| General Fiction posted October 10, 2025 | Chapters: |
...20 21 -22- 23... 
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Marie settles in at the Kendricks'
A chapter in the book Beating the Devil
Beating the Devil - Chapter 22
by Jim Wile
| Background A cancer researcher invents an early cancer detection system. |
Recap of Chapter 21: Brian joins Julia at the imaging center, where the ER doctor tells them she ordered an MRI of Marie’s spine because it looked like her cancer may have returned.
The next morning, Marie is visited by the on-call oncologist who reviewed her MRI, and he gives her the bad news that the cancer is back in her spine. Julia is with her. He has also ordered a CT scan of her abdomen to see if it has further metastasized.
Brian arrives later with the kids to visit Marie in the hospital. While the kids spend time with her, Julia tells Brian out in the hall that the cancer has returned and asks him how he would feel about having Marie live with them permanently until the end.
Chapter 22
“If this had been seven years ago, I would have said, ‘No way,’ but things are different now, and of course we can offer to have her live with us, if that’s what you want. But with everything you do, including training Earl to be a therapy dog, don’t you think you’ll be spread awfully thin if you have to care for her too? It’s likely to be a lot of work, especially later as the disease progresses.”
“Well, we can always hire extra help for her to share the workload if it gets to that point. You know this probably means the end of her career, so she really won’t have a reason for continuing to live in New York. I just think she’ll be much happier being around her family. Will you be able to put up with her full-time, though?”
“I love your mother now, Babe. She can be irritating at times, but she’s come a long way from how she used to be. The kids love her too. We should offer. She’ll probably put up a fuss about it, but she’ll see the wisdom of it in the end. I think it will be the best way to spend however much time she has left, and that may not be too long. I’m fairly certain of what the CT scan will reveal.”
The tears returned to Julia’s eyes. “Thank you, Brian,” she said as they hugged and held each other for a long time.
As they all feared, the CT scan of her abdomen revealed that the cancer had metastasized further than her spine—not only to her liver but also to her kidneys and large intestine.
In her two remaining days in the hospital, Marie was fitted for an orthotic brace that would cover her chest, abdomen, and lower back, giving her spine the stability it would need to heal. Thanks to the modern technology of a 3-D scanner that was used to map her body, the brace was ready in 24 hours, thus shortening her hospital stay.
Marie was released two days later with a walker to use and a prescription for physical therapy to begin once the spine had healed sufficiently. Dr. Gladwin also made a referral to an oncologist near where she would be staying in Cherrywood.
The Kendricks had planned well when they built their house because one of the five bedrooms, with an en suite, was located on the first floor. It was the room that Marie would occupy for the foreseeable future. Brian and Julia had not yet broached the subject of a permanent move, deciding to save that for a time when it would become more obvious to her.
Upon Marie’s arrival at the house, Earl greeted her at the door. He knew her well from several visits during the past year. Unlike some of the previous times, before his therapy dog training had kicked in, he greeted her calmly without jumping up, putting his paws on her chest and attempting to lick her face. This wouldn’t have been possible at any rate due to her walker, but he showed no inclination to try. There was no need to suppress that rapidly wagging tail, though, or his yips of excitement.
“Hello, Earl. How’s my favorite granddog? I’ll give you a proper hello when I get settled.”
He was happy to see her and pranced around. They had grown quite fond of each other, something that was not likely to have happened just a few years ago. She didn’t like most dogs, but this was her family now, and she loved every member.
“I could sure use a drink, Julia.”
“Okay, Mother. Let’s get you settled in the Florida room, and Brian will make your favorite.
When she was comfortably seated in a recliner with her feet up, Brian brought her an Arnold Palmer, her new favorite since she had sworn off alcohol. He then excused himself to go down to the lab. It was a workday after all, and his techs would be there. Johnny and Lindsay were in their last week of school before summer break, so it was just Marie and Julia now, and, of course, Earl.
He came over to Marie, and she began scratching his neck.
“There’s my big boy. Just look at how much you’ve filled out.”
He kept licking her hand, and his tail wagged happily.
“We’re working on that licking behavior, Mother,” said Julia. “He’s stopped licking faces, but he still sneaks licks of the hand when he thinks he can get away with it. Ask him to shake, and let’s see if he’ll give you his paw. I’m trying to get him to do that instead of licking.”
“Shake, Earl.”
When Earl put up his paw, Marie said, “Good boy, Earl! Good boy,” and she grabbed it for a shake. After releasing it, she continued patting his head and scratching his neck, and he stayed by her side. “You’re doing wonders with him, Julia. Is he a full-fledged therapy dog now?”
“Not quite. He hasn’t earned his vest yet, so to speak. We’re not a registered therapy team, and we still accompany other teams when they visit sites, but we’re getting close to going out on our own. We have to pass a test first. It won’t be long, though.”
“I’m sure people will love him.”
Downstairs in the lab, the team was going full speed ahead with their work on the nanoparticle pill.
“Malcolm, honey.”
“Yes, Bertie, dear.”
“Was this rack of test tubes sterilized yet?”
“Did it first thing this morning, dearest.”
“Okay, thank you.”
In the two years that Bertie had been working in the lab and Mal had returned, Brian couldn’t have been more pleased with the progress the three of them had made and the atmosphere in the lab. He was secretly amused by the pet names they had adopted for each other and the way they worked together.
The competition between them, if you could call it that, was more along the lines of who could come up with the cleverest names for the rats (Bertie was in the lead with Rat Damon) or the best dad joke (Mal led here with “What do you call cheese that isn’t yours? Nacho cheese.)
During their first five months of working together, they perfected the home breathalyzers to the point that they were in very close agreement with not only the lab’s breathalyzer, gas chromatograph, and mass spectrometer combination, but also between the six they had initially constructed.
The team used the home breathalyzers on rats they had just induced cancer in. They would check the rats each day after they’d begun supplementing their water with Aflatoxin B-1 to see at what point they could detect cancer. This established a base detection time for when no pill was used.
For a different group of rats, they had fed them the nanoparticle pill at the same time they had begun inducing cancer. The detection time was substantially earlier, which not only proved the efficacy of the system but also provided the data needed to gain FDA approval for human trials.
During the past seven months, they spent most of their time testing the nanoparticle pill for toxicity. It would do no good to detect cancer early if it were to harm or possibly be fatal to the patient.
While Brian and Abby fine-tuned the pill, they had Bertie and Mal design a set of experiments to test the toxicity of the nanoparticles they were using. Unfortunately for the rats, there would be scheduled sacrifices with organ dissection to assess the amount of buildup, if any, in the organs. Unpleasant as that was, it was a necessity because that final step, for obvious reasons, couldn’t be done on humans.
Brian was very proud of Bertie and Mal for designing this comprehensive plan for toxicity testing, and he put it into effect immediately. The first scheduled group of dissections would begin in five months.
Marie went to bed at 9:00 PM on her first night out of the hospital. Once she had turned the bedside light off and settled in, she began mulling over her future. She dwelled on the idea that her career with the New York Phil might now be over. After many years of putting the violin before every other aspect of her life, she realized how much of her identity was wrapped up in it. She had reached her career goal of playing in one of the world’s elite orchestras, where she was now a well-liked and respected member, and it would likely be coming to an end. No, not just likely; she was certain, and it wounded her deeply.
As she brooded, she heard a light scratching at her door. What was that about? She ignored it, but it continued after a few moments. Then she heard a soft whimper.
Gingerly she got up, and, using the walker beside her bed, she made it to the door and opened it. Earl came in and looked up at Marie as if asking her if he could stay awhile.
“Here to give me some of your doggy therapy, Earl? Well, come on in. I’m going to leave the door cracked so you can let yourself out again.”
She made her way back to the bed, which Earl had already jumped upon, and when she’d settled back in, Earl positioned himself against her with his head where Marie could pet him.
His calming presence was exactly what she needed to ward off her feelings of despair, and she soon fell asleep with his comforting body by her side.
 Recognized |
Brian Kendrick: A 43-year-old neuroscientist and cancer researcher
Julia Kendrick: Brian's 43-year-old wife. She is also a world-class violinist.
Johnny Kendrick: Their 8-year-old son
Lindsay Kendrick: Their 6-year-old daughter
Earl Kendrick: The Kendrick's chocolate Labrador Retriever
Dr. Marie Schmidt: Julia's mother
Abby Payne: Brian's partner on the project. She is 67 and a brilliant mathematician
Malcolm Roberts (Mal): One of Brian's two lab technicians
Tanya Roberts: Mal's wife
Samantha (Sammy) Roberts: Mal's 6-year-old daughter
Letitia Roberts (Lettie): Mal's mother
Larry Posner: One of Brian's two lab technicians
Vivian Delacroix: An oncology professor at Wake Forest University also doing early cancer detection work
Roberta (Bertie) Chen: Brian's new lab technician
Cedric (aka Cecil) Washington: Marie's premier violin student and friend
Maddy McPhail: Owner of Bo
Bo McPhail: Maddy McPhail's cancer-sniffing therapy dog
Picture courtesy of Imagen-4-Ultra
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