My brother learned he had cancer during his physical examination while retiring from the Army. He was 45, a big, muscular, macho guy with a bluff manner and a confident air. Both he and I had married young, divorced, and had spent many years single. I was 42.
Our paths rarely crossed while we were adults, and I didn't see him until several months into his treatment and recovery. My mother was living with him in Los Angeles and she asked if I could come out and stay with him for a week to give her a break. I thought it was the least I could do.
He looked better than I expected. He was bald from the chemotherapy, but he had always had his head shaved so that was not a shock. He had lost about thirty pounds and looked gaunt, but was in good spirits. "Chemo over," he said, with a show of heartiness, "And I'm on the road to recovery." I was less confident.
The first two days we were together we talked as we had not in many years and went out to a movie and I cooked a decent meal for him -- my mother being a horrible cook, we joked. I slept on a pull-out couch in his one-bedroom, one-bath apartment.
My second night there I heard him shout in the night and rushed into his bedroom to see what was the matter. He was having a bad dream, thrashing around in his bed, agitated and sweating. I shook him awake, "Bob, please. Wake up. It's only a dream." The bedside light was on.
His eyes snapped open and he looked confused and, then, recognizing me, he pulled me to him and sobbed on my breast. I sat down on the bed and cradled his head in my arms and on my lap. "It's the pain killers. And the chemo," he said. "I have terrible dreams. I'm afraid of the dark." He was still trying to catch his breath between sobs and his cheeks were streaked with tears. My soldier brother, always so sure of himself, was like a big baby.
I stayed with him until he was again sleeping soundly. I became aware that I was only barely covered. My bedtime outfit is a knee-length flannel nightgown with a scoop neckline and spaghetti straps. I wear it for comfort, not sexiness, but it was hiked up around my thighs where his head was resting and my breasts -- which are large --- were spilling out of the top. Bob was wearing pajamas tied around his waist and a few pubic hairs stuck out of the slit down the front. I wondered why men lost the hair on their head after chemo but not their pubic hair.
As a single girl who traveled around the world on her job, I was accustomed to taking men where and when I found them. I had hopped into a large number of beds in my days. And so had Bob. He had been known is his early days as quite the lady's man and he probably still had been before his cancer.
The next morning I was standing at the stove cooking breakfast -- still in my night gown, but partly covered by a robe -- when he came out of the bedroom and hugged me from behind. "Thanks for last night," he said. "I'm sorry."
I turned around and pulled him to me and kissed him on the forehead. "You've been sick, silly boy. That's what I'm here for." As I hugged him, I couldn't help but feel the partial erection beneath the thin fabric of his pajamas. "So," I thought, "he was not rendered totally incapable by the chemotherapy." I mentally chastised myself for the thought, gave him another squeeze and felt my breasts pressing against his bare chest, and then announced that the coffee was ready.
We had a really fun day and I believed, for the first time, that my brother was going to get well. That night, we went to bed as usual, he in the bedroom, me on the couch, but about two a.m., I was awakened by the sound of his sobbing and talking in his sleep. I rushed to him and sat down on the bed and, again, cradled his head on my lap. He was sweating. I got a wet towel and began to wipe away the sweat on his face and shoulders. He slowly relaxed.
