I'm Glad My Mom Died(26)
“Hm,” Mom says with a long look out the window. “They already did that in The Parent Trap.”
25.
I WAKE UP AT EIGHT a.m. on my Costco mat. My bunk bed is now overwrought with stuff, so I’m back to sleeping on the mat. I’m wearing my Revlon Run/Walk 2002 tee. I like the design. It’s got a lot of purple in it, which I’m into right now.
I can’t let Mom know I’m into purple, since Mom prefers pink. She would be heartbroken if I suddenly announce that I’ve switched my favorite color to one that isn’t also hers. It is an honor that Mom cares about me so much that something like me having my own favorite color would devastate her. True love.
Last year’s Revlon Run/Walk tee was mostly silver, and the year before that it was mostly blue. I know about all the Run/Walk tee colors for the past seven years because that’s how long my family has been attending the annual Run/Walk. We started attending the Revlon Run/Walks after Mom went into remission for her stage four metastatic ductal carcinoma, a term I am well acquainted with because, in addition to our weekly VHS viewing, Mom often has me recite it to casting directors.
“Everyone loves the story of somebody overcoming adversity. If you mention my ductal carcinoma, you’ll get the sympathy vote.”
Mom’s cancer rarely seems to come up organically in my auditions for the Suite Life of Zack & Cody and the King of Queens, but on shows like ER, I can wedge it in a little more naturally, especially if there’s a character in the episode who has cancer.
“You know, my mother had stage four ductal carcinoma, so I really relate to the material.”
Mom always says that we go to the Revlon Run/Walks to support women with breast cancer, which is so noble of her. Dustin once said under his breath that he thought Mom went more for the free cancer merch than the cause itself, but Dustin is a “troublemaker” and also Mom’s least favorite child, which she even told him directly, so obviously Dustin doesn’t know the first thing about Mom or her intentions.
I’m rocking my oversized cancer tee and planning what poem I’ll write for Mom this weekend. Since Mom’s not a fan of me writing screenplays, I’ve taken an indefinite hiatus from those, but she is very supportive of me writing quick little poems about how much I love her, so I keep up with writing this way now.
I’m trying to figure out what to rhyme with the word “mommy” when I realize my chest is kind of sore. More specifically, the nipple area of the right side of my chest. I reach my right hand up to touch the sore area and there I feel it… A LUMP. Terror immediately fills my body. This can’t be happening. First Mom and now me? The room starts spinning. I weigh my options—I can go wake Mom to tell her now, but that seems burdensome. Or I can let her sleep until eleven a.m., when I usually wake her up with her morning cup of tea. “I’d wake up earlier if I wasn’t up so late stressing about money,” Mom always says. “Maybe if your father got a job that PAID THE BILLS for once so I wouldn’t have to depend on a CHILD…”
I don’t know which to pick, so I do what any sensible, cancer-ridden tween deciding when to tell their mom does—I eeny meeny miny moe it.
“Oh, Sweetie.” Mom half laughs as she runs her fingers back and forth along my puffy, lumped nipple on the right, and then over my smooth, flat nipple on the left to compare. “That’s not cancer.”
“Then what is it?”
“You’re just getting boobies.”
Oh. No. The only thing worse than a cancer diagnosis is a growing-up diagnosis. I am horrified of growing up. First, I’m small for my age, which is a benefit in showbiz because I can book roles for characters younger than me. I can work longer hours on set and have to take fewer breaks by law. Logistics aside, I’m more cooperative and can take direction better than those seven-year-old scumbags.
Mom is constantly reminding me how good it is that I look so young for my age. “You’ll book more, baby. You’ll book a lot more.”
If I start to grow up, Mom won’t love me as much. She often weeps and holds me really tight and says she just wants me to stay small and young. It breaks my heart when she does this. I wish I could stop time. I wish I could stay a child. I feel guilty that I can’t. I feel guilty with every inch I grow. I feel guilty whenever we see one of my aunts or uncles and they comment on how much I’m “growing up.” I can see Mom’s eyebrow twitch whenever they say that. I can see how much it pains her.
I’m determined to not grow up. I’ll do anything to stop it from happening.
“Well, is there anything I could do to stop the boobies from coming in?” I ask Mom nervously.
Mom breaks into a laugh-exhale, the kind where her eyes wrinkle up. I know this expression well, the way I know all of Mom’s expressions well. I have learned them inside and out so that I can behave accordingly at all times.
No one else in the family seems to understand Mom’s emotions. Everyone else walks around clueless, never knowing which Mom they’re going to get. But I always know. I’ve spent my whole life studying her so that I can always know, because I always want to do whatever I can in any given moment to keep or make Mom happy. I know the difference between Mom being irritated and outraged. I know the difference between when she’s upset at Dad or when she’s upset at Grandma (clenched jaw means Dad, tight eyebrow means Grandma). I know the difference between when she’s a little happy (kisses me on the forehead) and a lot happy (sings Phil Collins). And right now, in this moment, where she laugh-exhales and her eyes wrinkle up, I know that she’s not only a lot happy, but a special, particular kind of happy.