It Hasn't Been Long Enough

Pete sat in the waiting room of the hospital in San Francisco. Patrick had been sick the last few days and hadn’t been able to perform because his voice had kept giving out. After hearing his band mates yell at him for two days straight about seeing a doctor, Patrick had finally given in and went to the closest hospital to get checked out.

Pete couldn’t figure out what was taking so long. He figured Patrick just had a cold or the flu, or even at worst laryngitis. But, couldn’t a doctor diagnose that quickly, prescribe him some medicine, and send him on his way? Instead, Pete had been sitting there for well over two hours, and no one had said what was going on.

Pete’s girlfriend, Gloria, sat next to him, impatiently tapping her fingernails on the table that sat to her right while she read a two-month old magazine. “Can’t we go yet?” Gloria whined.

“No,” Pete told her, while his other band members, Joe and Andy, both rolled their eyes at her question. “We’re going to figure out what’s wrong with Patrick.”

“But, can’t he just call us when he gets out? I mean, I’m sure it’s nothing.”

“Gloria, we’re staying!” Pete said adamantly.

An hour later, the four of them were still sitting in the waiting room waiting to hear something from either Patrick or his doctors. “Pete, this is boring. Can we please go?” Gloria asked while batting her eyelashes.

“Why don’t you go down to the cafeteria? You can go get a coffee and something to eat,” Pete suggested while handing her a ten dollar bill.

“Fine!” Gloria said, grabbing the bill out of his hand and heading down the hallway to find the cafeteria.

Ten minutes later, a nurse came out saying, “Are you guys here for Patrick Stump?”

“Yes,” Joe answered for them, as all three of them stood up.

“Well, you can go see Patrick right now. I think the doctors are going to go talk to him in a few minutes.”

“Is everything alright?” Andy asked the nurse.

“The doctor will tell you everything,” the nurse replied, ignoring the question.

The three boys walked to their friend’s room, wondering what exactly was going on. When they walked in, they were shocked to see how Patrick looked. Lying in the bed was a sullen-looking man who was almost unrecognizable.

“Hey, Patrick,” Andy said, walking into the room first.

“How are you feeling?” Joe asked.

“Not my best,” Patrick admitted.

“So, have you gotten any word back as to what’s wrong?” Pete asked his best friend.

“Nope. The doctor said he’d be back soon to talk to me.” As soon as Patrick spoke the words, an older man came walking into the room.

“Hello,” he smiled. “I’m Dr. Kranston, Patrick’s doctor. I assume you all are his band mates?”

“Yes,” Pete said.

“Okay, well Patrick I have your test results back. Would you like to discuss them with everyone else or in private?”

“Say it with everyone in the room. I’m going to tell them anyways.”

“Okay,” Dr. Kranston said slowly. “Well, I have some bad news for you. You have adenocarcinoma, a type of lung cancer.”

“What?” Patrick asked. “Are you sure you’re not mistaken? I mean I don't even smoke.” The other members of the band stood still, not knowing what to say.

“All the tests we’ve done point to adenocarcinoma. This is one of the most common types of lung cancer that occur in people who do not smoke. Of course, we are going to do some more tests, but it is safe to say that you do have it. The good news is it doesn’t seem to have spread to other parts of your body yet,” Dr. Kranston told him.

“Yet?” Andy asked.

“Well, any type of cancer can spread to other parts of the body. We took a CT and PET scan and it doesn’t seem to have spread yet. We seem to have caught it early, which is a good thing. This means that we can treat it quickly, and there is a higher chance of a full recovery.”

“What would we do to treat it?” Patrick asked from his spot on the bed.

“Well, for most patients, we take out a part of their lungs. This usually seems to treat it, but if it doesn’t then you might have to do some chemotherapy.”

“This is all just happening way too fast,” Pete said. “He just found out today, and you’re already talking about taking out his lung and doing chemotherapy?”

“Well, the faster we start treatment, the faster Patrick gets back to being healthy,” Dr. Kranston said.

“Do I have to stay here?” Patrick asked.

“I guess not, but I would encourage you to start treatment as soon as possible. Is there a certain place you were thinking of going?”

“I’d like to go back to Chicago,” Patrick answered.

“The University of Chicago has a wonderful oncology department. I would suggest there.”

“Okay. What should I do?” Patrick asked. “Call them?”

“I can call them for you and ask for you to be admitted. I’m sure it would be no problem,” Dr. Kranston said.

“Thank you,” Patrick said.

“Okay, well I’m going to order a couple of more tests just to be positive, but I’ll call the University of Chicago in just a little bit. I would suggest getting there in the next couple of days to start treatment,” Dr. Kranston said walking out of the room.

Pete couldn’t believe how the day had turned out. They had all went into the hospital hoping Patrick would be able to do a show in a couple of days, and now they were all going back to Chicago for Patrick to get treated for lung cancer. Could his life get any worse?