Chapter 3
Three
“Atumor.”
I don’t really know who I’m talking to. Not the doctor; he’s the one who told me. Not my mother; she won’t look at me. I just say it, dazed, trying to make it all make sense. Trying to wrap my own brain around the fact she’s kept this hidden from me for years.
“It is benign,” Dr. Mott offers, sliding a stack of information across the desk as he begins filling me in on everything I didn’t know I didn’t know. Including the fact they’ve known about it for a decade.
The headaches and random moments of memory loss aren’t her quirks or need for more water, they’re from a slow-growing benign brain tumor called a meningioma that’s gotten large enough—nearly four centimeters—to become symptomatic.
Large enough the doctor—and neurologist, because she has one of those too—are recommending surgery.
Brain surgery. That my mother is resisting.
Because Iris Conway doesn’t come for so many visits to the doctor because she has the hots for him, she has a brain tumor.
She was right when she said I don’t know everything about her. I don’t know jack shit.
My mom may have come out of the crash with my dad a decade ago with only a single scratch on her forehead, but they did a CT scan just to be sure she didn’t have a concussion.
She didn’t; she had a small brain tumor.
She was symptomless for years—simply monitoring its slow growth—until the recent headaches and memory loss started.
“Personality changes—impulsivity and poor judgment, especially—memory loss, headaches, even seizures and vision issues are all common,” Dr. Mott explains.
“Iris is already quite a woman—” He smiles warmly at her, choosing his next words carefully.
“Any eccentric behaviors that were there before could make it a little more confusing for someone on the outside. Harder to tell where her personality ends and neurological symptoms begin.” He shrugs slightly. “Her exaggerated, if you will.”
I flip through the images of my mother’s brain like I have a clue what I’m doing, trying to digest it all.
“Seizures?” The fact the tumor likely contributed to her inviting a stranger into our bank account is one thing, but the thought of my mother convulsing on the floor is a punch to the gut.
“A possibility.”
“Rue,” Mom says in a quiet yet firm voice, looking at the same scans of her brain as me. “I’m fine. I’m not having a seizure. This is nothing.”
I have never wanted to shake someone stupid then give them a big hug more.
“Nothing?” I zero in on the scar on her forehead. It holds so much more weight than it ever has before. “Mom, this is the opposite of nothing. You have a brain tumor. That’s making you forget things. Making you impulsive. Making you have headaches. We have no money.”
“We’ll figure out the money,” she says. “And I’ll be fine.”
“Fine?” She’s in denial. I blow the bangs out of my face and look at the doctor. “What do we need to do? What are the options?”
“There’s radiation,” he begins. “It’s less invasive but often not as effective.
The neurologist can give you specifics, but it would likely stunt the growth and not shrink it.
The only way to remove it is surgery. It’s riskier but has a better chance of getting it all.
” He slides another folder to me. “This is everything from the neurologist. He’s out of Duke if you want to talk to him. ”
My mom has the nerve to look annoyed.
That she didn’t tell me she has a brain tumor.
“What happens if we do nothing?” I ask.
He shrugs. “Again, that’s a question for the neurologist, but—” He sighs. “Given the symptoms, I’d expect them to continue if not worsen over time.”
I look from him to my mom, panic licking at my spine. I don’t want her to worsen. I don’t want any of this.
The doctor continues to talk while I study every line of the paperwork.
Symptom frequency can range from daily to weekly—that tracks—and will likely increase as the tumor grows.
But it’s the line about surgery that stops me: Grade I meningioma tumors have a high surgical success rate and a low recurrence risk rate.
It’s all I need to know.
“How much? With our insurance I mean?”
“That’s a question for Maureen at the front desk. Depends on your deductible.”
I don’t need Maureen—it’s high. I know that because for a small business like ours, insurance is expensive.
We chose the coverage we did for emergencies, not because we were harboring secret brain tumors that made us date internet assholes.
Our high deductible made sense up until about two hours ago when we were all healthy and our bank account held money.
This is bad.
By the time I’m driving—both of us quiet—my only thought is on her having that surgery. How we’re going to pay for it and how I’ll convince her to do it. I’ll drag her into the operating room kicking and screaming if that’s what it takes. I’ll use a gag and handcuffs. I’ll rob a bank.
At her familiar farmhouse—her doctor assured me multiple times she is still very capable of living alone—I cut the engine.
The house is dark, but I can easily picture the vibrant colored walls covered in our photos and the rag rugs on the wood floors.
The mismatched furniture that fills every room.
Her bookshelves covered in her favorite books.
The smell of her basil plant in the kitchen window and the coolness of the pink satin sash of her robe between my fingers.
I see her in the yard, decades younger, bossing us girls around as we pick dandelions for her to turn into tea. Until this moment, I’ve always thought of her exactly that way: perpetually forty-five and perpetually her. Maybe just . . . perpetual.
“Why didn’t you tell us?” I finally ask.
“It was nothing,” she says. “Ed had just died . . . it didn’t feel important. Like a mole.”
I scoff. “A mole, Mom?”
She fidgets with her bracelets but says nothing.
“And the surgery?” I sound angrier than I intend. “Why are you fighting it?”
“I don’t see you rushing to have your skull cracked open and brain dissected.” We exchange eye rolls. “And I knew once I told you, this is what would happen. I just . . .” She sighs. “Wanted a little more time.”
My mother isn’t in denial; she’s scared.
At the small twist in her lips, maybe even terrified.
She’s always been the fearless one while I worry about everything.
And now, she’s scared and I’m scared. I want to force her into a surgery that we might not be able to afford, but the longer we wait, the further away she might slip from being the woman in front of me. The woman I need and love.
“I have to get Bennie,” I say to the windshield.
Quiet, she gets out of the car and walks toward her house.
The bridge of my nose burns with unshed tears, but I refuse to let them fall.
Because they won’t fix our money.
Because they won’t fix my mom’s brain.
And because once they start, they might never stop.