Pale Girl Speaks

by Hillary Fogelson

  Me: Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. I think about that sometimes. I try not to think about that, sometimes.

  Mom: Do you think the whole beach culture in California had anything to do with it? Would you have gone to the beach as much if we hadn’t lived in California?

  Me: Well, um, no, considering Georgia doesn’t have a beach. But I don’t think moving here gave me melanoma. I think I would have gotten it anyway . . . it’s so weird to think about a choice, a certain decision, that seems insignificant at the time, but then you look back and see how it changed the course of an entire life. An entire family. I mean, even if we had moved to California, and we had lived on the same street, in the same house, everything the same, what if Janice had never mentioned Dr. Bach to you? I mean, how did it even come up in the first place? It’s so weird.

  Mom:

  Me: I think if we had stayed in Georgia, I never would have gone to a dermatologist. No one in Georgia goes to a dermatologist. I think if we had stayed . . . I think if we had stayed, I would have died from melanoma. That’s what I think. Me and Dad both.

  Mom:

  Me: But we did move, and look how well that turned out. Look at all the fun we’ve had.

  Mom:

  Me: I love you. None of this is your fault. You know that, right?

  Mom:

  Me: Mom?

  Mom: Sometimes I just think—

  Me: It’s not your fault. You put sunscreen on me when I was a kid. That’s all you could do. It was in the cards. I’ve gotta go. I’ve gotta finish this bathroom before the Tilex eats away the actual tile. I’ll talk to you later.

  Mom: I love you, sweetie.

  Me: I love you too.

  Click.

  1:23 PM:

  Knock, knock.

  Me: Coming.

  Knock, knock.

  Me: I’m coming.

  Knock, knock.

  Me: Tess? Tess? Can you hear me?

  Tess: Hilly? Sorry I’m late.

  Me: I just put lotion on my hands and I can’t turn the door kno—

  I’m taking a mental picture of this moment because I don’t want to ever forget it. When I’m one hundred years old, celebrating seventy-five years of being cancer free, I want to remember my best friend standing on the threshold of my front door, holding a bag of honey-nut Chex Mix in one hand and a cup of coconut sorbet in the other. Oh, and the candles. She has put these beautiful, tall, skinny red candles in the sorbet. And the candles are lit. And they are dripping. Making teeny, tiny red dots all over my sorbet, my beloved sorbet. And I don’t even care because—

  Tess: Happy year anniversary to you. Happy year anniversary to you. Happy year anniversary to Hillllllllllllllyyyyyy. Happy year anniversary to you.

  Me: Oh my God! I can’t believe you!

  Tess: I got the sorbet from the diner at The Standard. I know it’s your favorite.

  Me: I can’t believe you did that. Thank you so much. I’m totally crying right now.

  Tess: Yeah, me too, me too. Make a wish.

  Me:

  Tess: You make one?

  Me: Yep.

  Tess: Will you tell me what it is?

  Me: Nope.

  Tess: Can I guess?

  Me: Nope.

  AFTER THE SORBET . . . AND THE CHEX MIX:

  Tess: What did your mom say? Did she wish you a happy anniversary?

  Me: No. Well, after I told her it was today, she did. No, actually—technically—she didn’t. She had the date wrong. She said she thought it was next week . . . she had the whole entire thing mixed up. She started telling me how she’d never forget when I told her the news, but then she went on to describe a totally wrong version of what happened. She couldn’t have been more wrong. She combined, like, three different trips together. Whatever. I didn’t have the heart to tell her. It’s really not important.

  Tess: How does it make you feel that your mother and husband forgot your anniversary?

  Me: You are such a therapist right now. First of all, my mother didn’t forget; she just got . . . confused. And, well, it doesn’t make me feel bad, strangely enough. I don’t know.

  Tess: And what about your dad? Does he know what today is?

  Me: I don’t think so. I doubt it. But that’s fine. It’s better that way, actually . . . I don’t really know how to explain it. It’s like, I don’t need other people to be excited for me, because I’m excited for me. And it’s too hard for my mom to get worked up about my year, with all that’s going on with my dad. She needs to focus her energies on him. And Adam, he didn’t really forget. When I woke up this morning, I rolled over to see if he was awake, and he was lying on his back, eyes plastered to the ceiling, pulling out his chest hairs, making them into little chest-hair brushes, like mini-broomsticks. He does that when he’s nervous. He knew exactly what today was; he just couldn’t figure out what he was supposed to say. Actually, that was a brilliant moment. Adam, speechless. Rare.

  3:45 PM:

  Knock, knock, knock.

  Me: Coming . . .

  Ring.

  Me: Shit. Hello?

  Mom: Hillary?

  Me: Hey, Mom.

  Mom: I didn’t recognize your voice. You sound out of breath.

  Me: I was running to get the door. Hold on one sec. Dad just got here. Coming! . . . hey, welcome.

  Dad: The house smells so good.

  Me: Thanks. You can put your bags in the guest room. We should leave for your appointment in a couple of minutes. Traffic will be pretty bad at this hour.

  Dad: You don’t need to—

  Me: Dad, hold on a second. I’ve got Mom on the phone. Mom? Hello?

  Mom: I’m still here.

  Me: Sorry. You called just as Dad came to the door.

  Mom: Oh, I’ll let you get back to your father. I just wanted to wish you a happy anniversary.

  Me: Oh.

  Mom: I don’t think I said it when I talked to you before. Have a wonderful dinner with your father. You two deserve a celebration.

  Me: Yeah, it should be nice. I hope the restaurant is good.

  Mom: I’ll let you go. Have fun tonight. And tell your father to call me after his appointment.

  Me: Okay. I’ll talk to you later.

  Mom: I love you, sweetie.

  Me: I love you too.

  Click.

  Dad: What was that about?

  Me: Oh . . . um, Mom just wanted to make sure you landed safely. And she wants you to call her after your appointment. We should probably go. Traffic gets heavy right about now.

  Dad: You don’t need to go with me.

  Me: I know. I want to.

  Dad: But I’d . . . okay.

  Me: Good. I’ll drive.

  A FINAL STOP:

  Silence. My dad and I are riding a bumpy St. John’s elevator to the third floor (our floor) in complete silence. And even though I’m staring up at a brown streak smeared across the top of the elevator door, and despite the fact that my father seems to be examining a scuff on his all-purpose /all-weather/all-season boots, it’s not an awkward silence lingering between the two of us. Not like so many we’ve shared over so many years, so many times before. This particular silence is almost peaceful. It’s unifying. The quiet seems to be saying so much—so much about our relationship. Our new relationship. It feels like it has taken so long and so much out of both of us to create something so simple. Like it has taken an endless stream of events to create this simple moment of peace between my father and me.

  Silence. I am comfortable with the silence. Comfortable with the full quiet of the moment—the moment I’ve been waiting for for a very long time.

  Ding.

  Tom: So, we’ve got both of you today, I see.

  Me: No, I’m just here to hang out. I’m the driver.

  Tom: Jon, if you’re ready, you can head on back to room 4. Dr. Gregory should be with you soon. He’s not running too behind today.

  Me: I’ll just wait out here.

  Dad: You can come back w
ith me if you want.

  Me: Oh. Okay. Yeah. If you don’t mind. I don’t know if I told you, I made a reservation at that Cuban place you were talking about last night. At least I think it’s the right place. El Floridita. Does that sound right?

  Dad: That’s it. How did you find it?

  Me: Online. It wasn’t easy, though. I only found one site that had it listed under “Hollywood Cuban restaurants.” It must be a local secret or something.

  Dad: Did they say anything about having music?

  Me: Yeah, but the band isn’t playing tonight. I didn’t know you were a fan of Cuban food. Wow, this room is freezing.

  Dad: I usually have to leave my pants on under my hospital gown.

  Me: Me too. Or I put my gown on and then put my shirt on over it.

  Dad: Yeah. And I also try to remember to wear warm socks when I have an appointment.

  Me: I do the same thing. I always wear my wool Eddie Bauer ski socks. The ones you got me. They are so warm. They’re the best hospital socks. Do you want to put your gown on? I can go wait out—

  Dad: No, no, you’re fine. I’m just going to take my shirt off.

  Me: Does your scar still—oh my God. Dad, those . . . things . . . under your arms. From the vaccine.

  Dad: Where they injected me. I got ulcers at all the injection sites. They’re almost healed, though.

  Me: The women I met at the Positive Appearance Center had them. Do they hurt you?

  Dad: In the beginning they hurt like a son of a gun. They’re much better now.

  Me: This is better . . . ?

  Dad: I’m a fast healer.

  Me: Yeah, I guess you are. I guess you are.

  Knock, knock.

  Dad: Come in.

  Me: Please.

  Dr. Gregory: So, it’s a family affair.

  Me: You know me. I just can’t stay away.

  Dr. Gregory: Shall we have a loo—

  Me: I think I’m gonna wait outside. I’ll be in the waiting room, reading my book.

  I am casually walking down the hall. An up-tempo kinda casual. Okay, it’s a brisk walk. Very brisk. All right, fine—it’s more of a skip. A fast-paced, huge-strided skip. Like what you do when you need to get out of a situation as fast as humanly possible but don’t want nurses to look at you funny. I’m sure you’ve been in the same situation dozens of times. You know the one I mean—the one where you discover something that literally shakes you to your core. When you finally see something that’s been right in front of you all along and you can’t for the life of you figure out why you didn’t see it sooner. The kinda thing that forces you to jump up, move around, take a deep breath, and regroup . . .

  I just saw my father as a person. Just now, right in front of me, he was flesh and blood. For the first time ever, he seemed really human. Not like a parent or an elder or even a friend. Just a person. A person not all that unlike me. Watching my dad slowly slip a hospital gown over his shoulders while carefully trying to avoid rubbing the scars that are sprinkled along the sides of his torso, I related to him on a level deeper than father-daughter. Much deeper than parent-child. I saw him as a man. As a man who wanted me to see his battle scars. As a man who wears a shirt over his hospital gown. As a man whose toes get cold—just like mine. It’s that realization that’s racing through my head as I’m fast-skipping toward the waiting room.

  Dad: All right. I’m all done.

  Me: That was fast. Everything looked good?

  Dad: Yep.

  Me: You ready to go?

  Dad: You bet. Why don’t you let me drive?

  Me: No, you don’t need to . . . okay. That would be nice.

  6:25 PM:

  As we drive to dinner, I’m far away. I know Adam is saying something about the traffic and my dad something about garlic, but it all seems very far away. I’m so far. A million thoughts are running through my head: images, feelings, sounds, smells. It’s all twirling around, swirling, getting stirred up in the big pot that sits atop my shoulders. I’m dizzy with memories. A year’s worth of memories are drowning out everything around me . . . I can’t hear Adam or my father anymore. Instead I’m hearing Dr. Bach and Gregory and Lesaux and I’m smelling the hospital room where I wanted to circle the place on my stomach and I can see the crazy lady with her reindeer slippers and I can smell the aftershave on Adam’s cheek as he hugged me goodbye before my surgery. The hairs on my arms are standing up, waiting at attention for the next set of sensations: my mother waving goodbye, movie theater carpet, a hanky-size hospital blanket, a dressed-up test tube, a whiff of Chanel no. 5, red candles . . . it’s all washing over me. A million thoughts a second. Cold toes, an elevator ceiling, IUD string, sunscreen between my fingers, sweat on my palms, the smell of iodine, the woman without an ear, my dad’s scar, the cold liquid being pumped into my vein before surgery, an army of blue dots, the weight of my volunteer badge dangling from my pocket . . .

  BUT AT THE VERY, VERY END:

  Me: Goodnight, dad.

  Dad: ’Night. Today was a big day.

  Me: It was a little hectic, I guess.

  Dad: No, I mean it was an important day for you.

  Me: Oh. Yeah. It was a big day.

  Dad: Congratulations. On your “year.”

  Me: Thanks.

  Dad: I like it.

  Me: What?

  Dad: Your ankle. Your tattoo.

  Me: Ah, Mom told you. Yeah, I told Gregory it was between “brave” and a tattoo of a mole. He laughed. Sleep good.

  Dad: You too.

  Me: I will. Love you.

  It’s all here. Inside. My year. Stored up for me to play and replay, over and over whenever I want . . . even if I don’t want. ’Cause even if I don’t want, it will continue to play. Play and play out. And it all means something. Something different. It all means something to me, anyway. It all did something to me. I can feel it moving through me. All of it. The last year. Filling me up. I feel all . . . puffed up.

  I feel full. Full of life. I feel alive.

  2010

  I drive. I’m a driver. That’s what I do—of late. My days are spent bobbing and weaving through the eastside, Florence and the Machine pulsing in the background, the HOLLYWOOD sign just out of reach. Griffith observatory teasing me to my right, I daydream I am up there, looking down . . . to school and back again, ballet class, swimming, piano, gymnastics, art class, music class, class about how to register for the next, best . . . class.

  These are the places I can be found. And all for what? For who? For whom?

  For two of the most wildly fan-fucking-tastic kids who have ever lived. Not that I am biased. This is truth. My older one eased her way into this world wide-eyed and comfortable, despite an unfortunate forehead that swooped back like an eggplant from endless hours in my birth canal—a forehead with nearly two lobes from all the pressure, and yet she didn’t seem to mind. She’s never been in a big hurry. And the world waits for her. That’s Willa. She’s an old soul. Been around the block a time or two. She can look you in the eyes and know what you need, what you need to hear, and then she’ll tell it to you . . . and keep telling it to you, and keep telling it to you—an endless diatribe of observations, advice, and predictions.

  A big head with an even bigger brain. She’s smart. Like, real smart. The good kind. The hard kind. The kind of smart that keeps her up at night pondering life and death, questioning why we’re all here and what’s the point, anyway? The kind of smart that makes a parent thrilled and terrified all at the same time. I live in constant fear of the next question. I start sweating when I hear her start slow with, “Mom, I’ve been wondering about something . . . ” She’s that rare combination of heart, soul, brains, and motormouth. That’s Willa.

  And then there’s my second child. A child who put me on bed rest for thirty weeks. A child I bled for, a child who wasn’t supposed to make it and yet practically crawled her way out of me at exactly forty weeks with little more than a grunt from my end. That’s Harper. She’s my warr
ior, a war buddy—we’ve been to hell and back, and so we share this unspoken bond . . . but she ages me. My eyebrows have all but turned white, and as I pencil them in each morning I catch myself whispering her name under my breath. She can be tough as nails, a real bona fide bitch, but not to me. Never to me. To me she’s an angel . . . with devil horns and a weakness for all things gelatin. She’s quick-witted, a Montessori workhorse, determined, imaginative, and, of course, the youngest. A second child through and through. Always plotting and planning how she can stand out, get my attention, get there first, get the last marshmallow, the last kiss, more, better, bigger, anything to beat . . . Willa.

  They are my life, and so I drive. Willingly. I’m a mother now.

  Me: So, girls, tell me about your day. Harper, did you talk about cornucopias?

  Harper: We did a song!

  Me: Great, let me hear it.

  Harper: I am thankful for my fami-lee and for my diarrhea, poo-poo buuuuutt, butt face, pee in your mouuuth—

  Willa: Harper, that’s gross.

  Harper: Poot.

  Me: Okay, Harper, that’s enough.

  Harper: Penis.

  Me: Seriously, Harper, I’m going to take away your allowance. What did you guys do today? Did you . . . talk about what you’re thankful for? Oh, that reminds me. Willa, I doubt you remember this, but when you were in preschool, you made this place mat that said what you were thankful for. You remember what you wrote?

  Willa: Something about the Earth?

  Me: No, nothing about the Earth.

  Willa: I know. I remember. It was about my family.

  Me: No. Everyone else in your class was thankful for their family . . . movies. You said you were thankful for movies.

  Willa: I did!

  Harper: Well, you do like movies. Right, Mom, right? Willa and Dad are the same, and you and me are the same. Willa and Dad are lazy and like to watch TV, and me and you are good at putting our clothes away and don’t really watch TV that much. Right?