The Truth About Hollywood

I was talking lightly with Danny and Dad, waiting for the results of some tests to come in to determine what they were going to do about Mom. She was sleeping most of the time, a deep sleep. Nothing, even Dad's obnoxious laugh, made her even stir. It was scary, almost like she was dead already.

There was a knock on the door frame, and we all looked over to see who it was. The guy was tall, maybe a little over six feet, with wavy blonde hair and light blue eyes. He was basically the ideal California surfer guy, so it was weird to see him as a doctor, holding a clipboard in his hand and looking grim.

My hopes weren't high, and it must have shown on my face, since Danny squeezed my hand to show that he was there for me. He was a sweet guy, definitely.

"Alright, so this is Karen Bryant's room?" the doctor spoke, flipping a page of the clipboard up before bringing his gaze to us.

"Yes," my dad answered, his voice tense. "What's wrong with her?"

"Her cancer is very progressed. She got diagnosed really late, and that's hurting her chances of making a recovery at all. Right now, it looks like her cancer is spreading, and that's what caused her to collapse. She's starting to get a lot worse." The doctor looked at us, his lips pressed together like he didn't like what he was about to say. "We're going to start some really intense chemotherapy in the morning, and it might save her life. If it doesn't, since she hasn't been really receptive to the treatment, then..." He shrugged, as if to say, 'Come up with your own prognosis'.

"So she's going to die?" I burst out, jumping to my feet. It occurred to me that this whole thing looked like something out of a bad soap opera, but it was real. Too real. I wasn't prepared to accept the reality yet. "There's nothing you can do?!"

"If the chemo doesn't work, then no," he answered. "I'm sorry, we've tried it from all angles."

I ripped my gaze from his, trying to focus on not crying. My eyes were betraying me, starting to make the tiles on the floor look blurry, the lines between them starting to become waved. "Thank you, Doc," Dad granted, not sounding thankful at all.

My lips pressed together, and I closed my eyes, trying to make the tears go back to where they came from. Instead, they started to fall, and I started to hate myself.

"I'm going to..." I started to explain, but my voice stopped working. Wiping my face furiously, I ran out of the room, not stopping until I was outside, where it was pouring rain. It hadn't earlier, but I guess the universe just wanted me to feel just a little worse about my life.

I wanted to keep running, to try to get away from everything was happening, but I couldn't get myself to. Instead, I threw myself on the small wall that made the front border of the patches of grass on either side of the hospital entrance. My hair was matted to my face, and my clothes were soaked, but I didn't care. At least no one could tell I was crying.

Burying my face in my hands, I sobbed loudly, but didn't care enough to see if anyone looked over at me. No one came over to ask me if I was okay, to ask what was wrong. No one cared enough.

How was my life supposed to get better if my mother was going to be gone? I might as well just kiss my TV role and my possible-stardom goodbye because there was absolutely no way that I was going to be able to move on from something as big as my mother dying. Maybe some people could, but I just wasn't that strong.

I felt arms close around me, and I looked over to find Danny staring at me. "It's going to be okay, Claire. No matter what happens...it's going to be okay."

My tears picked up again, and I snuggled my face into his shoulder. He rubbed my back, whispering that it was going to be okay over and over.

Finally, my tears stopped, and I got to my feet. I didn't know how much time had passed, but I didn't really care. "Danny, how am I going to do this? So much shit has happened today, and it's not even eight. How am I going to get to the set tomorrow? How am I going to be able to act with this on my mind? How am I going to live without my mom?!"

"Shh," Danny soothed, pulling me into his chest. "It's going to be okay. I can call and tell them where you are. You shouldn't be expected to work when something like this is happening. And you don't know if your mom is going to die yet. They're going to do some more chemo."

"Yeah, well, that's not going to do anything. It's done nothing so far, and it's going to do nothing now. I'm going to lose my mom, and then I'm going to have to quit the show."

"Would she want you to do that?!" Danny screamed at me, shaking my shoulders. I wanted to punch him for being insensitive, but I knew that he was just trying to get through to me.

With those few words, I thought back to the conversation that we had last night about how she wanted me to do what I had always wanted, not worry about what was happening to her. God, was that really only last night? It felt like it had been forever ago, weeks ago. Too much had happened in that single day.

"No," I whispered. "But I just...I don't know what to do. I don't want to lose my mom." It was obvious how vulnerable my voice sounded, and Danny reacted to that.

"You won't," he assured me. "She'll be fine."

"Don't make promises you can't keep," I told him. "Don't get my hopes up."

"Claire, come on. Even if your mom doesn't get through chemo, and... Okay, worse case scenario, she dies. Think about it, will you? Just because your mom dies doesn't mean that you're going to lose her. She'll always be with you."

"Alright, I appreciate that you're trying to help me through this, but just shut up with the TV shit, okay? If my mom dies, she will be gone. She won't be there to talk to anymore, to help me through my Hollywood stuff. She won't be there to see me do anything with my useless life."

"Claire..." he trailed off, but I was already starting down the sidewalk. "YOU CAN'T WALK AWAY FROM THIS! YOUR PARENTS NEED YOU!"

I turned around for a second to see him standing there, looking so young and helpless in the rain, and thought for a second about going back to the hospital, about sitting by Mom's side while she puked her brains out from the poison being pumped through her veins.

But I just kept walking, not knowing where I was going.