The List
Becky
I sit at the kitchen table with my leather-bound journal open in front of me, a smooth black pen resting between my fingers.
The apartment is quiet. Too quiet.
No footsteps in the hallway. No television playing in the background. No Felix calling my name from the bedroom.
Just the low hum of the refrigerator and the steady ticking of the clock on the wall.
I stare at the blank page for a long time, wondering how the hell Iโm supposed to begin.
Maybe itโs because some things are easier to think about than to admit, even when youโre the only person who will ever read them.
Six months ago, I walked into Dr. Grayโs office expecting another lecture about my fatigue. I thought heโd tell me to sleep more, eat better, take some vitamins, or run a few more tests.
Instead, he turned his tablet toward me.
I still remember that moment as if it happened yesterday. The dark masses scattered across my lungs and liver. The irregular edges. The places the disease had already reached.
I stared at the screen, waiting for him to tell me there had been a mistake.
There wasnโt.
Stage four. Aggressive. Those were the words he used.
Treatment started the following week, but the months that followed brought more bad news than hope. Every scan seemed to give Dr. Gray another reason to look at me with that careful expression doctors wear when theyโre trying not to let their faces reveal too much.
Last Tuesday, he called me back into his office.
He didnโt make me wait, and he didnโt pretend the news would be better than it was.
He looked at me and explained that, given how things had progressed, I might have about a month left.
Weeks, perhaps a month.
Thatโs what I have left.
And somehow, that wasnโt even the worst thing that happened to me.
Felix had been leaving me long before cancer entered the picture.
It started with the late nights, then the phone calls heโd take in another room and the unfamiliar perfume that sometimes clung to his shirts. Even our sex changed. Three minutes, maybe less. Heโd chase his own finish while I lay beneath him, staring at the ceiling and wondering when the man I married had stopped seeing me.
I should have known something was wrong.
I just didnโt want to admit it.
When I came home from Dr. Grayโs office six months ago and told Felix about my diagnosis, he barely reacted. He stood there with his arms crossed, his jaw tight, listening as I explained that I had cancer.
Two weeks later, he packed a suitcase.
I sat on the edge of our bed and watched him fold his clothes into it. He didnโt cry, ask how I was feeling, or even look particularly sorry.
Then he turned to me and said the words that still feel like broken glass lodged somewhere inside my chest.
โI stopped loving you years ago, Becky. This just made it easier. And yes, Iโve been fucking my lawyer since spring. She makes me feel like a man again, and staying with you will make my life more miserable. Youโre nothing but a dying weight I refuse to carry. You disgust me so much. Please donโt call or text me. Iโm done with this marriage. Youโll receive the divorce papers tomorrow morning. Make sure you fucking sign them, or Iโll come back here and kill you myself.โ
Then he zipped his suitcase and walked out.
Just like that.
Six months of treatment, fear, and uncertainty, and the man who promised to stand beside me through sickness and health couldnโt even find enough decency to leave without making me feel like I was the problem.
I should hate him.
Sometimes I do.
Other times, I wonder what the hell is wrong with me for still remembering the little things, like how he used to kiss my forehead before leaving for work or how heโd pull me closer in his sleep.
Funny how the mind works. It holds on to the good memories even when the person who gave them to you turns out to be someone you barely recognize.
I blink away the sting in my eyes and look down at my journal.
Enough.
Iโm tired of crying over Felix. Iโm tired of thinking about what I could have done differently or wondering whether I would still have a husband if I werenโt dying.
And Iโm especially tired of feeling as though my life is already over when Iโm still breathing.
Maybe I donโt have much time left, but I have some.
For once, I want to spend it doing things because I want to, not because theyโre sensible or respectable or what someone expects a forty-five-year-old woman to do.
I pick up my pen and write a title in big block letters.
MY SEX BUCKET LIST.
I stare at it, then laugh under my breath.
My sex bucket list.
The words sound ridiculous, but thereโs something strangely liberating about seeing them on paper. Thirty years old, and I have never had the kind of sex that leaves me with stories worth telling. My ex-husband was the worst of it, and if those years taught me anything, itโs that being married doesnโt automatically mean being satisfied.
I tap the pen against the page.
What the hell do I have to lose?
I write the first item.
โI want to be a glory hole for a whole night.โ
Heat crawls up my neck as I read the words aloud. The thought is outrageous, even by my own standards, but thatโs precisely why I want to try it. No expectations, no emotional attachments, no worrying about whether someone likes me enough to stay.
Just an experience that belongs entirely to me.
I move to the second item.
โI want to fuck my doctor.โ
A smile spreads across my face before I can stop it.
Dr. Gray has this annoyingly calm voice that makes even the worst news sound like something we can discuss over a cup of tea. Heโs handsome, too, with broad shoulders and long fingers that always seem to make me forget what I was about to say.
Iโve caught myself noticing those fingers more than once during my appointments.
Perhaps itโs the circumstances. Perhaps itโs the fact that heโs one of the few people who has looked me in the eyes and spoken honestly about whatโs happening to my body.
Whatever it is, the attraction is there, and Iโm done pretending otherwise.
I write the third item.
โI want to take a sexual risk in public.โ
The idea makes my pulse jump. The thrill of a stolen moment, the possibility of being discovered, the knowledge that Iโm doing something I would ordinarily never dare to do.
I donโt know whether Iโd actually have the nerve to go through with it, but the whole point of this list is to stop letting fear make every decision for me.
Number four comes next.
โI want to peg a guy.โ
I pause, then add a little note beside it.
Preferably someone who thinks heโs too macho to ever consider it.
A laugh escapes me. The thought of challenging someoneโs assumptions about what makes a man masculine is oddly satisfying. Iโve spent enough of my life watching people pretend to be things theyโre not. Perhaps itโs time I had some fun turning expectations on their heads.
Number five is simpler.
โI want to be tied down and completely surrender control.โ
I look at the sentence for a moment longer than necessary.
Thereโs something appealing about the idea of letting go, of not having to make decisions or pretend I have everything under control. For months, Iโve had to be brave for doctors, relatives, and anyone who looks at me with that familiar expression of pity.
Sometimes, I donโt want to be brave.
Sometimes, I want to stop thinking about what happens next and simply exist in the moment.
I underline the sentence.
Number six.
โI want a threesome.โ
The words look almost comical sitting there on the page, but I leave them alone. If Iโm going to do this, I might as well be honest about what I want.
Number seven makes me grin.
โI want to wear a remote-controlled toy to an event and let someone else control it.โ
I can already imagine myself sitting through a dinner or walking around a gallery, trying to look perfectly composed while someone else knows a secret no one in the room would ever suspect.
The idea makes me laugh again.
God, Iโve missed laughing like this.
For the first time in months, Iโm not thinking about scan results or medication schedules or the way people lower their voices when they talk about my future. Iโm thinking about something ridiculous, something exciting, something that has absolutely nothing to do with dying.
I continue writing.
โI want rough oral sex with someone I trust enough to explore it with.โ
โI want to watch two men together and direct the scene.โ
โI want a one-night stand with someone who wants me simply because he finds me desirable.โ
That last one makes me stop.
I read it again, then stare at the page.
Someone who wants me because he finds me desirable.
Not because we share a mortgage. Not because we made vows years ago. Not because he feels obligated to stay while my body betrays me.
Because he looks at me and wants me.
I swallow the sudden lump in my throat and force myself to keep writing.
โI want to film myself exploring my own sexuality, so I can look back at the memories later.โ
โI want to explore a manโs body in ways Iโve never tried before.โ
โI want to watch porn with a partner and recreate something we both find exciting.โ
โI want to role-play. Iโll be a nurse.โ
I chuckle at that one. After everything Iโve been through with doctors and hospitals, perhaps itโs only fair that I get to play the person in charge for once.
Finally, I write the fifteenth item.
โI want to masturbate with a vibrator until I squirt.โ
I add a little note underneath.
Iโve never done it before.
There. Fifteen things I want to experience, fifteen possibilities I would once have dismissed as fantasies I was too old, too shy, or too sensible to pursue.
I set the pen down and look at the page.
Fifteen items.
Fifteen chances to feel alive before the month is up.
Or should I say, before I die?
The thought settles over me, and for a moment, the room feels unbearably quiet again.
Iโm still scared. Of course I am. Iโd be lying if I said otherwise. I donโt want to die, and I certainly donโt want to spend my remaining days pretending that I do.
But I canโt change my diagnosis by sitting here crying, and I canโt make Felix love me by wishing hard enough.
What I can do is decide what happens next.
I pick up the pen again and draw a little star beside the title.
