© Christopher Shennan 2008
All Sarah Osborne remembered of that interview was the single rose on the doctor's desk, and the clear, compassionate tones of his voice. The window revealing a landscaped garden; the examining couch in the corner; the certificates of qualification on the wall -- all dissolved into a featureless mist. All she could think of was that the rose, like her beautiful body, would one day lose its petals. The petals would simply fall off; hers would be ruthlessly severed by a surgeon's knife. The humiliation of it swamped her.
The doctor's voice droned on, "This need not be a negative experience, Sarah."
He was an old family friend, but his words had the opposite of the intended effect. They struck a note of despair and vibrated faintly with bitterness. He was too kind for her to be angry with him, but how could he know? Was it his breast that would be removed? ( Removed? She hated the innocuous word: severed, violated, destroyed, dismembered, seemed more appropriate) A man could only experience sympathy if his chest was disfigured in some way.
With a woman it was different. Her breasts were more than a mundane part of her physical make-up. They were a symbol of femininity; a focus of male attention; to herself and others an essential part of womanhood. A woman with her breast removed was an object, not of sympathy, but of pity. Even to herself, viewed in her own mirror, such a woman would see herself as her own bad dream.
". . . talk to David for you?"
The words shocked Sarah our of her private thoughts, "Er . . . what?"
"I was saying," said Dr. Morgan, "asking you really, if you would want me to talk to David for you . . . explain some of the medical angles, and the psychological ones too. It might make it easier for him . . . and for you also." His voice was gentle, just as it had always been. She could remember the same tone of voice soothing her during many of her childhood ills. Now he was using it again, almost understanding the hurt and the pain she would go through -- was going through.
What had Dr. Morgan said? He had said something about David? A new scene of horror opened up in the corridors of her mind. David, her fiance, and soon to be husband and lover. How would he react to the stripping of petals from his marital rose? Shame? Embarrassment? How would she react? How could her wedding night be anything approaching normal, even supposing there would be a wedding night now. Slowly, her eyes focussed on the rose perched on the edge of the doctor's desk again. Her heart skipped a beat. During the brief period of her gloomy reverie, a single petal had broken loose and fluttered to the floor. It seemed like an omen.
.............................................
A week passed before Sarah came out of the daze that had descended upon her when Dr. Morgan had broken the news of her impending mastectomy. She was not entirely sure she had come out of it, for the sense of unreality still hovered at the edges of her consciousness. She was aware that the term "deflowered" had sexual connotations, but she still thought it appropriate; the flower of her femininity was to be stripped from her.
"Dear Sarah," her mother was saying, "no one can blame you for being shocked, even devastated, by what is happening to you, but please reconsider. At least tell David why you are breaking off your engagement."
Sarah turned, trying not to see her reflection in the side-board mirror. She knew she was beautiful, even stunning. But the fact had never seemed important to her. Beauty faded, and in the end, all you were left with was the kind of person you were. If you were not inwardly beautiful, any outward beauty would be marred. At least, that is what she had always believed. It had been imprinted on her from childhood by her father, who had done his best to protect his daughter from vanity.
What she had never realized before was how much her sub-conscious mind still clung to the opposite notion; that a change in her physical body would ultimately lead to a change in identity. She could not shake off the feeling that when her body was altered by surgery, her personality would be altered as well. She would no longer be Sarah Osborne, or the Sarah David had known, or the woman David visualized as his future wife.
She spoke gently, "I can't tell David, mother. I just can't. Dr. Morgan offered to explain things to him from the medical point of view, but I told him not to. I also hold you and dad to your promise not to tell him either, or even hint that I'm going to be . . . to be . . . de-flowered." A sob broke from her, but she continued, "I would much rather he believed I am refusing to marry him because I no longer love him.
Mrs. Osborne came close and put an arm around her daughter, "And is that the truth? Do you no longer love David?"
Sarah drew away and her voice rose on a note of panic, "Of course not! Of course it's not true. I love David more now than ever. It's just that . . . well . . . I can't bear to have him marry me out of . . . out of pity." Having said that, she released herself from her mother's embrace and fled into the garden.
As she walked numbly along the paths, and across the well-kept lawns, the memory of her telephone conversation with David filled her mind.
"At least tell me why?" David had pleaded. "I keep telling myself it's something I've said or done that's causing you to act this way."
"It has nothing to do with you, David. Why can't you just accept that I'm not the one for you. I couldn't make you the kind of wife you would . . . want."
"At least let me come and see you so we can talk about it. There has to be a way to work things out."
"No, David! Just leave things as they are. Find another girl who can really make you happy.
"Sarah please . . ."
"Goodbye David!" Sarah had replaced the receiver, then fled to her room. It was a long time before her tears stopped flowing, or the sobs stopped wracking her still beautiful body.
Now, as Sarah stood in the garden amidst the roses, she felt empty and alone. She had always found tears a kind of therapy; a healing balm in the face of overwhelming grief. That was not the case now. The only result of her bout of sobbing had been a deeper loneliness; a more profound emptiness than before. It was as if the tears had merely sucked more of the life-principle from her being, and left a shadow of hopelessness in its place.
A foot scraped on the footpath and Sarah turned. The straight, kindly figure of her father stood before her -- non-intrusive. He simply stood there as he had a thousand times in her growing years, solid, like a pillar in the temple of Solomon -- supportive. John Reginald Osborne: the name echoed in her consciousness, seeming to replace the thin tendrils of hope her tears had leaked from her. He was the one man she knew loved her -- would love her -- regardless of her outward appearance. The grey of his eyes penetrated beyond mere form, though he was by no means immune to his daughter's beauty.
Taking Sarah by the arm, John Osborne walked with her down the path, "There's something I want you to see." He paused, then said, "No, I don't want you to merely see it. I want you to look at it until you really understand." His voice was still gentle, but there was an urgency to it that faintly alarmed her.
"But why don't you just explain it to me? You've always been good at explaining things." Her tone was affectionate.
He stopped near a bed of roses, "If I did that you may feel I was pressuring you to see things my way."
"I would never . . ."
"Perhaps not consciously," Sarah's father interrupted, " but the idea would be lurking there, ready to overshadow any future happiness you might find. I would not want that for my little girl."
The sun shimmered on Sarah's golden locks as she jerked her head bitterly, "If any such happiness were possible! I don't suppose it is . . . now."
"Anything is possible, but you must believe in it and seek it with all your heart."
Sarah sighed, "I'm not sure I can believe in anything right now, except . .."
"Except what?
"Except your and mother's care for me. It's the only thing that's real to me at the moment. Everything else seems like a dream -- a very bad dream."
"There will be other dreams, and other loves," John Osborne said. "It just takes a little time, and a little careful consideration to realise it. Now take that rose, for instance. It has a story to tell that just may open your eyes to one of the mysteries of life." He indicated a full-bloomed rose that was beginning to fade at the edges. Its yellow petals seemed to have only a tenuous hold on the central bud that bore them. The stem itself was bent, with a tiny bud of new growth showing close to where it joined the main bush.
"Look at it, Sarah. I'll leave you alone now, but look at that rose till you can read its message."
When he had gone, Sarah tried to follow her father's advice, but all she could see was a wilting rose with the petals ready to fall. The sight did nothing but remind her, in graphic detail, of her own predicament. More depressed than ever, she turned away to wrestle with the anger and hurt churning inside her.
The sun was already low on the horizon when Sarah moved disconsolately back toward the house, oblivious to the grating of the garden gate and the shadow ofa tall figure approaching her.
Sarah jumped when he tapped her on the shoulder, shocked out of her private world. She turned on the man, knowing it would be David, and knowing that the emotions in her were mixed anger and relief. She was angry he would violate her specific desire to be left alone; relieved the matter could at last be thrashed out and disposed of.
"You shouldn't have come," Sarah said helplessly, backing away from his tall, athletic frame; from the blond good looks and the grey, pleading eyes.
"I had to come, Sarah. I promise I won't press myself on you if you insist on breaking it off. It's just that I'm going crazy trying to think what I've done wrong. Knowing the reason may not fix things, but at least I can stop tormenting myself." He took a gentle hold on her elbow and eased her toward a bench. The shadows were growing longer. The sun would soon dip below the trees and the gloom would hide at least some of the pain in her eyes.
Sarah had dreaded this moment, and the dread had not been entirely without warrant. She quite simply loved David, and seeing him again compounded the agony of the inevitable parting. Seeing him beside her, hearing the slight panting of his breath that gave evidence of his distress, Sarah's resolve faltered. Perhap's she was wrong. Perhaps she was being unfair to him in assuming his love for her revolved around her physical beauty. Perhaps there was that quality in him that could endure a wedding night; that could endure a lifetime of intimacy with one stripped of the symbol of womanhood.
"I don't care what the problem is, " David was saying, "nothing will stop me loving you."
Hope fluttered softly. Sarah started to speak, then fell silent.
Please, Sarah! His fingers caressed the golden strands of her hair.
"Are you . . . sure?"
"Of course I'm sure. Nothing could be worse than this torment of not knowing."
So she told him. She told him of the doctor's diagnosis and the scheduled operation. She shared her shame and her fears and her terror that he would stop loving her. And while she talked she watched. It was as though her senses had been fine-tuned. She could read every expression on his face while she looked desperately for signs of the moral power that would sweep her fears away. She looked for the softening of his features into an all-encompassing love. She waited for the words that would mock her fears and tell her that nothing . . . nothing could stand between their love. They did not come.
Horrified, she watched David's features change from passion, to disbelief, to shock , and finally to something she could only interpret as disgust. Then came the platitudes, the explanations and the justifications. What was happening to her was not quite natural, after all. Sarah had been right to break their engagement. He really admired her for her good common sense. He wished her well for the future, but he really had to go. It took longer than that, the excuses wrapped in good manners and a concerned tone of voice. But the end result was the same: David scurrying out of the garden gate and Sarah shrinking on her seat as though the weight of her inward pain was trying to crush her.
The sun was long gone while Sarah sat motionless. The moon rose over the treetops and shed a silvery light on the garden -- a full moon. Still she sat, till a chill wind drove her along the path toward the house. She stopped near the rose her father had urged her to study, and found that the moonlight had somehow transformed it. It was more like a vision than a mere flower of a day. She saw the wilted petals and the new bud courageously protruding from the stem and understanding settled upon her like a soft rain.
The petals were falling from the full-blown rose, but the bud spoke of renewal and hope. One part of her womanhood was about to die, but Sarah Osborne still carried within her a life that would burst into new beauty. Different beauty, but nevertheless real. She breathed deeply and ran into her house. Hope for the future was still only a tiny flutter in her breast, but that it was real and vibrant she had no doubt at all.
