The Names They Gave Us(4)

“Wait.” I reach across the console to grip Lukas’s arm. “Pull over.”

Lukas obeys, drifting the car to the side of my tree-lined street. The church looms ahead of us. It’s so close to our house that in the daylight, the steeple casts a shadow across our roof.

Leaning forward, I try to slow my breathing. “I just . . . I need to get it together before I walk in there.”

He nods. Of anyone in the world, Lukas would understand my need for composure. It’s like a tacit agreement in his family: straight-back shoulders, soft expressions, always in control. Their whole house is full of tall windows and cream linen upholstery. The possibility of smudges or stains will simply not be indulged.

“It’s my mom, Lukas. My mom.” These are only two words, but they glint with a hundred facets. She’s my closest friend, my cheering section, my nurse, my teacher, my confidant. The least I can do is collect myself and try to handle this with grace.

“I know,” Lukas says quietly.

When my mom was originally diagnosed, I tried to memorize her. Even in small moments—ducking her head into my room to say good night, singing along to the radio in the kitchen—I mentally freeze-framed every detail. Curly hair to her shoulders, always pulled back to reveal her trademark dangly earrings. The soft, pale skin that she rarely covers with makeup. The wide-set hips, so like mine, that she has never once complained about.

Deep breaths, air expanding my lungs until they ache.

“Hey. You’ve got this.” Lukas reaches over to clasp my hand.

He says this when I’m nervous before a swim meet. But these types of inner strength pull from different reservoirs. Competition jitters call for adrenaline, for confidence. Your mother’s mortality? I have no idea what that requires. Faith? Because I tried that before.

Lukas means well, though, with his clammy hand on mine.

I give myself one last slow exhale, then a puff of my inhaler.

“Good?” Lukas asks. He’s seen a few stress-induced asthma attacks, and each time, he calmly talks me through it.

“You’ve got this,” he repeats, with one last hand squeeze.

This is what I’ll never, ever forget: My parents waiting for me on the couch. The stiffness of my beaded dress as I sink into the armchair. It’s in my breasts again. My mom’s soft hands holding mine. Gonna fight it. The teakettle shrilling. Double mastectomy. Sipping for the comfort of the heat, not even able to taste the mint. Trusting in God like we always have. How quickly I fastened a mask of bravery onto my face.

“We don’t want you to worry,” my mom says. “Surgery is scheduled for Monday morning. That’s the first and hopefully only step.”

“This Monday morning?” I gesture down at my ridiculous, jewel-encrusted dress. “You let me get all dressed up and go to prom when . . . when this is happening?”

“Oh, honey.” She looks so genuinely sad, like telling me is the worst part of all this. Pressure builds behind my eyes, but I refuse to succumb to tears. “We wanted you to have your night. You deserved that much.”

But don’t they see? Prom night—my perfect prom night—doesn’t matter at all compared to this. Why do they think I’ve stayed home every Friday of high school for our family movie night? Because I swore—to myself and to God—I’d never take this for granted, and I meant it.

“How long have you known?”

My parents exchange guilty glances, and for the first time in my life, I wonder if they’ve lied to me before. If protecting your child trumps the ninth commandment. It’s my dad who speaks this time. “They found a lump at a checkup two weeks ago, and the biopsy came back pretty quickly.”

Maybe it would be different if I had a sibling, but it’s the three of us. I’m the only one who’s been going on her merry way while the rest of this family worried, suffered, planned ahead without her.

“And when were you going to tell me?”

My dad answers more steadily this time. “Tomorrow morning. Before I tell the congregation. We didn’t want you to worry for any longer than you had to.”

I understand their good intentions—I do. But understanding doesn’t make me feel any less lied to.

“Oh, Luce,” my mom says. “I’m sorry it happened like this.”

“I’m sorry it’s happening at all.” Yes, I feel burned by their secrecy. We’re supposed to be a team, and I’m old enough to handle this. But mostly, I wish there was no awful diagnosis to keep secret in the first place.

“You should head up to bed,” my mom suggests gently. “Change out of that pretty gown. It’s been a long night. We can talk about it more tomorrow, okay?”

I acquiesce, but mostly so I can react in private. Clutching the stair rails with both hands, I feel the air thin; I feel my vision tunnel. And behind the bedroom door, my dress closes around me, squeezing like a fist. The crystals feel too hard, rock fragments trapping me in this too-tight casing. I contort my arms to reach the zipper, bending in a way that should hurt. But I feel nothing.

The dress drops from my body as I reach for my inhaler. The last time I glanced in the vanity mirror, I was zipped-up and sparkling—the very picture of prom night. Now, I am freckled skin squeezed into nude spandex, hands on my knees as I gasp for breath. My perfect hair coming loose, gown pooled on the floor. Behind me, a bookcase full of stories my mother read to me, full of swimming trophies and jewel-toned ribbons, full of certificates from childhood piano recitals. What is any of it worth? What is any of it without my mom?