“Okay,” she started again after a deep breath, gathering what she’d rehearsed the previous night with Malcolm. “Here’s the deal. Pancreatic cancer is very aggressive and deadly. It has very poor prognosis, with only one out of four people alive a year after diagnosis.” Her voice, she thought, sounded less breathy and more self-assured. Good. “The problem is that it’s so hard to detect, we are only able to diagnose it very late in the game. At that point, the cancer has already spread so widely, most treatments can’t do much to counteract it. But if diagnosis were faster—”
“People could get treatment sooner and have a higher chance of survival,” Tom said, nodding a bit impatiently. “Yep, I’m well aware. We already have some screening tools, though. Like imaging.”
She wasn’t surprised he brought it up, since imaging was what Tom’s lab focused on. “Yes, but that’s expensive, time-consuming, and often not useful because of the pancreas’s position. But . . .” She took another deep breath. “I think I have found a set of biomarkers. Not from tissue biopsy—blood biomarkers. Noninvasive, easy to obtain. Cheap. In mice they can detect pancreatic cancer as early as stage one.”
She paused. Tom and Adam were both staring at her. Tom was clearly interested, and Adam looked . . . a little weird, to be honest. Impressed, maybe? Nah, impossible.
“Okay. This sounds promising. What’s the next step?”
“Collecting more data. Running more analyses with better equipment to prove that my set of biomarkers is worthy of a clinical trial. But for that I need a larger lab.”
“I see.” He nodded with a thoughtful expression and then leaned back in his chair. “Why pancreatic cancer?”
“It’s one of the most lethal, and we know so little about how—”
“No,” Tom interrupted. “Most third-year Ph.D. students are too busy infighting over the centrifuge to come up with their own line of research. There must be a reason you’re so motivated. Did someone close to you have cancer?”
Olive swallowed before reluctantly answering, “Yes.”
“Who?”
“Tom,” Adam said, a trace of warning in his voice. His knee was still against her thigh. Still warm. And yet, Olive felt her blood turn cold. She really, really didn’t want to say it. And yet she couldn’t ignore the question. She needed Tom’s help.
“My mother.”
Okay. It was out there now. She’d said it, and she could go back to trying not to think about it—
“Did she die?”
A beat. Olive hesitated and then nodded silently, not looking at either of the men at the table. She knew Tom wasn’t trying to be mean—people were curious, after all. But it wasn’t something Olive wanted to discuss. She barely ever talked about it, even with Anh and Malcolm, and she had carefully avoided writing about her experience in her grad school applications, even when everyone had told her it would give her a leg up.
She just . . . She couldn’t. She just couldn’t.
“How old were you—”
“Tom,” Adam interrupted, tone sharp. He set his tea down with more force than necessary. “Stop harassing my girlfriend.” It was less of a warning and more of a threat.
“Right. Yes. I’m an insensitive ass.” Tom smiled, apologetic.
Olive noticed that he was looking at her shoulder. When she followed his gaze, she realized that Adam had placed his arm on the back of her chair. He wasn’t touching her, but there was something . . . protective about his position. He seemed to generate large amounts of heat, which was not at all unwelcome. It helped melt the yucky feeling the conversation with Tom had left behind.
“Then again, so is your boyfriend.” Tom winked at her. “Okay, Olive. Tell you what.” Tom leaned forward, elbows on the table. “I’ve read your paper. And the abstract you submitted to the SBD conference. Are you still planning to go?”