Birthdays

My last memories of Uncle Jacob are mostly of me trying to glare at him but failing miserably because of my allergies and his attempts to die as a human chimney. It was his sixtieth birthday, and we celebrated at a Chinese restaurant bright with red walls and false cheer. The chatter was deafening. Irish American families are rarely quiet - and mine was no exception - but the constant jabbering was blaring and just teetering on the edge of hysteria.

The topics of conversation ranged from work and children to travel and vacations to random anecdotes, somewhat embellished for entertainment value. No one spoke the words “cancer”, “metastasized”, or “hospice”. Raucous laughter and stealthy, worried glances filled the room. Jacob smiled graciously at everyone but rarely spoke. His frame, never large to begin with, was skeletal and his usually ruddy complexion had an odd, gray cast that did not bode well.

I tried to join in the artificial joviality but failed. "Uncle Jacob," I said, kissing both his weathered cheeks and smiling as wide as I could, "Happy birthday! How are you doing?"

"Well, I'm dying, but I can finally fit into my jeans from high school." He deadpanned. It pretty much went downhill from there.

"Cara, tell your uncle about the bees." My mother nudged my elbow, grinning so wide her foundation began to crack.

"Bees?" One of my other uncles, Sean, chimed in, his tone similar to a fifth-grader performing a class skit.

"Yea, so," I rocked my weight back and forth and stared at my feet, "I've been staying in a rental apartment for a bit because my house is infested with bees."

Everyone stared at me. I knew immediately that my uncles would have added gory details of being stung or hearing the humming of wings. My mother would have insisted the bees were in every corner of the house. But no one told me I'd have to present at this thing, damn it.

"They're in the wall," I began, trying to salvage the situation. "I rarely see them, but I was trying to fix a leak in the bathroom and came across the…" I gulped for breath, my mind returning to the shock of the discovery, the fall from the ladder, the hospital trip, the serious faces of the doctors, the subsequent tests, the endless appointments, and the news I still had yet to tell my mother. "…the hive." I finished. "They estimate there are about twenty thousand bees." I added lamely.

My mother sighed and patted my arm. "Yes, well. Cara, dear, would you go get my lipstick from the car? I think it fell out of my purse." I nodded and bolted out of the restaurant, grateful for the reprieve. I dutifully checked the car, though both my mother and I knew her lipstick never fell out of her purse.

I turned back to the restaurant and sat on a bench beside the front door. I doubted I would be missed. I sat, ruminating on bees and cancer, when a waft of smoke stung my eyes. Jacob stood before me, lit cigarette in hand. He gestured to the bench, "Can I sit here?" I nodded and scooted a bit. Jacob sat heavily and exhaled a long plume of smoke.

I tried to stop the words, but they flew from my mouth with no regard for my intentions, "Should you be smoking?"

Jacob took a long drag. "Nah," he said with a shrug, "but this won't kill me."

"Sorry." I murmured. Jacob shrugged again.

We sat in silence for a while, each absorbed in our own thoughts. "I should…" I began rising, but Jacob interrupted me.

"How long they give you?" he asked, eyeing me as if he could see the cancer beneath my skin.

"What do you mean," I hedged.

"Sit down." Jacob said. I did so automatically.

We stared at each other for a long minute. "Your ma know?" he asked.

I shook my head. "How did you…" I started.

Jacob gave me a joyless smile. "I been surrounded by dying people for months. I know the look. You just find out?"

I nodded again. "When I found the bees, I freaked out and fell off my ladder." I told him.

"Twenty thousand bees? Yea, I'd freak out too."

"I hurt my back," I continued, "and they saw something abnormal on the x-ray and then there were more tests and I…" I took a breath and said in a rush, "I have breast cancer and it's spread to my spine and they … they think maybe a year or two." I stared at Jacob, this dying man, the first person I'd told.

"Well, shit." He breathed out.

We sat in silence for another long moment. "You, you should probably go back," I told him, "this is your party."

"Yea," Jacob said, lighting another cigarette, "but the living are just exhausting."

I had no response for that, and we fell back into silence.

"You write," he blurted without preamble. It was not a question, but I nodded anyway.

"Try to," I replied. "But I never finish. I can never figure out how the stories end."

"Yea?" There was a pregnant pause as Jacob took a long drag, the tip sizzling. He held the smoke then let it out in a long stream. "I know how all my stories end. Just can't write them for shit. I got notebooks of ideas and outlines, but anytime I try to write a piece, it all goes to hell."

I gave a humorless laugh. "Well aren't we a pair." I shook my head, then gave Jacob a speculative glance. "Would you, maybe," I paused, nervous. I didn't like anyone looking at my work and I didn't want to offend. "Maybe let me look at your ideas and see if I can write anything?"

"That's why I brought it up," Jacob said, clapping my shoulder with a bony hand. "I need a ghostwriter. But you got to share space as author." He eyed me seriously. "I can't get my piece of immortality if I'm not on the byline."

I smiled at him. "Of course. But don't get your hopes up, I haven't finished a story yet."

"Well, my options are kind of limited at this point." He snarked, softening his words with a half-smile. "Might as well send 'em on as let' em die with me." His gaze raked over me, appraising. "Don't you hold on to 'em either. Write what you can and pass it on when you're about to go."

"This is turning into a morbid chain letter," I laughed. "How will I even know when to pass it on?"

"You'll know," he said flatly.

"Oh." I said, because what else was there to say.

We sat in companionable silence while Jacob finished his cigarette. He placed his hands on his knees and rose more quickly than I believed him able. "Well, let's go."

"Oh, I was going to stay another…."

Jacob cut me off. "If I gotta go, you gotta go."

"It's not my party," I grumbled but rose anyway.

"Not mine either." Jacob called over his shoulder.

"Then who's is it?" I shot back, a single eyebrow raised.

"Kate's." We said in unison. Jacob's daughter had planned the entire party and was playing hostess. I imagined she was furious that her father was gone so long.

We trudged up the stairs to the party room and faced Kate's furious glare. "What were you DOING?!" She snapped at us both.

"Smoking." Jacob shrugged. "Cara made me come back in."

"Honestly, dad." She sighed and shot me a grateful glance. Then, she threw an arm around her father's shoulders and steered him toward the head of a table.

The rest of the evening was a blur - food, drinking, the required cake, and presents. The last words I said to my uncle were some perfunctory goodbye as the restaurant owners stood to the side to hurry us along.

My mother called me a week later after work. "What on earth did you say to your uncle that he'd write you in the will?!" she shrieked at me. That was the beginning of many such shrieks - from my sisters when they found out, from Kate when the will was read, from everyone when I told them that I was dying of breast cancer. After that admission, no one spoke of contesting, and I was given a small black notebook, $20,000, and a brief note.

My uncle's large scrawl proclaimed:

Here's my ideas, write what you will. Remember to pass it on and DON'T FORGET MY BYLINE. Love, Jacob

PS- thought you might need some cash so you could focus on writing.

The notebook was nearly full of outlines and general plots. There were fantasy stories with incredible creatures and complex magic, hard-boiled detective stories, clichéd romances, and everything in between. I read through them all over a long weekend, forgetting to sleep and marring a few pages with coffee. But the story I kept returning to was a fantasy/action story where a man saves a whole town using the lost technology of the ancients.

I bought my own little black book and wrote in it with every spare minute of my free time. It wasn't long before I had to quit work altogether. It was fine; I had more time to write, creating a world of magic and reincarnation. I was grateful for my Jacob’s money; I couldn’t afford to die without it. By the time I went to Hospice care, I had finished the rough draft and was editing the story as I typed it. One of my nurses, Julie, helped me proofread and told me her own story ideas.

Julie helped me self-publish the story, and I gave her Jacob's black book as a thank you. I saw my book listed in the online bookstore when the exhaustion hit.

It was a process. Sometimes I woke up to teary eyes and hand-holding. Sometimes I heard voices. Gradually, it became harder and harder to respond. Gradually, I couldn’t respond at all.

And then I woke up on a hill, grass under my prone body and a man sitting next to me.

"This is not the one I thought you'd pick." Jacob's gravelly voice rumbled next to me.

"What the WHAT?! I screamed as I sat up too quickly.

Jacob rolled his eyes. "So dramatic." He grumbled.

I looked around. In the distance were a fortress I'd described in detail, a mountain range I'd drawn myself, and a small town just beginning to flourish. I'd written it all.

"We're in the story," I said more to myself than anyone.

"Yup," Jacob said, refusing to give me a moment. "Happy birthday! I've been here for a bit. You took forever."

I glared at him. "Sorry for dying too slowly for you." I paused, "We're really in the story?" My voice went soft.

Jacob nodded.

"Are we important?" I couldn't keep the nervousness out of my voice.

"Not. At. All." Jacob crowed gleefully.

"Oh." I considered. "Then, what do we do?" I asked, eyes wide.

"We live," Jacob replied with a half-smile, "however we want to."