Finally, Rose was awakened; it was by a kind of metal hissing. She was dreaming that she was in the kitchen and the percolator was gurgling. She was standing before the stove listening. She was wearing a tight dress. It was so tight, it was difficult to breath, so she kept her breaths shallow. But, then the cool air of the hospital room nudged her senses. Then, she noticed the pain: the searing, the tearing and the burning. She reached with her right hand to fiddle with her wedding ring, but she couldn't move her right hand.

Rose opened her eyes. She took in the room. The metal bed with a chart hanging on the footboard. The light from the window. It looked like mid afternoon. She was high up in the hospital room so she couldn't see the foliage and plants below. In the distance, she could see hills and trees. The sky was gray and it smudged the horizon. She couldn't tell what season it was. She couldn't remember why she was there. She thought it may be summer. But, then she saw that there was a light hanging overhead and she realized the room was artificially bright. Her mouth was dry. She swallowed and it felt like sand was sitting in the back of her throat. The saliva wouldn't go down. She took a shallow breath and when she did, the searing pain burned her chest and right arm again. She looked down at herself, she was under a sheet. She pulled down the sheet with her left hand. She saw that she was wrapped like a mummy from her waist to her shoulder. Part of her right arm was wrapped too. She remembered what Dr. Higgins had said. "If we find that its cancer, we'll have to eradicate it." She felt scared, confused. She felt like she had those times when she'd gotten lost as a child. The horrible feeling that she would never be able to find her way back. 

Something was gone. She felt as if there was a bridge she had traversed. She started across when she first saw the needle and everything went black before the surgery. She was on the other side in that  moment, wrapped like a mummy. She has no knowledge of it. It made her want to scream because it was her body. Just like when she gave birth to Henry. The intense pain in waves, then the mask on her face, straps on her arms. At the same time a needle. Then nothing. Not a thing in her brain while her body was being handled. And when she had awakened, there was Henry. A little tiny screaming baby. But his screams were so new that they were more like scratches on a wall. When she had picked him up he had been shaky, fragile, his little nose was bent to one side. A baby. This baby, she had thought, came forth through a empty nothingness that she had no recollection of. Now, she knew the same kind of change had happened. Everything was now different, but she didn't know why. Everything was buried in those times in between.That's where the answers remained.

***

Dr. Higgins was much younger than she remembered. In fact, it bothered Rose so much that she could hardly concentrate on what he was saying. He had the same thick glasses and black eye brows. But, his face, his skin, was young. She instinctively looked on at his hand, his ring finger. Was he too young to be married. No? There was a wedding ring. But, now as he was standing above her hospital bed, pushing his glasses back and sometimes looking in the direction of the hallway as he spoke, she felt there had been a misunderstanding. But, then she came to. She remembered that she wanted to know what they had done to her. She wanted to know what was going to happen next.

"So, you're feeling sore. Is it a lot of pain. Do you need more medication?"

"What happened?" Rose asked.

Dr. Higgins sat down on the chair next to the bed. Rose was seated straight up in the bed, her right side hurt enormously.

"We did a biopsy and determined that it was cancer. There were two lumps in your right breast and one under your arm. It had spread significantly. In these cases, Rosie, we have to remove all the tissue that is cancerous."

"Please call me Rose," she said, "People called me Rosie when I was a girl."

"Oh, I'm sorry" Dr. Higgins said, "That is the name that Dr. Wells had given me."

"Oh."

"So we had to remove significant tissue. Its called a radical masetcomy. We know that cancer spreads—cancer is greek for the word crab—it spreads like a crab with cells multiplying within cells or tissue they come in contact with."

"Oh," Rose said. She was trying to imagine those two lumps. Trying to understand what they were doing inside of her body. Two little crabs inside of her breast.

"In the case of breast cancer, we have to remove the breast—"

Rose felt herself grow numb and start to cry. Of course she knew that must have been what had happened. In fact, she knew that it was. She could see that the bandage was flatter, although there was a lot of swelling. She knew it was gone, but hearing him say it. Knowing that he had done it. Taken a knife or some kind of instrument and cut the flesh of her breast and removed it like bread dough, pulling it apart. Taking it away. She imagined it. It was a part of her. It was gone. She wanted to know where it was.

"It is easy to be emotional about this. But, you have to remember that, this is a life saving surgery."

But, Rose couldn't help but cry.

"Should I come back later?" he asked.

"No." she said. She sniffed and wiped her eyes.

"Why is my arm so swollen? I can't move it."

"That will take some time. Its part of the surgery. As I have said we have to remove any tissue that may have come in contact with the cancer cells. We can't always see how much or where it has grown." He raised his eyebrows and stared at her for a moment. "You are much younger than most women with breast cancer. But, your life is not over. You will recover and heal."

Rose nodded and looked at him intently. All her eyes could see was him in a white coat, his bare hands on her body. She felt the urge to wrap her hands around herself. To cover herself with more blankets.

"Let me see your arm, Rose." He stood and pulled the blanket down on her right arm. It was bright red and swollen to twice its size. "I don't think its an infection." He said inspecting his arm. He said it almost to himself. Rose watched his eyes and tried to understand what he was seeing when he looked at her arm. It was not a person; he wasn't seeing her as a person. He looked at her. "We had to remove the muscle in the chest, and the lymph nodes. The lymph nodes usually carry fluid. This fluid is building up in your arm. It will be absorbed by your body."

"When can I go home?" she asked.

"In about a week. We have to wait for the swelling to come down and to change your dressings."

"What will I look like?"

He leaned close and looked at her. "I want you to remember that you are alive. This is a very serious illness."

Rose thought about her mother. She knew what would have happened. "I know," she said, "but will I be horribly ugly?"

The doctor removed a tape measure from his pocket and gently wrapped it around her right arm. "We'll have to watch the swelling on your arm. The nurse will do that when she changes your dressings. Are you in a lot of pain?"

Rose started to cry again. She nodded her head. "Yes," she said. She knew the medicine would return her to her dreamy sleep and take her away from that horrible place.