it. Going from store to store looking. Me taking more and more pills just to keep going.

That was one of the difficult things for me to deal with at the time. Once Mel had something in her head nothing else mattered. I dreaded those weekends. I knew Mel would not stop until she found it. Then one day, by God, we did. And when we did I was not impressed. It was very much like the other glass balls Mel had outright rejected. "See this is what I was talking about. Do you see the difference?" And I nodded, though I did not see it all. Then we would move on to the next perfect piece, a curtain or rug, a towel set that matched the theme, bathroom accessories that would tie it all in, ad infimum. I think it was the hunt Mel enjoyed. Mel was a very creative person and she fancied herself a layman interior decorator. When at last we would get home I would head directly to bed. I was instantly asleep.

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