End of Affection

By Kartika Lestari

Harry’s heart felt like the earth after being hit by a meteor, shattered into pieces, nothing but a deep, empty hole. He gripped his wife Shanti’s hand, who sat beside him on the couch in their dining room. Since they made their way out of the hospital that afternoon, she had leaned on his arm.

“I’m sorry,” Shanti whispered. Her voice sounded hoarse. Tears trickled down her cheeks. 

He wiped her tears while putting his arm around her. “No, honey. Nothing to be sorry about.”  

“I shouldn’t trouble you.”

“No…” he said in an undertone. “I’m so grateful to have you. I wouldn’t be here without you.”

Her gaze fell on a large painting hanging on the opposite wall—an oil painting based on a family photo she had commissioned about fifteen years ago, before their two daughters, Amy and Lisa, had gotten married and given them four grandchildren. 

He followed her gaze. “I’ll call them.” He lifted his hand from her shoulder to reach for the phone on the TV console.

“No…not now.” She held him back. “I just want to be with you now.” She took hold of his hand and rested her head on his shoulder. 

She must need time to calm herself. He stroked the base of her palm with his fingers. I must become her tower of strength. He planted a kiss on her head.

That evening, she had gone to sleep right after taking a pill prescribed by Dr. Ben. Harry leaned against the headboard. His hands held a postcard-size picture of a young woman wearing a full-skirted, tea-length dress. He remembered the dress had been guava green, though it appeared gray in the picture. Her hair was slicked back with a curl at the bottom like Grace Kelly’s. He watched his wife sleeping on her back to his left. Her face hadn’t changed much, though fine wrinkles now spread across her forehead and the corners of her eyes. She’d dyed her wavy hair, keeping it black, which made her look years younger. He was about to imagine her in ten or twenty years when her wrinkles would have gotten deeper, but Dr. Ben’s words rang: Don’t wait too long to decide, because stage four of cancer is when it becomes inoperable. Harry’s eyes shifted to her chest. It steadily rose and fell like any other day, month, or year. He didn’t detect any difference. Had Dr. Ben misdiagnosed? Harry hoped, but the CT-scan images showed… He released a breath, knowing his hope would only remain hope.    

He glanced at the clock on the opposite wall—almost 8:30. His wife had asked not to tell their children yet, but no…he shouldn’t have put it off. He got up and strode into the dining room. There, he dialed Amy and Lisa’s numbers, asking them to come this weekend.

Two months later… Shanti sat upright on the hospital’s bed, propped by a pillow. Two weeks earlier, she’d undergone surgery to remove the mass, along with the whole of her left lung. Her daughters had just left the room to arrange everything for her discharge the next day. 

Harry held her hand, careful not to disturb the intravenous needle. He knew they were not safe yet. He had something to say, but he couldn’t find a single word. 

“Harry?” Shanti broke the silence. “What’s wrong?” She tilted her head to the right, as if she felt his nervousness and tried to discover the cause.

Harry lifted his head, looking at her. “Yesterday…” 

“Yes?” She gazed at him.

“Dr. Ben talked about the next steps. He said—”

“Chemotherapy?” 

“It’s the only way of—”

“I know…” The light in her eyes faded. 

He scanned her face.

“Do you remember Angela?” she asked. 

He nodded. Angela, her best friend, had died five years earlier after about three years of battling cervical cancer.  

“She had chemotherapy.” Her eyes wandered. “Took dozens of medicines, bought a wig—” She took a few short breaths. “She—her family, every day, only thought—talked about how to combat her sickness.” Her voice broke. She swallowed. Her shoulders jiggled. 

He sprang forward and soothed her upper back while observing her breath. “Are you OK? I’ll call the doctor.” 

Her thin lips formed a small O. 

He sat back and rubbed her knee beneath the covers. Her breath steadied, though a slight wheeze still sounded at times. A gurney’s wheels and footsteps in the corridor filled the silence. 

“Harry,” she said in a low pitch. 

He raised his head and saw her peering at him with rheumy eyes.

“I want to keep my hair. I don’t want the nausea, the vomiting, the agony— I want a life.”

He stared blankly at the transparent bag of assorted colored, deflated balloons, given to her by Dr. Ben that morning, on her lap.

“I want a life with you, with our children…without pain.” 

He squeezed his eyes shut. What could he say? He wanted her to live longer than the six months estimated by Doctor Ben. Chemotherapy would help kill any remaining cancer cells. He frowned. No—he knew he shouldn’t have pushed her to do something she didn’t want to. He shouldn’t have distressed her, ever. Now all he could do was to walk beside her. He buried his fears deep inside his heart. He gazed at her, nodding once, almost unnoticed.

One month had passed when Shanti tied off a red inflated balloon as big as a Fuji apple. 

“It’s the biggest one yet!” Harry wrote “Fuji Apple” and that day’s date on the balloon, then hung it on the standing hat rack next to the TV console. She grinned, not taking her eyes off the colorful balloons ranging from a kiwi on one end to the newly hung Fuji apple on the other. Dozens, next to the kiwi one, had shriveled. These represented the progress she had made to expand her lung capacity since leaving the hospital. Each time she tried to inflate the balloon a little more, to create a more substantial fruit. 

He noticed beads of sweat on her brow, so he took a handkerchief out of his pocket to wipe them. “That’s enough for today, honey. Don’t push yourself.” He looked at the row of balloons. He never counted how many blown-up balloons they had, but there had been twenty-five pieces in the plastic bag. She had inflated them all, and he bought another pack a few days ago. His eyes fell to deflated ones hanging at the very bottom of the standing rack; they had never reached a bergamot orange when she blew them up in the first two weeks after her return. Then he eyed the kiwi-grapefruit sequence that had given him more hope day by day. The corners of his mouth curved up. “Soon, we’ll have a honeydew,” he whispered in her ear. 

Her eyes sparkled as she nodded as if she would blow up one for him.

The medical check-up in the fourth month since Shanti’s discharge showed the mass had spread to the right lung. Her condition deteriorated, and it became harder for Harry to care for her on his own. So, they moved to Amy’s house, which was about an hour’s drive from theirs. 

On that particular morning, Amy and her husband had already left for work, and the kids were at school. The caregiver had called to say her bike was giving her trouble. So, nobody was at home except Harry and Shanti. They sat beside each other on a living room sofa, facing balloons hanging on a string stretched across the wall next to the couch. Most of them had lost their shapes, but nothing seemed to be a honeydew. An unopened bag of balloons lay on the wooden table in the middle of the room. 

“I want to eat pudding,” she said. 

Her appetite surprised him, but it could only be a good sign. He hastened to take a cup of chocolate pudding from the small fridge next to her and fed her until the last spoonful. A moment after throwing the cup in the trash and taking his seat, he felt her hand touching his arm.  

“I’m sleepy,” she said. “Can I sleep here?” She touched his lap.

He looked at her. “Of course!”

He got up and helped her lift her legs onto the couch, turning her upper body a bit so she could lie on her back. Then he placed a seat cushion under her knees. He was about to fetch the ventilator from the corner when she nudged him. 

“I don’t need it,” she said. 

So, he sat a few inches behind her backside, put a pillow on his lap, and helped her lie down and rest her head on the pillow in his lap. “Comfortable?” 

She nodded slightly, smiling. “Thank you, honey.”

He saw her eyes close. As he put his hand on her shoulder, he felt her breath movements—short but steady, no wheezing. With his free hand, he reached for his bag on the side table, unzipped it, and retrieved the monochrome photo of the young Shanti. He couldn’t forget the moment when she had given him the picture.  

***

Over five decades ago, on a Sunday evening, about a week before the 1961 New Year and a few days before his birthday, Harry sat on the terrace of Shanti’s home and asked if she would marry him. He didn’t have enough money to buy a ring and instead handed her a potted rose tree as high as his upper arm he’d planted himself. Her eyes widened with astonishment, gazing at the only newly bloomed white flower. She breathed yes. 

When he rose to leave, she asked him to wait and entered her home. He didn’t remember how long he waited outside alone until she came back with an envelope in her hand. Your birthday gift, she said. She told him she had prepared it for a month, but she wrote the last two sentences on the back just now.

That night, he surveyed every pixel of her image, admiring her beauty, until he nodded off in the following dawn. He’d thrown the plain envelope but kept the picture wherever he walked. 

***

Shanti had slept. Harry caressed her temple and gently smoothed back her hairline. Then he noticed her chest move up as if she breathed in as much air as possible and released it in one motion, as if someone pulled her heart away from her body. The swiftness shocked him.

“Honey?” His heart thudded faster. “Shanti?” He placed his fingers under her nose but didn’t feel any air. His hands trembled. He set the picture down on her arm and placed his thumb on the side of her wrist. No pulse. He moved his hand to the front of her neck, under the jaw. No vibration. He leaned forward, hugging her. His brow met hers. Something seemed to burst from his chest. His shoulders shook as he begged, please don’t go now. You haven’t even blown up one honeydew yet. 

Balinese metallophones played from the open studio next to the house when the picture fell to the floor, landing face down on the carpet, revealing handwriting in faded blue ink on the back: “Happy Birthday – 29th December 1960.” Thank you for choosing me to be your bride. Keep holding me, and I’ll always be by your side until my last breath. 

Kartika Lestari began writing in 2021, after serving as a full-time lecturer and climate scientist for 23 years. She has focused on nonfiction, some of which has appeared in small online magazines. Occasionally, she also writes on Medium. Her essay collection, Ganbarou!: Stories behind Japan’s efforts in dealing with disasters, is currently being prepared for publication by a publisher in Indonesia. Now, she is working on her first memoir. Since 2023, she has served as co-organizer of the annual Japan Writers Conference. She is also a freelance editor of academic papers.

Kartika was born and grew up in a town on a mountainside in Indonesia. She and her husband currently live in Japan with their dog and run a growing business. Find her at www.kartikalestari.com.