Cancer Schmancer by Fran Drescher

up. Friendship rings are a real thing, 9377 Cancer Schmancer 2/28/02 4:18 PM Page 81
    “It’s Cancer”
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    made up by some other clever girl who wanted a ring from her man. For some reason the word friendship conjures up less fear than, let’s say, engagement might.
    Well, I’d seen something I liked while shopping at Barney’s one day, and I liked a little platinum ring from the Tiffany’s catalog as well. “Where should we go?” he asked. But I felt bad, like he was only suggesting this because he felt sorry for me and not because he truly wanted to. He insisted that he’d always in-tended on us going to pick out the friendship ring, but that a million things kept getting in the way. Now was the perfect time, and today was the perfect day. Who was I to argue? It was a lovely gesture.
    So I called both stores to see how late they’d be open, because it was now around five in the afternoon and the shops in Beverly Hills tend to close early. As fate would have it, Barney’s had just closed and Tiffany’s was open another half hour. So Tiffany’s it was!
    As we drove from the beach to Beverly Hills in a race against the clock, I felt loved. We got to Tiffany’s just as they were closing.
    I knew exactly what I wanted and they happened to have a ring that fit perfectly, a beautifully simple platinum-and-diamond Elsa Peretti friendship ring that I slipped on my thumb and haven’t taken off since. As we drove home, I gazed down at my finger and contemplated my life. The future was uncertain and nothing made sense. I felt like a stranger in a strange land.

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    9377 Cancer Schmancer 2/28/02 4:18 PM Page 83
    The First Night with Cancer
    J u n e 1 3 , 2 0 0 0
    that evening when we got home, the house was empty and dimly lit by a night-light. Chester was asleep in the bedroom.
    As the sky darkened, so did the weight of the cancer. I walked around the house quietly, going through the motions of preparing for bed. The fish tank light illuminated the kitchen, John read in the living room, and I slipped into my bathroom to wash my face.
    Yup, “going through the motions” is a good way to describe it, because I was really somewhere else. Somewhere far away and deep inside my head. I opened a drawer, removed the toothpaste, turned on the faucet. I could see myself doing it all, but it all seemed strange, foreign, and out of step.
    As I sat at my vanity, I thought about my things. My chair, my makeup, my toothbrush. What will happen to them after I’m gone?
    Will they be trash for the garbage man to haul away? The toothbrush was expensive and I’ve got Lancôme I haven’t even opened yet. I felt myself plunging deeper and deeper into a horrible feeling of isolation. I was sitting there staring at my image, my face, me, when the piercing ring of the telephone broke through my silence. It was my sister, Nadine.
    Now, my older sister and I have had a complicated relationship our whole lives. I say “older,” but really we’re only a year and eigh-9377 Cancer Schmancer 2/28/02 4:18 PM Page 84
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    teen days apart, a closeness in age that definitely exacerbated issues growing up. It’s not easy being the “older” one when a baby comes into the house, especially when you’re still a baby yourself.
    And since Nadine was always much taller than I, it made her seem even older. In fact, I never realized how close in age we really were until quite recently.
    As an adult, being a year apart means nothing, but for us, as children, it created an enormous gap, each of us trying to define ourselves as individuals through friends, hobbies, sports, even food preferences. And everything seemed to be opposite. I was left-handed, she was right. I had dark hair, she had light. She liked ath-letics while I preferred performing arts.
    As a teenager Nadine was always rebellious, which constantly worried my parents. In fact, for the better part of my life, I was either a