22. Your anti-potato agenda #2
“Yeah. He’s all of that,” Hunter mumbled and fought the urge to turn the color of the marinara sauce he was dipping his pretzel in. “But if he moves out, don’t worry, I can cover the rent. Or find someone else. It’ll be fine.”
She heaved a deep breath, filled with worry Hunter was sure, but she didn’t say anything.
Instead, she popped more pretzel into her mouth.
His mom was great, really. She worried about him and didn’t understand why he was trying to build this career, but she never once actually tried to stop him from doing it.
He wondered suddenly if he could tell her that it was Colby he’d been involved with.
He was almost certain she wouldn’t be angry.
But she’d be confused and, knowing his mom, it would be another source of worry.
Because she said it herself, she wants her son to be safe and secure.
Being a bisexual in a homophobic industry—and let’s face it, a homophobic world—probably wasn’t something she would rest easy about.
He’d stressed her out enough. He didn’t need to add to it.
And it wasn’t like he was going to be with Colby.
Or any other guy. He had to ignore that side of himself if he wanted to keep growing his career.
“I have some news, and I have been meaning to tell you, but I just don’t want you to overreact.”
Hunter stopped reaching for the appetizer.
He looked at his mom, with her long, straight black hair, just a few strands of gray, and her big, dark brown eyes.
People always seemed shocked when they realized Catherine was his mother.
Despite having a bit of Asian heritage in him, he didn’t look like her.
He didn’t look like his dad either, obviously, but he blended more with him looks-wise.
There were several painful times when people thought Catherine was his nanny while he was growing up.
If it bothered her, she never said it. And you could always hear the pride in her voice when she’d say “this is my son.”
“The last time you told me not to overreact, you announced you had cancer,” Hunter said, and when she stared right back at him without so much as a blink, his heart plummeted and his blood chilled. “What? No. Mom…”
“It’s fine. They caught it early again. In fact, it may not even be that.” She waved a hand in the air. “It’s just a lump at this point.”
“Holy shit. Mom.” He reached for her hand across the table, and when he grabbed it and squeezed, she patted the top of his hand with her other one and then pulled away.
“No, no. Save the dramatics for acting. I’m fine.”
Hunter’s senior year of high school, Catherine had found a lump in her breast. It was small, but it was cancer, and the doctor treated her with a lumpectomy and radiation, just to be sure.
It had scared the life out of Hunter, sent his anxiety into a tailspin, and caused non-stop grief in his father’s household because his stepmother couldn’t fathom why Greg was so invested in helping Catherine recover.
He came over a lot to check on Hunter and Catherine, and even made sure he was available to drive her to and from radiation appointments when Hunter was in school or had other commitments, like school play rehearsals.
It was the single worst thing that had ever happened to Hunter, and he didn’t talk about it ever.
He liked to pretend it was all just a bad dream.
He’d never even told Leandra about that chapter of his past.
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
She shrugged and kept eating the pretzel, dipping healthy chunks in the spicy dip. “I was going to wait until after the biopsy, when we knew for sure if it was even something to worry about, but then you showed up for this visit, and it felt better than doing it over the phone later.”
“Mom…” He didn’t know what to say or what to do. “When is the biopsy?”
“Thursday. And before you offer, I don’t want you to stay for it,” Catherine warned him. “It’s going to be fine. Just like last time. No matter what it is. And it could be nothing.”
Hunter knew in his gut that it wasn’t nothing.
But he tried to console himself with memories of how smoothly it had gone the last time.
She was off work for almost four months, but this was Canada, so there’d been no deductibles or co-pays, and she had sick leave, so her treatment didn’t impact them financially at all.
She had lost some weight and had a radiation burn at one point, which Hunter never saw because of its location, but it had required one overnight stay in the emergency room.
But then she’d been deemed cancer-free and lived an entirely normal existence for the last seven—almost eight—years.
“Does Dad know? I can move my flight.”
Catherine shook her head adamantly. “No. You go back to California and start auditioning again. Keep your ball rolling. It makes me happy to know you’ll be hustling. Get your next job so I can stop fretting about you.”
“Does Dad know?” Hunter repeated.
“No. Again, nothing to know yet.”
“How are you getting to and from the biopsy?” Hunter was ready to phone his father right here at the table if she said something stupid like "metro" or "taxi".
“Shirley. Ming’s mom,” Catherine said. “She has the day off and offered to go with me. You know she’s a nurse, so she will keep a good eye on me.
Also, she and David moved downtown, too.
But in the Plateau. To be closer to Ming, who bought her own little condo there.
It’s a studio. She calls it a loft, but Shirley says that’s an overstatement. I haven’t seen it.”
Hunter let out a shaky breath. He knew the comment about his ex’s parents moving wasn’t a dig.
But he also knew that his mother would love for him to live close to her.
Catherine was raised to believe family stayed close and took care of each other.
Hunter’s grandparents had lived in a townhouse two blocks over from where he grew up until they passed.
But Hunter was off trying to be a movie star instead of being there for his mom.
The waiter collected the empty pretzel plate and then brought out their steaks.
Catherine continued to talk about work, updated him on old family friends, got Hunter talking about his dad, and asked more questions about his movie.
He tried to act like nothing was wrong, but inside, Hunter was spiraling.
His mother couldn’t be sick. Not again. The doctors had told them that if she made it past five years, her chance of reoccurrence was minimal. So this had to be a false alarm.
He forced himself to eat the steak and swallow every bite. It sat like cement in his gut. After a shared chocolate lava cake—which was like pouring paste on the cement boulder already in his belly—Hunter paid the bill, and they walked home in the snow.