Money, Sex & Eternal Life

Ronnie…

The phone ripped me out of a deep sleep; it was 4.21am, Ronnie was dying.

My distraught caller sobbed that her hubby was about to succumb to the cancer that he’d been fighting for the past few months. She was sitting with him at that very moment in Glenn Innes hospital where doctors gave him only a few hours to live. He had asked about me. Could I come? Quickly?

Sitting bolt upright in bed, I was overwhelmed by shock mingled with disbelief. My mate Ronnie dying? We were young blokes with our whole lives ahead of us. Indestructible, immortal almost! We had big dreams that didn’t include leaving planet Earth just yet; death wasn’t on our agenda.

I checked the luminous clock dial and figured the eight-hour drive would land me in Glenn Innes around noon. Would Ronnie hang on that long? Our friendship since primary school suggested he was worth the effort. Throwing on the jeans and sweatshirt that were lying on the floor, I jumped into my Ute and spat gravel as I speared off into the night.

I usually enjoyed long drives, but this time I couldn’t settle down. I gave up jabbing at the radio, turned it off, and watched the video that was playing in my mind. It was crammed with nostalgia; me and Ronnie, the road trips, sleeping out in swags, fishing, BBQs, the laughs, being each other’s Best Man, playing touch footy with our mates. It hurt like crazy somewhere deep inside to think that he was about to leave us. Forever! I suddenly realised for the first time in many years that my eyes were full of tears. Damn it, no one could see me; I let ‘em flow.

I was nearing Muswellbrook on the New England when the sun started struggling into an anaemic dawn, throwing long shadows from the occasional roo that grazed the verge. Spider webs glistening with dew hung in the barbed wire fences like diamond-encrusted necklaces. As I charged on towards Ronnie, my thoughts turned from the old days to the present. What would I say to Ronnie if he was still alive when I got there? The finality of Ronnie’s predicament suddenly overawed me; this wasn’t someone else, this was my best mate.

Down the years, Ronnie and I had had a few debates about life. I had always been open to the possibility that someone or something was out there in the cosmos quietly influencing the human race, but he was adamant I was wrong. He wasn’t nasty, just sarcastic with a wicked sense of humour. As far as he was concerned, we were here on Earth by chance, the by-product of billions of years of evolution.

‘What you see is all you’ve got mate,’ was his mantra, ‘when ya cark it, that’s it, the end!’

Maybe he was right, but then again, perhaps he wasn’t. If the doctor’s gloomy prognosis was correct, then Ronnie was about to find out for himself. He would soon know with absolute certainty whether he was a lump of meaningless meat sliding into unconscious oblivion. Or, maybe he’d meet up with some mysterious Bloke Upstairs who had put the world together.

As I pondered the eternal implications of death, I experienced an acute pang of concern for Ronnie that transcended his physical predicament. I felt like I wanted to assure him that there was hope beyond the grave; tell him that I loved him. Would that be too sloppy for a dying mate to hear from another bloke? Try as I may, I couldn’t think of anything halfway appropriate to say as I tossed it around in my mind.

As I sat there staring at the monotonous white line flicking past at 140, I realised I was praying for Ronnie, a simple prayer that went like ‘please look after my mate’. That surprised me because I never prayed. I had previously thought a bit about prayer but honestly couldn’t believe that they got answered, mainly because there was no evidence that anyone was listening; was there? It annoyed me to think about the claims some people made about their prayers. Utter bullshit! But what the heck, right now I didn’t have any other options.

I was still going full belt when I flashed past the 60 sign on the edge of town. I braked hard when the ‘Glen Innes District Hospital’ arrow pointed me down a cross street. Swinging into the car park, I left the keys in the Ute as I limped stiffly to the Reception counter; it had been a long stint behind the wheel. The nurse frowned when I mentioned Ronnie’s name, then pointed me to a room down the end of a long sterile corridor. My Redbacks squished on the highly polished linoleum floor; the sound echoed down the disinfected white tunnel to the only door at the end.

As I opened the Visitors Room door I was confronted by about a dozen bleary-eyed people seated along the walls; they were facing each other on two bench seats, all staring like zombies, no one saying a word. They all looked at me at once, then just as quickly they all looked away, like spectators following the ball at a tennis match. Still, no one spoke. I recognised only two of the people in the room. One was Ronnie’s wife Lorraine, who had called me eight hours earlier, and then there was ‘the other woman’.

I’d only met the other woman, Doris, once before when I stumbled upon her and Ronnie totally by chance late one night at an outer Sydney pub a few years back. They were sitting holding hands listening to a rock band with a couple of rounds of empties stacked on the table in front of them. Ronnie’s jaw dropped, and his eyes almost left their sockets when he saw me; I was the last person he could have expected to run into on the far side of town. He went sheet white, uncharacteristically stuttering as he leapt to his feet to shake my paw. He awkwardly introduced me to Doris. After a minute of uncomfortable chit-chat, he said he needed a pee and towed me out to the Men’s.

Stunned, and before I could say anything, my typically self-confident mate grabbed my shoulder and started babbling. His confession shocked me! It turned out that he had known Doris since she was his high school crush. They’d dated until Lorraine came along and then drifted apart after he had married Lorraine. But less than a year into his marriage Doris had resurfaced, and they had rekindled the fire, but secretly. No one knew. No one suspected a thing, not his wife Lorraine, not even me, his best mate!

As we stood there in the Men’s room those few years ago, Ronnie pleaded with me to keep his secret. He reckoned he loved both women and would do anything not to see either of them hurt. I tried to extract a promise that he’d give up on Doris and devote himself to his wife, but no go. Ronnie said he’d rather jump under a bus than give up either love. I figured it was his life, not mine, so I decided I’d say nothing. We never discussed Doris again; we both just sort of pretended she didn’t exist.

As I stood staring at the tear-stained mourners in the Visitors Room, Lorraine got up, grabbed me in a weak hug, and then led me outside. Sure enough, Ronnie was dying. He’d had a crook back for years, and like most blokes he’d just put up with it rather than seek medical advice. But seven weeks ago he’d been admitted to hospital with particularly bad spasms. Tests had revealed cancer in his spine, which had already invaded most of his body; it was too late for chemo or to operate. He was a goner. Lorraine sobbed as she told me Ronnie was now passing in and out of consciousness and that the doctor had suggested she summons the family to prepare for his imminent demise.

Lorraine was touched that so many family and friends had taken the time to come to join her on the death watch, including ‘our old school friend Doris’. Obviously, Lorraine still knew nothing about Doris and Ronnie.

I left Lorraine in the Visitors Room and squished my way back to the Nurses’ station to find out where I could locate Ronnie. The duty nurse said it was futile, that he was out to it and unlikely to regain consciousness. I insisted that I needed to see him, pleading that I’d driven eight hours non-stop to visit him before he passed away. She relented and said that if I wanted to sit with him that would be OK, but only 5 minutes. My heart was in my throat as she led me to a private room, where she pushed me through the door and left. There was Ronnie, lying unconscious, tubes everywhere, hooked up to a variety of machines that beeped and flashed. I was shocked as I dragged up a chair next to the bed and looked at my old mate. He was lying on his back, mouth open, a cadaver reduced to skin and bone. The slight rise and fall of his chest was the only sign of life.

I pulled the chair closer so that I was sitting right next to his unshaven face, near enough so that I could just hear his raspy, uneven breath. His chest rattled deep inside with every breath. The place reeked of disinfectant. I had no idea about what to do or how to react; I had never been with a dying person before. I grabbed Ronnie’s hand and held it; it was quite cold. Once again, I realised that I was praying that Ronnie would be OK. I didn’t expect any answer, so the hair rose on the back of my neck when Ronnie half-opened his eyes and peered at me. ‘Hey mate,’ he grated feebly.

‘Hell, Ronnie, you scared the shit outta me… how ya going, mate?’ I gave his hand a squeeze. He gave me a weak squeeze back.

‘Me? I’m stuffed mate…. me back, cancer…. the Big C‘s everywhere they reckon, all over me, it’s...