The Mole

After years of daily inspections, contorting his body to see his back and behind, pulling his hair apart so he could examine his scalp, checking between his toes as well as the soles of his feet, Chase finally saw something that looked a bit unusual. It was a mole. Well, he wasn’t actually sure it was a mole, but it was some new mark on his skin, and it was easiest for Chase to mentally refer to it as the mole. He found it on his back, slightly higher than the midpoint and just a smidge to the left of his spine. The mole was in a place that easily could have gone undetected unless one had a partner point it out, or, as was the case with Chase, one was carefully checking their skin, using a handheld mirror in combination with the one on his bathroom wall.

The mole looked innocent enough. There wasn’t anything about it that made Chase think the new lesion was any different, or potentially more dangerous, than the red bumps or brown patches that began appearing on his skin after he turned thirty. It probably wasn’t even worth monitoring or creating expectations.  

 

Winnow approached Chase after their co-ed softball teams had lined up and shaken hands at the conclusion of their mid-summer game.  

“Hey, take it easy on us next time.”  

Chase recognized the second baseman from his competitor. “We shouldn’t be in this league.”

“Why are you?”

“The execs want a trophy, I guess. This was our closest game so far.”

“24-4. If you guys are that good, you could have let a gal get a hit.”

Chase recalled Winnow leading off the game with a soft liner over the head of the pitcher.  He heard cheers from her teammates as he drifted over from his shortstop position and grabbed the ball on a hop just beyond the infield dirt. He fired it to first to nab her by half a step.

“You got down the line pretty quick. It was closer than I thought it was going to be.”

“I used to run track. You play other sports?”

“I played basketball and football growing up, but baseball was always my favorite.”

“You’re an adult now. Do you ride?”

“Ride?” Chase couldn’t envision the freckled female wearing a baseball cap riding a motorcycle.  

“Yeah, on a bike. Thirty or forty miles.”

“I’ve never kept track of how far I rode on a bike. Just as far as I needed to go, I guess.”

“We should ride sometime.”  

 

Chase didn’t think the mole appeared any more grotesque or threatening than the spots Winnow had circled with a pen on the morning of his annual physical.

“Make sure Dr. T. sees these,” she would say as Chase twisted his head over both shoulders trying to find the lesions and his wife’s markings.

“I will but he always says they’re nothing to worry about.”

“Didn’t he say you shouldn’t get new things on your skin at your age?”

“He said I shouldn’t get new moles. Other stuff is okay. Maybe not okay. They might be ugly and unwanted, but they’re not going to kill you.”

“Well, I’m not a doctor, he is. He can tell you if they’re moles or not.”

Chase didn’t have a pen and wasn’t sure he could circle the mole even if he had one. He also didn’t have an appointment for a physical, and Dr. T. had retired.

Chase decided to continue watching the mole to see if it changed in any way. He was still pretty sure it wouldn’t amount to anything.

 

Their first date, if it was a date, was an expensive one for Chase. Winnow met him at a local bike shop. She wore shorts and a sleeveless top, which was appropriate attire for outside on the hot summer day, but Chase noticed goosebumps on her arms inside the store that had cranked the air conditioning.

“You okay?”

“I should have brought a sweater.”

“You want to wait outside?”

Winnow grabbed a men’s bike jersey off a hanger. She practically disappeared beneath the extra-large blue top with a lightning bolt across the back. “You might want to get one of these. You’ll definitely need shorts at least.”

“What else?”

“Bike, helmet, shoes with clips, bike shorts. Jersey is optional. And sunblock. Lots and lots of sunblock.”

“They sell that here?”

“They should. You go out riding for a few hours, you’ll need it.”

“Who’s getting a bike?” A salesperson with square glasses and a triangle of facial hair on his chin joined them.

“He is. First road bike.”

“You look about my height. Six feet?”

Chase nodded. “Yeah, why?”

“You want it to fit right. Is there a style you like?”

Chase pointed at a red Cannondale.

“That one’s too small. We can order it in your size, but for testing purposes, why don’t you try this white one? It’s also a Cannondale.”

The salesperson had Chase get on the bike, then off, so he could adjust the height of the seat. “You can ride around the block a couple of times to see how it feels. You won’t normally wear jeans when you ride so it won’t feel as smooth today.”

“Can I ride with these?” Chase lifted his leg to show he was wearing boat shoes.

The salesperson sighed. “They’re fine for going around the block.”

“He’s going to want clip pedals and some shoes,” Winnow said.

“You warn him about falling?”

“Not yet.” Winnow led Chase towards the door. “Don’t want to scare him until he makes the purchase.”

Chase rode around the block twice. He wasn’t sure what he was expected to feel. It felt like any other time he’d ridden a bike in his life, except he had to hunch over a bit more.

“Did you change gears?” Winnow asked when he returned.

“No.” He’d seen levers on both the left and right sides of the handlebars but didn’t know how they worked. In any case, the suburban streets were flat.

Winnow examined the gears and brakes. “Mine’s an R500, so this one should be pretty similar.”

Chase noticed his was an R600. “Should I get it?”

Winnow removed the jersey and draped it over Chase’s shoulder. “It’s a good bike, but you’re going to want to use it if you buy it. There are cheaper ones if you only want to ride casually and pedal hard to try to keep up.”

Chase didn’t know a thing about the sport of cycling. He’d never watched the Tour de France and couldn’t name a cyclist other than Lance Armstrong. But he was attracted to Winnow’s petite physical appearance and her confident demeanor. He knew he wanted to spend more time with her. If she was into cycling, and willing to educate him on the ins and outs of the sport, he decided he’d give it a try.

After he dropped almost a thousand dollars, Chase stood outside the bike shop holding a paper bag containing shoes, clips, a helmet, shorts, a green jersey, and the receipt. He wondered if he would see Winnow again before his bike arrived in a week to ten days.

She looked into his bag, then up at him. “Seems like you should walk away with more than that for a grand.” 

“Two bags, at least.”

“Well, since you’ve spent all that money, I guess I can buy you a beer.”

“When?”

Winnow hooked her arm around the one he used to hold his bag.  “C’mon.”

 

Chase thought the mole looked more like an anvil than a circle, but it was hard to tell. He wasn’t sure of its color. It appeared to be brown and tan. It seemed a little crusty and slightly elevated, but he wasn’t a doctor.

Chase set down the handheld mirror and stared at the larger one in his bathroom. The man he saw looked fine, healthy, perhaps in need of some sleep, but he wasn’t overweight, nor was he frail. He didn’t think he looked like a man who had cancer or could have cancer.

He’d always felt a bit sheepish telling Dr. T. about the blotches and skin conditions, but he knew Winnow would have been upset if he didn’t mention them. Dr. T. told him the small red bumps were broken capillaries.

“We’re about the same age and have fair skin. We get older and things appear on our bodies.” A few times, Dr. T. momentarily left the inspection room and returned to apply liquid nitrogen to his skin. “Used about half of this with another patient. Would toss it anyway. I’m sure these are nothing, but this will take care of them.”

Chase believed Dr. T. would probably do the same with Chase’s new lesion if he were still practicing.  

 

The first couple of times, Chase fell, like many road bike newbies. He came to a stop and forgot, or was unable, to click out of the pedal clips. Momentarily, he was suspended in mid-air but without the ability to place a foot on the ground, so he soon toppled over. He suffered more from embarrassment than the fall as onlookers asked if he was okay.

“You have to take the clips out in advance of coming to a stop,” Winnow said.

“What if it’s a sudden stop?”

“That can be a problem. That’s one of the reasons I like riding on trails more than streets.  Less need to stop all the time.” Winnow brushed dirt from Chase’s jersey. “You can ride with one foot out of the clips until you get used to taking them in or out or when you know you’re going to have to stop a lot.”

Before they rode, Winnow and Chase put on cushioned bike shorts and jerseys with pouches in the back. They pumped up their bike tires and filled water bottles to take on their ride.  They lathered their faces, necks, arms, and legs in SPF 50 sunblock. 

Sometimes, they rode through city streets to reach a trail. Other times, they drove to a parking lot close to another. In the early days, Winnow picked a destination, be it a lunch spot or a taproom for their ride, to give Chase something to look forward to. Fellow cyclists on trails would extend their fingers from the brake as a sign of camaraderie. Those who showed up at tap rooms in cycling clothes and helmets were kin.  

Chase came to appreciate the joy of riding for its own sake. Being in nature, seeing flora and fauna, lakes and rivers. Working the body, especially one’s legs, and giving the mind time to rest or time to ponder, depending on one’s mood. Thinking they were doing their part to help the planet by relying on their own power rather than a combustion engine.  

They’d get back home four or five hours later, dirt and small insects covering their arms and legs, caught by the sticky sunblock. Gross and disgusting until they showered, and exhausted by the long ride and hours under a beating sun, they were nonetheless always elated by the experiences of the day and the companionship, soon looking forward to their next ride together.

 

Chase triple-checked the mole when he first noticed a change.

It had grown. Not that it was suddenly enormous, but it seemed a little bigger.  He couldn’t really measure it, but Chase believed he no longer had to contort his body quite as much to catch a glimpse. Without pulling on as much skin, without twisting his neck as far, he could see it. Part of it anyway. The mole was moving into view.

 It was also developing more color, or precisely, more colors. There was some black and a bit of red; it wasn’t just brown and tan anymore. No longer was it a mere splotch on his skin like the other the marks, lesions, and patches he’d observed appear without warning. The mole, this mole, was different. It had character, it had pizzazz.

Chase almost wanted to tell someone but whom would that be?

 

Chase and Winnow knew their lives would forever change once they had kids. While they believed that would ultimately be for the better, they saw no reason to rush to the point from which there would be no turning back. They spent years taking trips to escape northern winters for warmer climates and to get the opportunity to rent bikes and ride when snow and ice otherwise interrupted their regular, weekend pattern for months at a time.  

The downside of riding out of state was not knowing where the local trails were located.  More so than at home, they sometimes had to travel along the side of a road beside cars that were not merely impatient when desiring to make a right turn but seemingly hostile to the very presence of cyclists for some reason. Chase and Winnow always told one another to be careful, and they were, but, in the end, that wasn’t enough.    

Chase felt the truck even before he saw or heard it. He was following Winnow doing about 18 miles per hour on a flat road. The three-lane traffic to the left was supposed to travel at 35.  

Chase felt someone not passing him. He quickly glanced over his left shoulder and saw a white pickup truck thrusting close to, but not past, him. He heard it rev and watched it inch closer and closer to him and the white line the State had thought sufficient to protect cyclists.

He should have warned Winnow. That’s what he thought later when he replayed the day over and over again.

He knew it would have been hard for her to hear him even if he had yelled. And he wouldn’t have wanted her to turn her head to try to understand what he was saying. That would have been dangerous. But he thought he should have done something.

When the truck refused to pass him, Chase presumed the guy— it had to be a dude — wanted to scare him, not Winnow. For about five minutes, he did. Then Chase heard a horn further back. Probably another car growing impatient with the truck’s lack of speed.

Suddenly, the truck floored it and zoomed past Chase. Chase was ever so briefly thankful.  But the truck didn’t make it past Winnow. It swerved into her.

Maybe it had only tried to scare her as well. Cut in front to make her brake hard. But the truck didn’t slip past. Its back wheel clipped Winnows’ front, and she flew across the truck into traffic as Chase braked hard and tumbled over his handlebars, fracturing his collarbone.

 

Chase believed most cancers could be treated if discovered and diagnosed early. He used to wonder why people would not more regularly check their bodies for signs or why the healthcare industry wouldn’t require more preventative checks. After all, what you didn’t know could hurt you.

But he now understood that early discovery was just one component. People all the time must find lumps in their breasts or testes and choose to ignore them.

“It’s probably nothing,” was more wishful thinking than accurate self-diagnosis.

Chase recognized he had cancer. He knew with skin cancer in particular, early treatment was vital. But Chase chose not to seek medical attention.

 

Chase hoped for justice and fair treatment. He received neither. The local prosecutor allowed Winnow’s killer to plead no contest to one count of careless driving and one count for the failure to have auto insurance. He did not seek jail time.

Chase planned to sue the killer in civil court, but the out-of-state attorney he engaged tried to persuade him not to do it. “He’s essentially judgment proof.”  

“He’s got a house and that truck.”

“He’s got no insurance and gets to keep his residence. You really want that truck?”

“Would I get to blow it up?”

“If you did, you’d be the one in jail.”

The local newspaper angered Chase most of all. Every time it reported Winnow’s death or the legal proceedings surrounding it, the reporter inevitably described the events as a “biking accident.” After the third occasion, Chase wrote a letter to the editor.

My wife was a great cyclist. She regularly biked more than 2000 miles each year.

Winnow did not die in a biking accident. Perhaps that phrase would be apropos if she went out riding in the rain and skidded on wet leaves when she tried to make a sharp turn. Or maybe if she forgot to pull her clips out when she came to a stop and somehow fell over and hit her head.

What happened here—as you well know—is that the killer wanted to harass two individuals solely because they chose to exercise their right to bike along a public city street.  Strapped inside his two-ton truck, Winnow’s killer revved his vehicle directly behind me, inching closer and closer to my back tire. If at any point I had needed to make a sudden stop, he might have run right over me.  

I wish that had happened. Instead, after tormenting me, he sped ahead and launched his vehicle into my wife. Maybe had your local prosecutor actually investigated the matter he would have learned the killer intended to hit my wife and was guilty of murder.

In any case, her killer should have been charged with manslaughter for such reckless behavior that showed a wanton disregard for human life.

The events of March 10 were no more of a biking accident than it would be to describe the victim of a car bombing as having been in an auto accident.  

 

 

Chase stopped inspecting the mole after a few months. He knew the cancer was progressing because his abdomen and his bones ached. He understood the cancer had metastasized in other parts of his body. He wondered when it would be safe to seek medical assistance so that he might be relieved of some of his suffering.

 

“Litigation would be a waste of time and money.”  

Chase refused to be persuaded by his attorney. “I want a judgment.”

“You’ll spend thousands, if not tens of thousands, for a piece of paper.”

“I don’t care.”

The attorney filed the complaint with the local court and had a process server serve the killer. When the killer failed to answer the complaint, Chase moved for default.

To the surprise of Chase’s lawyer, the killer appeared at the hearing. He wore a tattered plaid shirt and a red bandana that the judge asked him to remove. She was a woman in her forties, dressed in her legal robe. “If you don’t want to default, you need to provide an answer to the complaint.”

“How I do that?”

“You might start by getting an attorney to represent you.”

The killer turned his jean pockets inside out. “I don’t have the money.  See?”

“Then you’ll have to answer the complaint yourself.”

“It was an accident.”

Chase thought he heard the killer stifle a chuckle when he spoke those words.

After she gave Chase’s attorney the opportunity to address his motion, the judge told everyone she was giving the killer another week to respond, or she’d find him in default.

On the day it was due, Chase’s lawyer received a copy of the complaint with the word “ANSWER” handwritten at the top. The allegations were also addressed through the killer’s bad penmanship. The most common response was “B.S.”

Chase’s counsel served written discovery that went ignored, as did his attempt to depose the killer. After months of non-responsiveness and two more motions that the killer did not attend, the judge ruled in Chase’s favor. She then held a hearing to assess damages.  Chase’s lawyer asked him to tell the Court about Winnow.

“She was everything, Your Honor. It’s not like my life was terrible before I met her, but after some time together, a couple of months at most, I realized I had a new version of life that I never had before. Everything that was good was better.  Everything that was bad was more tolerable. We always enjoyed each other’s company and did almost everything together. We got engaged after knowing each other for a year and married a year after that. We knew our life together would never end, only change. After years of waiting, we were ready to expand our family. She was two months pregnant when she was killed. We still hadn’t told anyone.  

“I don’t want any money. I don’t want anything from the killer. He already took everything I had and can’t give any of it back. I just want people to know, and I’d like the State to do more to protect cyclists from these maniacs who don’t care if they kill another human being.”

 

Chase didn’t put a gun to his head. He just let life run its course naturally. He allowed the mole to consume his body.

Chase knew it was too late but still wanted to hold out as long as he could. He called his lawyer and had him draft a will. He set aside money to have himself buried with Winnow. He wanted the rest of his savings to go to organizations that worked to create bike trails that prohibited use by automotive vehicles.  

 

Chase had a judgment, nothing more, other than an idea. He hadn’t ridden since the day Winnow was killed but decided that was how he’d do it. Riding alone as long and as far as he could on bright sunny days, dressed as he had in the past with one exception. He no longer used any sunblock.  

He rode past familiar and new places, observing nature’s beauty, and occasionally, some ugly human behavior, but every time he looked—be it in front or behind him, to his left or to his right—he couldn’t find Winnow. He rode alone. He only stopped momentarily to sip some water.  To visit the places he’d previously enjoyed with Winnow beside him would have only left him feeling emptier.  

When he returned home, Chase’s face, neck, arms, and legs were often as red as they could be, and frequently painful to the touch. A day or two later, his skin splintered and shed. He left mounds of it on top of his vanity, as well as the bathroom floor. He never threw any of it away or cleaned the piles. He left them where they gathered to remind him of the path he had chosen and to demonstrate the progress he was making towards achieving his final goal. It took years, but one day Chase discovered the mole.