Eleanor & Grey(2)

She pulled me tighter, and held on as if she wouldn’t ever let go. Then, Dad’s arms wrapped around the two of us, and we all held on for dear life.

Our tears fell in sync, and we stayed locked together as one unit.

As the hurt kept hurting, Mom placed her lips against my forehead and softly spoke words that made me cry even harder. “I’m so sorry, Ellie.”

But everything would be okay, because we were going to fight it.

We were going to fight it together.

And we were going to win.





1





Eleanor

June 21, 2003





Everything I knew about life, I learned from Harry Potter.

I called him the greatest teacher of life lessons, and I swore up and down that he’d saved my life countless times. When I was upset, I wrote spells to turn people into rats, slugs, or toads.

Needless to say, my people skills were lacking, which was fine, because I was really great at avoiding humans—well, at least until I was forced to interact with them.

“You’re grounded from your room,” Mom stated as she stood in my bedroom doorway rubbing her palms against her face. She’d tossed her brown hair up in a messy bun, and her painting apron was tied around her waist, hiding her Pink Floyd T-shirt. Her neon-green Chucks were covered in paint, and her pink thick-framed glasses sat on top of her head as she gave me the brightest smile.

She’d been painting all day in the garage, because the weekends were when she could let loose and dive into her love for art. During the week, she was just your everyday friendly nanny, saving kids from lives of dullness. On the weekends, though? She let her hair down.

It had been two months since her cancer diagnosis, and I loved whenever she was painting. As long as she was painting, I felt like things were okay. As long as she was still herself, every day was easier.

And for the most part, she was herself. Sometimes she was tired, but still, she was Mom. She just took a few more naps than normal.

I narrowed my eyes, looking up from my novel. “You can’t ground people from their bedroom.”

“Yes, you actually can. Your father and I talked it over, and we are grounding you from these four walls. It’s summer vacation! You need to hang out with your friends.”

My eyes darted from her to the book then back to her. “What exactly do you think I’m doing?” I loved my mother to death. Out of all mothers, she was top of the line, but that afternoon she was being completely inconsiderate. It wasn’t just any summer day, after all. It was June 21, 2003, the day I’d been counting down to for the past three years.

Three. Long. Painful. Years.

She was truly acting as if she didn’t recall that Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix had released that day. The fact that she even had the nerve to speak about anything other than Harry, Ron, and Hermione was mind-blowing.

“Eleanor, it’s your summer vacation and you haven’t even left your bedroom yet.”

“That’s because I had to reread the first four Harry Potter books in order to prepare for this one.” Truly, she should’ve understood. It was like back in her day if a new Black Sabbath album came out and, instead of letting her listen to it, Grandma told her to go pick up milk from the corner store.

Totally uncool.

Black Sabbath > milk.

Harry Potter > social life.

“Shay said there’s a party happening tonight,” Mom commented, plopping down on my bed. “There will probably be pot and alcohol,” she joked, nudging my arm.

“Oh, joy,” I mocked. “How could I pass up such a grand time?”

“Okay, I know you’re not the party animal yours truly was as a teenager, but I feel like every sixteen-year-old should go to an unsupervised party at least once in their life.”

“Why would I want to do that? Why would you want me to do that?”

“We haven’t had sex since summer break began,” Dad said matter-of-factly, joining the conversation.

“Daddd,” I groaned, covering my ears. “Come on!”

He walked into the room, sat down on the bed behind Mom, and wrapped his arms around her. “Ah, come on, Ellie. We all know sexual intercourse is a beautiful, natural act, one we should all celebrate when it is had in a consensual, respectable fashion.”

“Oh, my gosh, please stop talking. Seriously. Stop.” I tightened my grip on my ears, and they laughed.

“He’s just teasing you, but we were hoping to have a horror movie marathon, and I know how you hate horror movies,” Mom said, and I was actually thankful for the heads-up.

One time when I was a kid, I’d walked in on them watching Chucky, and for weeks I was convinced my dolls were out to get me. I got rid of every stuffed animal I owned. You never really notice how creepy Cabbage Patch Kids are until you envision them with butcher knives in their hands.

Don’t even get me started on the time Dad thought I was old enough to watch The Shining.

Spoiler alert: I wasn’t.

Ever since then, when they had a horror movie night, I made sure to go to Shay’s house. I would’ve been fine with it, too, if it hadn’t been that night of all nights.

“Can’t you guys just wait a few days?” I asked.

“We would, but seeing how it’s our anniversary…” Mom’s words trailed off, obviously thinking that would be enough to convince me.