Beth splashed water on her face and staggered to the bedroom. This was the fifth time today, the fifth time that she had been unable to find any relief from the waves of nausea that had swept over her. As she collapsed onto her bed she spotted a photo sticking out from behind the wall mirror. “Ah, that photo,” she thought. It had been taken at a party the week before she had received the news. Carefully pushing herself to her feet she leaned across to examine the picture. Out of it peered an attractive woman in her mid-thirties surrounded by a rainbow of balloons and streamers that bounced in the sunlit background. The photographer had caught her unawares, had frozen her laughing with her head thrown back and her dark eyes sparkling. She looked vibrant, hair shiny and smooth as a new conker, skin honey tanned from a recent holiday. A yellow halter-necked sundress revealed an ample cleavage above a slender waist. “Oh yes,” Beth sighed, “the picture of health.” And then, catching her reflection, she laughed a laugh that cracked as it caught in her throat. Propping the photo up on the mantle below the mirror she began to scrutinise the two faces that looked back at her. There was no contest - the mirror never lied.

Her hair, or what was left of it, was no longer the rich chestnut that it had been at the party. Instead her head looked as though it was covered in a short grey velvety fuzz; that was the only way to describe it, you couldn’t call it hair anymore. The sparkle had left her eyes, which now sat like two bruised sunken pools in a face of parchment thin white skin. And as for the cleavage? Well…
It wasn’t the cancer that had drained her of colour, but the treatment for it. “It’s even bled the red from my lips,” Beth murmured, looking more closely at her reflection, “at this rate there will be nothing left. I’ll be a blank sheet.” But even while she thought this, she knew that the treatment was her best hope for a cure. “White,” she reflected, “means pure.” With that she grabbed her most colourful bandanna, wrapped it around her head and lay back down as another wave of nausea began to take control.