"Body Image"  3/4 (MF, Rom)

That afternoon she and her boyfriend were guided into a small
consultation room on the first floor to receive the biopsy
results.  Tom remained at her side, holding her hand as they sat
stiffly.  An orderly entered the room and, ignoring both of them,
mounted a pair of x-rays on the viewer and quietly exited the room.

Barely two minutes later Doctor Marsh entered the room but, instead
of going to the chair behind the desk, she crossed directly to her
patient and took both of Caroline's hands in her own.

"I'm sorry, Caroline.  I'm afraid the news is not what we had
hoped," she said as Caroline's heart began to sink.  "The biopsy
shows that you have a tumor."

"Is it cancer?" Caroline asked, her voice trembling.

The doctor had looked at her with sympathy.  "The tumor is
malignant.  It is cancer."

"Oh, God!" she gasped softly, a tear starting to run down her cheek.

She felt Tom squeeze her hand in support.

"It IS cancer," the doctor continued, "But I want you to understand
that you are a very lucky woman.  We have managed to catch your
cancer relatively early.  With proper treatment, there is an
excellent chance that you will have a complete recovery.  If you
had waited even a few more months your chances would not have been
nearly as good."

"A complete recovery?" Caroline had echoed, as she grasped at the
straw being placed before her.

"With the proper treatment.  I must tell you that the form of
cancer you have is quite aggressive.  We will have to operate as
soon as possible.  I've already scheduled you for surgery next
Thursday."  The doctor continued, "You will need to check in
overnight tonight so we can begin treatment.  Until your surgery
you will be given some rather unpleasant chemotherapy to minimize
the tumor's growth rate.  Then after the surgery there will be
another twelve weeks of chemo to ensure that anything that might
have spread is neutralized.  With any luck, that will be that.  You
will require a follow-up checkup every six months for the next ten
years, but I fully expect that you will beat this cancer."

"Oh, thank you!" Caroline gushed, her relief evident.  "You don't
know how terrified I was.  It means so much to me to hear that I'm
going to survive this intact."

"Caroline, that's not exactly what I just said," the doctor
responded quietly.

"I don't understand..."

"Perhaps it would be easier to explain from the x-rays," Doctor
Marsh answered.  Then she picked up a metal rod - a pointer - from
the desk and placed it on a dark spot on one of the x-rays.  "This
is your cancer.  Right now it is about a half inch in diameter and
one inch long and looks well contained.  But if you take a close
look at this second x-ray," she had continued, while pointing to
the shadow of the tumor on the second piece of film, "You will see
that the long axis of the tumor is aligned along these barely
discernible structures here."  The pointer had rested on a series
of shadows that Caroline could just make out.  "These are milk
ducts within the breast and the fact that the tumor follows them
is not good.  There is the possibility that the tumor, instead of
being contained, is spreading along these ducts.  Cancer cells may
have started to spread and may even have already taken up residence
in other areas of your breast."

The doctor removed the tip of the metal rod from the x-ray and
placed the pointer back on the desk, then looked directly into
Caroline's eyes.  "These days we usually recommend a lumpectomy
for a breast tumor.  That involves the removal of only the cancer
itself and the tissue immediately surrounding it, followed by
radiation or chemotherapy, or a combination of the two.  This kind
of operation is the least disfiguring and is as effective as more
radical surgery in many cases.  Unfortunately, I don't believe you
are one of those normal cases.  Of course, any decision you make
will be respected, but my medical opinion is that you should avoid
a lumpectomy.  Both because of the way the cancer seems to be
developing and the aggressive nature of this type of malignancy,
I am recommending that you undergo a full mastectomy."

"A full mastectomy?" Caroline replied, stunned.  "You're
recommending the removal of my whole breast?  I thought you said
I would fully recover."

"You WILL recover," Doctor Marsh insisted.  "You can beat this, but
I have to be blunt with you.  This is a particularly malignant form
of cancer, with a high potential for metastasizing - in layman's
terms that means of spreading to additional sites.  I think the
chances of your cancer not returning are less than fifty percent
with just a lumpectomy, and just a bit better than sixty-forty if
you then undergo radiation therapy or chemo.  With a full
mastectomy and three months of chemotherapy as a follow-up, your
chances of remaining cancer-free should be better than ninety-five
percent."

"And there are no other choices?" Caroline asked, without much hope.

"There are always other choices, but this one is your best," her
doctor replied.  "And the surgery doesn't have to be as traumatic
as you might think.  We can provide you with a breast implant as
part of the mastectomy procedure.  Cosmetically, you'll look the
same.  No one has to know you've changed."

The conversation lasted for almost another hour while Caroline and
her doctor tried to put the shattered pieces of her life back
together again.  But even then, Caroline knew that things were
never going to be the same.

                    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

In the end Caroline accepted her doctors advice - at least in
part.  She opted for a full mastectomy.  Her survival instincts
ensured that.  But despite her doctor's best efforts, she chose
NOT to have a breast implant done.

Doctor Marsh tried hard to change her mind.  "Of course, you can
always have an implant performed at a later date, but I think you
are making a mistake.  You may think that an implant is just for
cosmetic purposes, but it's not.  It is also for your own
psychological well-being.  You are going to feel a profound sense
of loss.  You are having part of your body removed, and not a minor
part.  The breast is directly associated in our culture with your
sexuality and womanliness - its loss can impact on you in ways you
can hardly imagine.  I really think you should reconsider."

Carline did not listen to her doctor.  She had heard too many
stories of women having health problems after such implants, and
had been unable to bring herself to allow her surgeons to insert a
foreign object into her body.  Her boyfriend Tom assured her that
it was not necessary - that her mastectomy would not make any
difference to him.

But Tom had been wrong.

During the weeks following her operation, Caroline found him to be
totally supportive.  He was there beside her bed when she awoke
after the surgery, sporting flowers and a VERY large teddy bear.
After she left the hospital, he was the one who cared for her - the
one who cooked and cleaned and helped change her dressings.  He was
a perfect companion during her recovery, until the day she was once
more well enough to take care of herself.  And then he changed.
Tom probably didn't even recognize the change when it occurred.
He still told her that he loved her.  He still talked with her.
But change he did, and they both felt it and became uneasy about
the difference.

At first there was nothing that Caroline could put her finger on.
She did not realize what it was until she decided that it was time
for her to return to work and begin trying to restore her life to
normal.  Having made that decision, she was finally forced to
surrender to the dictates of fashion.  The fact was that no one
made clothing for women with only one breast - particularly when
the other breast remained as full and round as Caroline's.  She
consulted with her doctor, who made the necessary arrangements to
deal with the problem.

On that fateful day, she brought the prosthesis home from her
doctor's office.  The device consisted of a brassiere with a
gel-filled plastic insert.  The insert was similar to the one her
doctor had tried to convince her to have implanted when she
underwent her mastectomy, only it was worn externally.  It zippered
into the compartment of the specially constructed padded brassiere -
a brassiere that was specifically designed to minimize differences
in appearance between the side with the insert and the side with
her remaining intact breast.  She removed the loose bulky sweater
she was wearing, and asked Tom to help her put the device on.   He
reluctantly agreed.  It was at that moment that Caroline realized
what had changed - her boyfriend didn't touch her any more than was
necessary, and never when he could gracefully avoid it.  And when
her body was exposed to him he was unable to avoid either staring
at or not looking at where her missing breast had once been.

                    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Caroline's realization was the beginning of the end for the
relationship between her and her boyfriend.  When she had been in
denial, Tom had pushed her into seeing her doctor.  When she had
undergone surgery, he had been there to support and uplift her.
While she had been recovering, he had cared for her - had fed her
when the chemotherapy had made her vomit and pushed her eat when
she had no appetite.  He had even bought her a beret and a wig when
the chemotherapy caused most of her hair to fall out.  But now that
she had healed - that she had survived - Tom found that he was
unable to cope with the change in her body.

She told him what she had seen - how he would no longer touch her -
and asked him straight out, "Do you still love me?"

"Yes, of course," he insisted - but he did not refute her
observation.  Their old closeness did not return.  She could see
him trying, see him push himself into making contact with her, but
the strain between them continued to grow.  Sex between them became
more and more infrequent, and they no longer kept the lights on when
their bodies joined.  They spoke less and less to each other.
Caroline could see their relationship dying before her eyes.

Still, when the end came she was not prepared.  She returned from
work one Friday afternoon to discover the apartment denuded of her
boyfriend's possessions.  Tom stood at the end of the bed - the
bed they shared - waiting for her.  The sight of him waiting like
that - the half-empty closet beside him - filled her with dread.

"Tom.  What's going on?  Where are all your things?"

His voice filled with sadness, he answered, "I'm moving out
Caroline."

Caroline stared at him in shock.  "But you can't.  I need you."

"I have to," he replied.  Then he walked over to her, and placed
his hand along her cheek, touching her as he once had.  He looked
into her eyes, telling her sadly, "I wanted to tell you myself -
in person like this."  Then he looked away, his eyes filling with
tears.  "I thought I could deal with this.  I really thought the
surgery wouldn't matter.  But I'm not that strong, and it's tearing
us both up.  I've tried to do it, but I can't.  I'm sorry."

"Tom...  Please," Caroline pleaded, "Stay with me.  I don't know
what I'll do if you leave."

"I'll destroy you if I stay.  Don't you understand that?  I'm
ashamed of myself!  I should be the one holding YOU - comforting
YOU - and I can't do that.  I can't reach out to you.  I'm ashamed
of the fact that I have to force myself to touch you."

"But I don't care!" she replied, her own tears streaming down her
cheeks.  "I need to have you stay."

"No, you don't," he insisted.  Once more he met her eyes with his
own.  "You'll be all right.  You're stronger than me, you know.
You deserve someone better than I am - someone who can be there for
you."

She pleaded with him to stay, but to no avail.  The breakup hit
her hard, but even then the rational part of her could not hate
Tom for leaving.  That rational part knew that he was right.  He
WOULD have destroyed her, or she him.  But knowing that he was
right did not made what she felt any less painful.

======================================================================

Several years ago to the recent past:
-------------------------------------
There had been other men after that, but none of Caroline's
relationships had lasted.  Each one failed when she made her
condition known.  After Tom's reaction to her surgery, she had
made it a point to warn her boyfriends of her condition.  That
had been the end of most of her relationships right there.  In
those few cases where it had not, where she and a man had advanced
to intimacy, her partners had proved unable to cope.  Once a man
had seen her in the nude, he rarely returned for any more dates.
Or worse, he exploited her for sex, content to occupy her bed, but
not to share any other part of her life.  Caroline had broken off
all such relationships; her own self-respect forcing her to chose
loneliness over being used.

The scars on her body healed, but the scars on her psyche festered
and grew.  Only once had she begun sexual intimacies with a man
without warning him in advance of her disfigurement.  He had been
a person she had really liked, they had both had too much to drink,
and one thing had led to another.  Caroline remembered with
humiliation how her date had lost his erection upon viewing her
scarred body.  He had tried unsuccessfully to recover, but the
damage was already done.  It was a long time before Caroline risked
another date after that disaster.  Instead, she turned inward,
pouring herself completely into her job.  She became single-mindedly
determined to excel in at least that part of her life.  And excel
she did.  By the time the position for a junior partner in the
firm's southwestern office had opened up, it was hers for the
asking.  She jumped at the chance to move to a different part of
the country and create a new life for herself.

She had made the move west a little more than eighteen months
earlier, and had thrown herself into her new job, quickly winning
a reputation as one of the rising stars in the firm.  And she
began to carefully date again, taking care to avoid the kind of
emotional and sexual intimacy that caused her so much pain in the
past.  This time she was much more casual in her relationships.
Only once had she felt herself starting to fall for a man, and she
had let him know about her missing breast early, before she had
become too vulnerable.  He did not respond kindly or well.  He
unceremoniously dropped her, and Caroline returned to less
threatening forms of dating, sadder but wiser.

Then she had met Brandon, and this time she knew she had not acted
quickly enough.  Before she realized it, she had fallen, and fallen
hard.  And now her only two choices had become joy or pain.

And Caroline had few illusions about which it was likely to be.

======================================================================

Today - Saturday night:
-----------------------
Brandon did not call her.

Nine o'clock came and went without a ring from the telephone.
Caroline's dark depression deepened as the minutes passed, when
suddenly, unexpectedly, the tinny wail of a buzzer sounded in the
front hallway leading from her apartment door.  The sound startled
her, making her jump.  She moved to the intercom next to the door
and pressed the button.

"Apartment 2C.  Can I help you?" she said.

"Caroline, It's me," she heard a voice say.  HIS voice.  She stood
transfixed, inadvertently releasing the intercom button.

The buzzer sounded again, more insistently this time.

Caroline responded to the renewed call, stabbing at the button on
the intercom.

"...oline, please buzz me in.  I need to talk to you.  It's
important."

She released the button again, cutting off the voice on the
speaker.  Not knowing how else to respond, she pushed the button
that released the latch at the building's front door, letting him
in.  Brandon would be on his way up - for what purpose she didn't
know.  Maybe he wanted to break up with her face-to-face.  He was
the kind of person who wouldn't dump her over the telephone.  He
had always been too much of a gentleman to do something like that.

Caroline looked at herself in panic.  She wasn't dressed for
visitors.  She wore only shoes, socks, briefs, blue jeans, and
an oversized sweatshirt.  She was not even wearing her prosthetic
bra.  If she hurried, she might have time to put it on before he
arrived.  She turned toward her bedroom door...

The doorbell for her small apartment rang out.

"Damn," she thought, "How did he get up here so fast?"  She stood
there, rooted to a spot in the floor, debating what to do.  Should
she just let him in?  He would see her sans bra, without the
illusion of normality.  But then she asked herself, "What
difference would that make?"  He had seen her naked the night
before.  She had no secrets left to hide.

Taking a deep breath, she released the safety chain and turned the
doorknob.  The door swung open to revel Brandon, dressed as he had
been the night before, holding a large bouquet of red, white, and
pink roses.

"Come in, please," she said, her mind reeling.

"Thank you," he replied, stepping through the doorway.  "These are
for you," he continued, holding the roses out for her.

She took the flowers gingerly, and held them to her face, drinking
in the cloyingly sweet aroma of their perfume.  "Let me put these
someplace," she said, escaping into the kitchen in an attempt to
clear her mind.  She fought for control, steeling herself for
whatever was about to happen.

She returned to find him sans overcoat.  Otherwise, he was exactly
as she had left him.  She couldn't help asking, "Why are you here?
Why didn't you just call?"

She was surprised to see him blush.  "I had to talk to you in
person - face-to-face.  I don't think I could say what I need to
say over the phone."

Caroline felt her heart sink.  "And you need to say what?"

"I want to apologize for last night.  I didn't handle things very
well.  You just so totally surprised me."

"I understand," she whispered, her eyes welling up with tears.
"You're not the first man to be repulsed by my body."

"It's not that, Caroline," Brandon protested.  "Not that at all.
It was me.  I had built up a mental image of you - of what you
would look like naked.  If you had warned me, I like thinking I
would have handled things better.  I wish you had given me a
chance."

"Handled things better in what way?" she responded bitterly, her
voice rising.  "Would you have been able to pretend better?  I
don't want that, Brandon.  I don't want or need your pity.  Just
don't be cruel to me.  If you want to leave me, say so!"

Brandon stepped forward, taking her head in both his hands, raising
her face, making her look at him.  "That is not what I want - not
what I want at all."

"Then why are you here?"

"Because I want to be with you.  Now that you've told me your
secret, I'm hoping that you will give me another chance.  Yesterday
was not what I wanted our first time making love to be like."  He
looked at her, a pleading in his eyes.  "Do you think that you
could do that?  Do you think you could let me start over and try
again?"

Caroline was taken aback by his request.  She could hardly believe
her good fortune and the words he was saying.  HE STILL WANTED HER.

"I think I would like that," she responded, her voice quivering.
"I think I would like that very much."

Brandon smiled.  "I'm so glad," he replied, leaning into her,
kissing her softly on the lips.

It was a slow, leisurely, and definitely ungentlemanly kiss - one
that Caroline could not avoid responding to.  She found herself
clinging to him, her need overtaking her.  Before the kiss broke
she had made up her mind.  Her hands went to the lower hem of her
sweatshirt and prepared to lift it off up over her head, only to
find herself prevented from doing so by Brandon's large hands over
hers.

"Let me," he said softly.

She let go of the sweatshirt, letting his hands replace hers, then
lifted her arms as he pulled the sweatshirt up and over her head,
baring her upper body to his gaze.  He dropped the sweatshirt to
the floor and placed his hands on each of her shoulders, holding
her firmly as he spoke to her.  "I need to have you help me.  Other
than last night, I've never made love to a woman in your situation.
You'll have to tell me what you like."

"I'll try" she replied, nervously.

"Last night, I didn't know what to do - where I should touch you -
where you would like to be touched.  For instance, I don't know if
you like it when I do THIS...," he continued, as he took the back
of one forefinger and ran it lightly over the nipple of Caroline's
missing breast.

"Oh yes, I do like that," she sighed.  "I don't have nearly as
much sensation in that nipple as in the other one, but yes, that
feels very nice."

"So you like that," he chuckled as he continued to stroke her.
"But not as much as when I do this one?" he continued, moving his
stroking to the nipple of her intact breast.  He was rewarded with
a shutter that passed through her body.  "Well, I guess that just
means I'm going to have to pay a lot of attention to this puppy,"
he said, lowering his head toward her breast.

Caroline gasped as she felt his mouth cover the rapidly hardening
nipple of her left breast.  It felt so good to feel him suckle and
nibble on her, his hand directing her turgid nub between his lips.
Then she felt his other hand on her remaining nipple, and she
melted under his ministrations.  She could hardly believe what was
happening.  He was touching her THERE - on the nipple of her absent
breast.  She could feel her nipple respond, hardening under his
touch and in sympathy to its twin in his mouth.

"Oh God.  Don't stop what you're doing," she sighed.  "That feels
so good."

He lifted his lips from her tit just long enough to say, "I would
never think of stopping," and then returned his lips to her breast.

Brandon continued his oral activities.  Caroline jumped when he
switched sides, his lips engulfing the nipple on her right as his
fingers took up the task of caressing her left one.  It had been
so long that Caroline had forgotten what a man's lips on her right
nipple could do, but her body had not.  Whether by reflex or
instinct, she could feel her lust rising as the reawakened
sensations from her right nipple traveled through her body.  She
threw her head back as the feeling flowed over her, her nipples
hardening even more, her vaginal secretions threatening to soak
through the cotton crotch of her panties.

Brandon returned to her other nipple, the greater degree of feeling
on that side pushing her over the edge.  She felt a wave of warm
sensation travel from deep within her - from between her legs then
throughout her, buckling her knees so the Brandon literally had to
hold her up as her orgasm gripped her.  He held her tightly against
himself until the tremors passing through her body died away.

"Oooooh," she moaned, "What did you do to me?  I've never come
before just from having my nipples done."

"Maybe you've just never had the right man do them before,"
Brandon said.  Then he smiled and began kissing his way up from
her nipple to her neck and then her mouth.  She returned his kisses
without hesitation, just as enthusiastic as him this time.  Without
breaking from the kiss, he picked her up in his arms and carried
her from the front hallway to the door of her bedroom.  Softly
kicking the door open, he maneuvered her through and sat her down
on the foot of the comforter covered bed.