A Remote Reprieve

She hadn’t left the house in years.

Jill had moved far away from anything and anyone as soon as she got the news. She didn’t want to be a burden on a single person she loved. She knew that the diagnosis would eventually make that fear a reality so she just left town.

She didn’t say a word about any of it. She didn’t even tell them that she was leaving.

Jill knew it was cruel and some would call it a coward’s way out. She was ok with that as long as her worst fears didn’t come true.

Jill hadn’t been able to seemingly disappear on her own though. She had one true friend in life, Hunter. He was the only person she’d ever trusted. It had been over seven years and no one had found her yet.

Hunter’s car crawled past the frozen pond and up the long dirt road that led to Jill’s hideaway in the woods. She was standing in the window watching for his headlights. When she saw him she grabbed her bags and headed out the door.

Locking it from the outside, Jill was greeted with the crisp dark air of the early morning. She heard Hunter put the car into park. Anxiety rushed over her.

As if going to the doctor to hear you’re dying isn’t enough, she thought to herself as she took the first steps toward the car. It was just before daylight, the most frigid time of the night. Jill hoped that no one would be on the road either. She wasn’t good at being around people even if they were driving other cars.

It hadn’t always been this way. She had once been the life of the party and the girl everyone knew. That was before her diagnosis. She hadn’t cared about any of that since she learned she wouldn’t make it to motherhood.

Jill and Hunter needed to be on the road well before the sun came up and he reminded her as soon as she got to the car.

She was nervous. He hadn’t seen her in a while. He had just been leaving her supplies on the steps. She looked over at him. The shock on his face told her that she looked very sick. She knew she did but something about how he looked at her made her burst into tears.

So much for my “I’m not fragile” argument. She thought.

“What?” She asked, throwing her hands up in the air trying to make it seem like everything was normal.

“I... I just hadn’t seen you in a while I guess.” he stammered, playing it off like nothing was amiss.

That’s exactly what she didn’t want. She hated knowing that he felt like he couldn’t be honest with her because she was so sick. She felt the anger rise in her chest. Not anger at Hunter, she could never be angry at him after all he’d done. She was angry at this disease that was taking over her body.

Hoping to make him comfortable, she turned to humor. “I do look like the undead, huh?”

She said through fake laughter.

“Let’s get to the highway. It’ll be a breeze from there.” Hunter expertly dodged the question.

Jill welcomed the idea that this ride didn’t have to be about how she looked or how sick she was. She knew. That’s why she had finally contacted the doctor again. She had ignored their calls and voicemails for nearly a decade.

It wasn’t anything against the doctor. She just didn’t want any treatment. She wanted to accept the fate she was given.

She felt the car moving but was trying to keep her eyes shut. She knew what lay ahead wouldn’t be easy. Not the car ride. Not the doctor’s appointment. Not what she would have to tell Hunter.

She felt the car turn onto a paved road. She couldn’t remember how far it was before they reached the highway.

“About 10 minutes” Hunter announced like he was reading her mind.

She gripped the handle of the door and the console more tightly. She squeezed her eyes shut. Breathing deeply, she tried to manage the panic that always happened when she rode in a car. Even before her diagnosis, even before she had trouble going out or being around people, Jill could never relax while riding in a car.

She kept herself calm while Hunter turned up some music. He had put her favorite tunes on a playlist for their trip. She smiled and absorbed the feeling of being around someone who cared. She tried not to let herself feel isolated but sometimes she did. She always returned to the few memories she had with Hunter, the only other person who knew she was sick when those lonely feelings crept in.

Hunter may never know how much he means to her.

She knew she couldn’t tell him because that would just make it even harder when she died.

She felt the car turn and accelerate. “We’re on the highway now!” Hunter excitedly shouted, treating it like the achievement it was.

Silence fell over the car as the lines passed under it. Only the faint sound of the playlist filled the air. As they approached the hospital Jill spoke. “Thanks again for enduring this with me.”

Hunter shrugged his shoulders and said, “No problem.”

She appreciated how nonchalant he was but sometimes she wanted the truth. She got out of the car and headed into the building knowing the doctor wouldn’t tell her what she wanted to hear.

The nurse called her name and escorted her to a room. The nurse didn’t grill her but she knew the doctor would. Her vitals weren’t bad but they weren’t good either. The doctor entered almost as soon as the nurse shut the door behind her.

“Why haven’t you been in?” he questioned.

“I didn’t want treatment,” Jill responded.

“Not any at all?” the doctor asked.

“None,” said Jill firmly.

“Ok, what brings you in today then?” the doctor moved on.

“I think I’m getting worse and I need to know how to die.” Jill expressed.

The shock on the doctor’s face told her that she was out of practice talking to people.

“How? To? Die?” he said like it was three separate questions.

“I didn’t mean it like that. I was thinking end-of-life services or something.”

“But no treatment?” the doctor asked again

“Right,” Jill confirmed.

The doctor pulled up a stool and sat down. He looked her right in the eye and asked, "Jill, what have you tried?”

“I haven’t tried anything.” Jill stared at him blankly.

“So you just gave up?” the doctor said, maintaining his gaze.

Jill was floored. She hadn’t considered that other people may see it as giving up. She had never thought of it that way. Is it giving up? She asked herself.

Something inside her told her the doctor was right. She had just given up. She hadn’t fought at all. That wasn’t like her.

Jill still didn’t accept treatment but instead decided to do something that Hunter considered reckless. She was hopping on a plane and headed somewhere. She was going to decide at the airport but Hunter was refusing to take her.

She understood he was worried because of her health but she had to go somewhere, anywhere. She needed to be with this idea that she’d given up.

After some begging and promises, Jill convinced Hunter to drop her off at the airport.

Standing at the ticket counter, Jill had no idea where she was going or what she was doing. She thought about running out the door and calling Hunter to come back but she knew she had to find confidence in herself again and this trip would surely do that.

“The next flight out is to Sanyal.” said the attendant.

“Where is that?” asked Jill.

“It’s a very small tropical island. It’s so remote they only accept two flights a year.” she read from the screen. “Sure you want to go there?”

Jill thought for a moment. She had envisioned she could go to a new city, find a doctor and start over but she had also promised herself she would get the next flight leaving.

“I’ll still go,” she said nervously.

It took 4 long flights to get her to the 6 person plane she was on now. When the plane touched down, she noticed there was no airport. The plane landed in what looked like a field. She climbed out and looked around. No signs or street lights. No streets at all. There weren’t any hotels either.

Jill panicked. What have I done? She thought.

The man from the seat next to her must have seen her shock because he said, “who family you stay with?”

“I don’t have someone to stay with,” she replied.

The man’s eyes got really big. He looked around in disbelief. “Where you sleep then?” he asked.

Jill began to cry. She had been holding in the tears since the doctor jolted her at his office. Now she was in a strange place with no way out for 6 months. She had no place to stay and there weren’t any hotels.

The man could see she was in distress and quickly offered his home to her. With no other options, Jill said yes and prepared to move in with this stranger.

All 6 people who had gotten off the plane were now walking in the same direction. Jill followed the man she was going to be living with. He looked behind him a couple of times to see if she was keeping up and took her bags the moment she began to struggle.

After about half an hour of walking, the man pointed up ahead to a small house built with rocks and mud. His front yard was filled with flowers and plants. She couldn’t see the backyard but imagined it was too. The house was secluded, he lived at the end of the dirt road, right on the water. The old man started up the path leading to his house and Jill couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

She stopped at the bottom of the path to take it all in.

The sun was setting right in front of her. It felt so close she could touch it. Beautiful water stretched out for as far as she could see between her and the sun. The breeze coming off the water blew her oversized button-up shirt behind her. She hadn’t felt the wind like that in a while. Her cabin was surrounded by woods. She heard the wind but rarely felt it.

“You sleep here.” she heard the man yell down to her. He was pointing to a small shed behind the house.

She could tell the small shed had a bed but it had gotten too dark to see much else. The kind man stuck his head out his back door and said “sleep good. Talk morning.”

Jill crawled under the blanket and the weight of the day overtook her eyelids quickly. She woke up to the sun shining in her window. Looking around her, she saw her shed was like an oasis and it even came with a little porch. She stood up to stretch and noticed the man in his kitchen, the back of his house wide open.

She made her way toward him. “Good morning,” he greeted her and gestured toward the chairs. Sitting down, she noticed a bright green light on the counter. The digital clock it was coming from was the only sign of the modern world in his house.

“You look sick he said,” as he slid her a cup of tea.

“I am,” she replied.

“Then I teach you how to heal you,” he said.

Jill stared at him. She couldn’t believe that her random flight had landed her in the hands of a traditional healer.

Find out what happens to Jill in part 2