All Things in Their Place

By GIULIA DELL'UOMO

Sara has just turned 20 when she discovers she has cancer.  The illness, although turning her life upside down, becomes the moment when she decides to live life to the full- she wants to keep making plans, fight and love. She wants to live so much that her relationship with her doctor, Roberto, grows outside the hospital walls and encroaches on real life, where love and fear intertwine in a web of instense emotion. Her time is marked by stints in hospital, endless exams, tears, laughter, the knowledge that her illness won't go away and the rebirth of a girl forced to become a woman too early. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: BadPress
• Release date: May 18, 2016
• ISBN: 9781507120552

Book preview

To my parents, for having given me yesterday’s strength and tomorrow’s hope.

To Sandro, may the notes from your guitar fly freely through the air.

All things in their place.

‘Sara, you have to redo the test.  Hold out your arm.’

I’m still asleep when the nurse’s voice echoes in my head. It’s not a dream and before I know it, I feel a needle prick and see the tube turn red.  I had automatically extended my arm.

‘We’re done. Press down while I put a bandaid on it.’

Ok, now I remember who and where I am. I yawn and stretch, reaching towards the ceiling with some force as the nurse leaves.  From the window a glimmer of light enters.  It gets bigger in the shadows of the room, crossing the darkness of the four walls that keep me from the outside world.

I pull the covers back up and look at the time.  It’s almost six in the morning, luckily I can sleep a bit longer.  I close my eyes and my phone on the side table brings me back to reality. A message.  Dad.

Hello my princess, don’t worry. Jesus will watch over you on this journey.

You always told me to be patient, Dad, but sometimes life tests us.  That’s how I know that you are up at this hour. Worry has kept sleep away and doesn’t allow your eyes to close or your mind to switch off.  No, your mind is always working, almost too aware, almost knowing too much.  If you speak of Jesus, Dad (and you never do) then deep down you must believe a little. You believe that a God exists who watches over us and helps us.  Or maybe you believe that a god can be close to us in these moments.  If you mention it then one thing is for certain: you looked inside yourself and needed something bigger to hold on to. Something strong that, even with the mystery, has always existed and always will exist. Something science can’t give you.  I appreciate it Dad.  I appreciate it because you’re showing me your fear whilst trying to beat mine.  You calling me princess is already helping beat it.  And I’m happy when you tell me Jesus will watch over me.  I want to believe it.  Sooner or later though everything passes.  I guarantee it, I promise you.  I will give you back your smile after the sadness. The storm has arrived, but when it passes we’ll have a lighter step, we will go forward stronger, more knowledgeable. We won’t fall again.  I promise you dad.

My roommate is sleeping deeply. She is snoring loudly, making a great noise almost like a tractor. It’s some kind of miracle I’m able to sleep with her in the room next to me.  She had an operation a couple of days ago and they’ll discharge her soon.  She is sleeping soundly now, and that’s why I don’t say anything when she transforms into farm machinery at night.  She deserves it in the end.  Her fear was not being able to see her grandchildren again.  When I met her a couple of days ago she said to me ‘You know, I’m a grandmother to two beautiful children.  They are the light of my life and when I found out what I had, my first thought was them. Then depression, the terror.  Then I began to pray’. Fabiola, that’s her name, never calls her illness by its name.  As if that stops it being real. As though by not naming it she denies it the right to come up unexpectedly and crowd her head.  A kind of defence mechanism. A survival choice. ‘My grandchildren are like my children twice over.  I love them too much to leave them alone.’  She smiled a sad smile because problems exist, even when you don’t name them.

There’s a moment in everyone’s life when you ask yourself why?.  Everyone sooner or later questions their existence out loud, trying to understand the reason why we were chosen for a certain path.  A quote from one of my favourite films says ‘Nobody is given anything they can’t deal with’.  Sure it might be true.  But I believe it’s something a bit less concrete than that, something more intimately tied to fate.  I believe that every life is already written in a book we can read only once our fates have become real, and that we are only pawns who move each day on this earth looking to the sky for answers.  But maybe, sometimes, the answer to all those questions ‘why’ is more simple than we think.

Simply ‘it had to be like this’. Maybe to some this could seem an answer too simplistic or superficial, but what purpose does it serve to give meaning to the unfathomable? Here inside the hospital walls, almost everyone has asked themselves this question.  Many have definitely stopped questioning themselves. They’re already past the punching the wall phase, screaming and crying desperately.  They have already suffered quite a few sleepless nights, of internet research, of pats on the back by well-meaning friends. And now they are fighting with clenched teeth, because the reason you are at war is not important.  It is only important to that you are at war, to roll up your sleeves and throw yourself into the most courageous void of your life.  Without knowing if you will drown or if and when you will float. It’s a risk that should be run though.  Because no one gives you back that time spent crying when you realise you are the chosen one.  Every second counts, every moment is precious in order to be able to anticipate your next move and try to win.  There are other tactics than running fast and having the courage to run as far as possible without pausing for breath. Never giving up.

It happened a few days ago. One February afternoon in my 21st year.  I was coming back from university. Mum peeked her head out the door ‘I’ve got something I have to tell you’.

My mum is a strong woman.  Maybe the strongest woman I know, to the point where she often gives me the impression of being indestructible.  She faces problems head-on with a clear, rational mind, and she always manages to find a solution for every issue.  She manages to analyse the obstacle and get past it.  My girlfriends say I resemble her, that I have an adult brain and that I’m the strongest of them all.  I don’t know if that’s true, even though I hope it is with all of my being.

That time though, her voice broke with emotion. Her eyes told me what she couldn’t. She grasped my hand closing hers around mine.  She held on tightly, intertwining her fingers with mine.  Then she hugged me and with all the calmness she could muster she said ‘Everything will be alright darling’.  She knew that I had already realised what she was talking about.  It has always been like that between us, we are able to read each other.

Some days earlier a scan on my neck in the subtle light of the hospital clinic.  A