Because of a Song

The waiting room in the emergency room was packed when I arrived. I shoved my way past people, trying to get to the front desk. Just as I was about to ask where my mother was, Stephen called out my name. “Lauren!” he called, dashing towards me. “She’s with me,” he quickly told a nurse and she nodded in understanding. Stephen practically dragged me to the room, but I didn’t mind. My head was whirling with endless possibilities about what had happened to my mother.

I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw her. She was as pale as a ghost, nothing like she had looked when I left this morning. Nothing seemed to be broken, nor was she bleeding. She wasn’t even on a respirator. What could possibly have happened?

“Lauren,” my dad started. “I don’t know how to say this but…your mom has breast cancer.”

“What?” My voice sounded like an echo in the strictly white room. “What do you mean she has breast cancer?” My mind raced with questions. How come we didn’t know this earlier? Is she going to be okay? What’s the next step?

My dad continued: “It’s in the final stage, honey.” I saw him start to tear up. “I know it’s sudden, but, uh…excuse me.” He wiped a few stray tears from his face.

Stephen, noticing that our father couldn’t go on any further without full-out bawling continued for him. “She only has two days, Lauren.”

“TWO DAYS?!” I was incredulous.

“It’s a rare case,” Stephen announced. “She didn’t show any symptoms until it was too late.”

The room started spinning. Everything had changed in the matter of a minute. I had to sit down. I quickly walked over to the nearest chair and sat down, burying my head in my hands. How could this have happened? My mom was so lively, making pancakes and laughing, just yesterday morning. I looked up at her again and my breath hitched in my throat. She looked awful. Her skin was pasty and she had a frown on her face. I could tell she was worried, probably about Stephen and I. What were we to do without a mother?

My dad found the courage to talk again. “I’m going to call your manager and request a few weeks off for you. It’s the right thing to do. I’d appreciate it if you and Stephen helped with the funeral plans.”

Funeral plans. My dad was already thinking of funeral plans. It didn’t bother me, after all her dying was inevitable, but it still hurt to hear my dad say that. It was as if him saying that was the final nail that was drilled into my head. My mom was going to die. She wasn’t going to come back. I only had two more days with her.

Then Stephen started crying and I couldn’t take it; I started to cry as well. The nurse found this time to come in and check on my mom. She had a somber look on her face; I could tell she felt extremely saddened for us. She didn’t say anything the whole time she was there; she simply took my mom’s readings and wrote them down on her clipboard. She turned around and smiled at us.

I tried to smile back but I don’t think it worked. She walked quietly out of the room and shut the door. I was glad she realized that we needed our space.

My mom suddenly said, “I don’t want you guys to worry. You have enough to worry about. It’s a done deal, okay? So let’s just enjoy our last two days together, worry free. Can we do that?”

My dad, Stephen, and I all nodded, but we knew it was a lie. We were worried, if not for our mom, for ourselves. We had no idea how to move on after a tragedy. All our grandparents were still alive and we had never known our great-grandparents. None of us had ever had to endure a situation like this.

Stephen walked over and sat in the chair next to me. Without saying a word, he grasped my hand. I looked over at him and saw that he was about to cry again. I squeezed his hand, reassuring him, silently telling him that it was okay to cry. And so he did. He cried harder than I had ever seen him cry before, even more than when he broke his wrist after he fell off his bike when he was nine.

Then he leaned into my shoulder. I got up and squatted in front of him. He buried his head in my chest and I held him, comforting him, pushing my fingers through his hair. We sat like that for at least ten minutes, him crying and me trying to not to. I glanced over my shoulder at my dad. He looked so weak, like he knew he couldn’t do anything to help us.

And that’s when I knew we had hit rock-bottom.