Zach and Abby

Chapter Six - Edited

Abby - Edited

If you do something often enough, it becomes routine. Once you’ve lived in the routine for long enough, it becomes your normal.

The walk from the parking lot, up four floors in the elevator and down the hall to room 492B wasn’t as daunting anymore. I knew the regular nurses by name, knew what certain things to ask for when my mom complained of certain things. Just like I eventually got used to reminding her of everyday things, I got used to the cancer.

The doctors tried surgery but the tumors, by then, were too large to remove without complications. The next best thing was chemotherapy twice a week.

“And James, Conner and Lucas stopped by here about an hour ago. They brought some chocolate chip cookies. They’re over on the table if you want one,” she continued, probably thinking I’d been listening all along.

“Glad to hear that,” I replied, unloading the last of the groceries, handing her a bottle of water. I cleaned up her tray, throwing out the trash. I wrote on the dry erase board outside her door what she wanted for dinner, they usually brought it by around five.

Once I was done, I finally took a seat in the chair closest to her bed, turning to see she was watching a basketball game on TV. Her hair was thinning, it wasn’t the bright, curly blonde it used to be. Just after two weeks of chemo, it was like I was looking at a new person.

She tried her best not to complain but every now and then she slipped. “I’m ready to leave this place. Have I told you that the first thing I want to do when I get out is cook dinner for my boys?” She’d started calling them her boys, she told almost everyone on the nursing staff she had thirty sons waiting for her at home.

Most of them would glance over at me when she said that, not sure whether to believe it or not.

She’d told me that at least ten times before but I kept quiet, smiling and nodding like that was a great idea. The doctors had thought it best to keep her here on permanent bed rest, the most recent prognosis was three months. I had ninety days left of a mother.

“I know, Mom. Hopefully you’ll get to cook again soon.”

She lost interest in the entire conversation after that. Her focus was on the basketball game on TV. Arizona State was up by ten points - when her team was winning, the whole floor of patients knew it.

I laid my head back against the chair, closing my eyes. After a minute, I found myself digging my phone out of my purse, checking it again only to see the same screen. No new messages, no calls, nothing.

That seemed to be the usual thing nowadays – nothing.

I tried to tell him, to show him that when things got tough, I shut down and closed out everyone around me. I was like a grenade from the time I was younger. Maybe I didn’t cause my mother’s illness but regardless, I carried around with me bad luck and I spread it to anyone who got close enough.