The Study
“It just isn’t fair.
This can’t be happening. What
are we going to do? Rebecca’s Leukemia
was responding so well to the Triton-proclax.
Why the hell were they taking it off the market? There is nothing else that works. She hasn’t had seizures, she hasn’t fainted.
She can’t drive a car while on it, big deal.
It’s keeping her alive. Doc, what the hell are we supposed to do? What
if it was your wife, Doc?”
“John… Rebecca, please.
You knew this was a trial program when you signed up.”
“But it’s working, Doc. It’s working.”
“The first few months of the study went well. Last week
reports of seizures started to come in. There have been 7 deaths reported in
the past two days. The trial is a
failure. Triton-proclax 50/20 is
shutdown.”
“It’s still on the market in Argentina, isn’t it, Doc? It’s still available in Argentina.”
“It’s not the same drug, John. I’m sorry. Rebecca, I want you to stay at home for the next week.
Rest, and eat whatever you feel like eating. Please write down everything you
eat, and make a note of anything unusual that you may feel. Please come back to
the office this Tuesday, and Thursday. I want to take some blood tests. It’s
important that we monitor your withdrawal from Triton-proclax 50/20 closely.
There is a very limited sample of people who came off the trial early, and
there were … complications. So it’s important to stay on top of things.”
John and Rebecca shuffled out of Dr. Mallory’s office. Their
thirty something faces suddenly looking forty something under the strain of
their despair. Rebecca’s complexion had turned from rosy to ashen, not from her
illness, but from her loss of hope.
Rebecca stayed in bed all weekend. She didn’t have much of
an appetite. She felt like a condemned woman, her bedroom had become her death
row cell. She sat at her dressing table and started to write notes of farewell
to everyone in her life. She had no idea how rapidly her condition would worsen
now that she had been removed from her wonder drug. John, on the other hand,
set out to find Triton-proclax on the black market.
On Tuesday Rebecca struggled to get herself dressed, then
John drove Rebecca to the doctor’s office for her blood test. After their
office visit they drove home, not speaking until John finally broke the
silence.
“Honey. I got a name
today. A pharmacist over in Braperton county.
I can get a thirty-day supply for ten thousand dollars.”
“What are you talking about, John? You heard the Doctor.”
“No. Honey. Really, this guy said that the pharmaceutical
company was ordered to collect and destroy all the Triton-proclax distributed
for the study. He says a guy on the inside at the incinerator plant replaced
the real Triton-proclax with Argentine knock-offs. We can have as much as we can pay cash for, but we have to hurry.
There aren’t that many pills to be had.”
“John, I don’t know.”
“Oh Rebecca, please, I love you. I can’t go on without you.
Please, let’s do this.”
“John, I can’t right now. Please, let’s sleep on it
tonight. We’ll talk about it in the
morning.”
“What the hell is there to talk about?”
“John, please.”
They drove on in silence.
John occasionally took his eyes off the road to look at Rebecca. He saw
the tears in her eyes. He didn’t push the conversation. He didn’t have to. John
knew exactly what he had to do the next morning.
***
John was disappointed to find that it would be seven to ten
business days before his company 401-K plan administrator could put a cashiers
check for a hundred thousand dollars in his hand. He tried to wait, but he could not. With each passing hour he knew the supply of pills was in danger
of being bought up by other people.
People just like him, with loved ones just as sick. But John didn’t care. This was his wife. She was the only person he cared about. John decided to take ten grand out of his savings account. It would buy a thirty-day supply. That was enough to cover the wait for his
big check, and hopefully he could promise the pharmacist a big sale, and he
would keep a supply around for him.
That was a naive thought on John’s part, but he couldn’t see it.
He took the hour-long drive to Braperton county, and as
instructed by his source he pulled up to the rear entrance of the
pharmacy. He parked next to a dumpster,
walked to the beat up metal rear door and rang the bell. A man in a white coat opened the metal door
and John simply said, “TP 50/20,” and he flashed the thick wad of hundred
dollar bills. The man in the white coat simply said, “Wait here,” and the metal
door closed.
The door was closed for only a minute or two, but it seemed
like an eternity. John nervously looked around expecting the police or federal
agents to swoop down on him. Then the
metal door opened and the exchange was made. The man in the white coat didn’t count
the money. John asked, “Aren’t you
going to count it?” The man stopped, looked John square in the eyes and said,
“I’m the only supplier there is. You aren’t going to cheat me out of a couple
of hundred, and screw yourself too.”
The door closed. The transaction was over. Now John had to face Rebecca with the news of what he had done.
***
John thought but could not find the words he needed to have
his taboo conversation with Rebecca.
That evening as they finished dinner without much conversation, John
took the bottle of pills out of his pocket and placed them on the table in
front of Rebecca. Her head sunk to her
chest, and tears streamed from her eyes as she reached out and grasped the
bottle of pills. As she clutched the
bottle to her chest, her crying escalated into a mournful wailing; mixed with a
bittersweet feeling joy, and then once again, the immediate realization that
the joy was temporary at best.
***
John’s hundred thousand was enough to buy the last of the
Triton-proclax 50/20 available on the black market. They had a one-year supply of pills, a year of hoping for a
miracle.
The bi-weekly visits to Dr. Mallory’s office for monitoring
continued for the next few months. One evening after the blood was drawn Dr
Mallory asked Rebecca to join him in his office.
“Rebecca.”
“Yes, Dr. Mallory?”
“Rebecca, you must be doing something different from my
other Triton-proclax 50/20 patients.
Are you sure you are writing down everything you are eating and
drinking?”
“YES, yes, of course, Dr. Mallory, of course I am,
everything.”
“Rebecca…Look me in the eye. You have done something you
shouldn’t have, haven’t you?”
She couldn’t look him in the eye. Her own eyes were filling
with tears.
“Rebecca, that’s very risky.”
“Do you want me to stop, Dr. Mallory?”
There was a long silence. “No Rebecca. I don’t want you to
stop. But I do need you to be honest
with me. It’s the only way we can get through this.”
“You don’t want me to stop?”
“Rebecca. We are going to be honest with each other,
agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“Rebecca… You are the last surviving member of the
Triton-proclax 50/20 trial.
“What?”
“When the other patients came off the drug, their white
count exploded. I want to try and wean you off the drug slowly. Monitoring you every step of the way. Will
you work with me Rebecca?”
“Yes, I have no other choice, do I?”
“Rebecca I believe this will be a long, but hopefully a
successful process. I’m going to insert
what’s called a central access catheter in your arm, so we don’t have to keep
sticking you with needles, OK?”
“Let’s go for it, Dr. Mallory.”
“I’ll also need you to bring in your pills, Rebecca.” There
was another long pause in the conversation. “Rebecca, we have to trust one
another.”
“Okay Dr. Mallory, I’ll bring them in.”
Rebecca brought her supply of Triton-proclax 50/20 into Dr.
Mallory. Most of it that is; she kept a
months supply hidden at home, just in case.
The revelation of Rebecca’s supply presented Dr. Mallory
with a new problem. Rebecca’s ill-gotten stash of Triton-proclax 50/20 was in
fact the Argentine knock-off, not the real drug. It seemed that hope was the
medicine that was keeping Rebecca alive. Dr. Mallory’s new challenge was to
keep Rebecca’s hope alive while concocting a successful ruse to wean her off
the counterfeit drug.
