Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Did we really stop time? How is that possible?
I’m not sure whether I’m relieved or disappointed that Cosmos never came back. This thing we can do—whatever it is—scares me. It’s not normal or natural. It’s not something that should happen. What does it mean that time stops when I’m with this terrifyingly attractive and confident stranger?
As curious as I was earlier, as much as I wanted him to stay and figure it out with me, with some distance it seems better to avoid Cosmos. He must have decided the same.
I pick up my computer and open the document titled finalfinalMFAmanuscript.doc.
I stare at the screen full of words that need to be rewritten.
They taunt me, mock how little I’ve accomplished this week, dare me to write something good.
Something that will impress my professors, that will change people’s minds about me, that even Jeremy won’t ignore or condemn.
My phone buzzes with a text, but I already know who it is. Aunt Joan is the only one who texts me this late at night. She never sleeps. I don’t want to answer it, but I know if I don’t, she’ll just keep trying, and I already have Jeremy sending me dozens of texts a day.
Aunt Joan:
How’s she doing?
You realize it’s 2am, right?
Aunt Joan:
Dolls balls! I was making something for your mom and got distracted. Didn’t know it was so late already. I’m gonna bring it down on Thursday, alright?
Aunt Joan’s been Mom’s best friend since high school, and if there’s one thing I know about her, it’s that I don’t want her bringing anything she’s made to the hospital.
When I was seven, she made me a doll so creepy it would have scared the clown from It.
Half of its head was covered in neon green hair that stuck out in every direction.
Inexplicably, the other half was bald. I swear the eyes followed me, and its mouth looked like it’d been sewn shut.
I told Mom I lost it, but I chucked it in the dumpster one night when I couldn’t take it anymore.
Then there was last Christmas. Aunt Joan knit Mom a sweater with sleeves that weren’t the same length. The front had a cactus on it that looked like a ten-fingered hand. It was so disturbing I couldn’t even look at it.
I don’t know if she’s up for visitors.
Aunt Joan:
If you think you’re gonna keep me from my best friend when she’s on death’s doorstep, you've got another thing coming to you, kiddo. I already shuffled everything around in my schedule and loaded my phone with audiobooks for the drive. Besides, don’t you have class?
Your mom said you have some special workshop thing on Thursdays.
Ugh, she’s right. I’ve already missed Thursday’s workshop two weeks in a row. Another absence won’t go unnoticed. I shouldn’t miss it again, and I don’t want to leave Mom alone, so I’ll just have to deal with Aunt Joan. At least I have a few days to psych myself up for it.
Aunt Joan:
Class going okay?
got to go. Mom’s awake.
I cringe at the lie, but push send. I don’t want to talk about class. Aunt Joan thought getting my MFA was a waste of money and told me so in no uncertain terms.
Going back to my computer, I painstakingly type out a paragraph, erase it, stare at the darkness beyond the window, re-read two paragraphs, erase one of them, slam my computer closed, and pick up my phone.
I’ve started reading books on my phone so that I won’t wake Mom with the light. The book I started last night is a beautifully written story of sisterhood and coming of age, but I can’t focus. I switch to reading a fantasy novel Kiara told me about and slowly sink into the story.
Just as the main character is about to free the man she loves from prison so they can lead an attack against the king, my phone buzzes multiple times in a row.
Ex-dad:
I thought you were going to call me.
Any updates on your mom? How long are they going to keep her?
Did you read about the new drug they’re using for treating leukemia? You should ask the doctors about it.
I also just saw this article about using black walnut extract to treat cancer.
Seriously, does no one sleep anymore? I know it’s three hours later where Father Cheats-a-lot lives in Boston, but it’s still way too early there for him to be texting.
He attaches the link, not caring that she doesn’t have leukemia and no accessible tumors on her skin, which is primarily what black walnut is used for—I know because I already looked into it. I looked at every option when Mom was first diagnosed two years ago, even those with no scientific backing.
He’s just trying to be helpful, but it grates like sandpaper.
Like I’m not already doing everything I can to keep Mom alive.
Like I need his help, and if he hadn’t sent a stupid little link, I might have floundered and Mom might have died.
Like he actually cares if she does. All hail ex-dad, the hero.
Ugh. I know he didn’t really mean it that way, but did he really think 2am was the time to text me about it? I click on the screen and start typing. I want to tell him off, let him know he’s out of line and it’s not his place to help us anymore, but I type: Thanks. I’ll look into it.
My thumb hovers over send, but instead hits the backspace and erases the message. If I engage with him, he’s just going to want to engage more, and I’m too exhausted.
“Promise me something?” Mom startles me out of my rumination.
I put down my phone and scoot my chair closer to her bed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“You didn’t.” She smiles and rolls on her side so she’s facing me. Her voice is scratchy, and each breath rattles, making it hard to hear her. “I’ve been thinking about the power of attorney.”
“Mom—”
“I’m going to do the paperwork. You won’t have to worry about anything. But… if I don’t make it, promise—” She cuts off coughing so hard the bed shakes, and she can’t recover her breath.
I get her water and help her sit up so she can drink. My heart pinches in my chest. I hate seeing her like this, fragile and weak. I want her the way she always was, carefree, energetic, sarcastic.
“I’m not throwing your ashes on Ryan Gosling, Mom. I don’t care how much you want to meet him.”
She doesn’t smile, but she stops drinking, and the corner of her lip twitches. She’s the only one who thinks I’m funny. I wish I could hear her laugh now. Really laugh.
“I’m not stuffing you and keeping you on the couch in my apartment, either,” I add, wanting to hear her laugh again.
“You don’t have an apartment,” she deadpans.
It’s true. I moved back into Mom’s house when she was diagnosed, partly to help and partly because I had nowhere else to go.
“Why do I need an apartment when I’ve got all this?” I wave my arm at the sterile hospital room. Beige floor. Beige walls. Beige blanket on the bed. It’s a study in poorly executed minimalism. “Plus all the free hot chocolate I want.”
“And eye candy, too.” Her smile is still weak, but there’s a lightness to her voice.
I roll my eyes. “I’m not looking.”
“Don’t lie to your mother.” She barely makes it through the words before another coughing fit overtakes her and the conversation stops so she can take another drink. When she’s had enough, she leans back against the pillows and closes her eyes with a soft smile.
The room is so silent I can hear the second hand on the clock tick, tick, ticking away.
Part of me wants to ask what she wanted me to promise, but a larger part of me doesn’t.
If I don’t promise her anything, maybe she won’t go.
Maybe she’ll hold out longer. I know it’s not logical, but grief doesn’t follow rules.
So, I stay quiet and listen to the clock.
Just when I think she’s fallen asleep, she clears her throat. “Don’t close yourself off from people who want to love you, Hazelnut.”
I swallow. “What do you mean?”
“Talk to your dad.”
The words pull at my anger like a tight rubber band. Jeremy doesn’t want to love me. He spent my entire childhood trying to change me, to make me into someone who wasn’t an embarrassment. He doesn’t deserve my time. Not after what he did to Mom.
She says she forgives him, but that doesn’t mean I have to.
On the first day we were in the hospital, I took her phone because mine was dead and I needed to text Kiara.
I didn’t mean to see the text from Jeremy, but it was right there on her lock screen.
Apparently, she told him she was in the hospital, and all he had the nerve to write back was, ‘Get well soon and give Nutter a hug for me.’
Seriously? The woman he was married to for almost two decades could die, and he sends the same message you’d find on a generic Hallmark card?
The rubber band inside me pulls tighter and tighter until I snap. “Why?”
“Because he’s the only family you have left.”
I stare at her, blinking. Numb. A physical slap would hurt less. She doesn’t have to remind me I’m alone. No one knows that better than I do.
“He loves you,” she says, so soft it makes my heart hurt.
Okay, fine, he loves me. In a generic Hallmark card way.
The same way someone loves their great-aunt or their cat.
He doesn’t want anything to happen to me.
He’d send a card if I was in the hospital.
He’d probably lend me money if I was at risk of being homeless—which might be a legitimate problem once we get out of the hospital, since the bills are piling up.
But Jeremy doesn’t understand me at all.
The me that he loves isn’t really me. It’s the sugarcoated version of me I let him see.
It’s the me that mastered in trying to impress him, only to be blindsided by his complete disregard for the love Mom and I offered.
“I don’t want you to be alone,” Mom says.
She understands my inner thoughts eerily well sometimes.
“I’m not alone,” I reply. “You’re with me. We make our own family.”
“Family requires letting someone see you.” Her eyes drill into me for one second… two… three. Then, she looks down. “I won’t always be with you, Hazelnut.”
I know that no one lives forever. Most parents die before their children. Eventually, I’ll have to let her go. But not yet. It’s too soon. She’s too young. I want more time.
“You’re gonna be fine,” I say definitively.
Mom gives me a sad smile, but she doesn’t argue anymore.
I lie down on the tiny couch and stare at the ceiling for a long time, listening to the rattle of Mom’s breath and the humming of the IV.