That summer, when Dean and I talked about my working mom issues, I threatened to quit everything. I could just stop. Stay home with the kids. Do crafts and help out at their school. Take on just enough work to get by. We could sell our house and move to the beach. We could downscale our lives: work less, spend less, live more. I said, “Maybe I shouldn’t go on like this. Maybe I don’t want to work so hard. Maybe I don’t need this life anymore.”
Dean answered, “I don’t need to live this way. I didn’t grow up like this. We have way too much.”
Sometimes I agreed. Dean could list many things he liked about our summer, but what I loved most were the times when we escaped it all, even the beauty of Malibu. I was happiest when the four of us were ensconced in that two-bedroom apartment. It was cozy. We were all on top of each other. We didn’t need a baby monitor. Liam’s crib was in our room next to the bed. Stella was right in the other bedroom because she can’t sleep when I’m in the room. While we were in Malibu I regretted buying our house. It was too big. I could see being so happy in that apartment. I’ve always liked cozy spots. I never wanted a big house like those I grew up in. Now all our money was in a big house where, not for the first time, I felt lost and out of place. Was this why I was working so hard? So we could afford to live in a house that I’d never wanted?
Again, Dean was right there with me. He said, “Let’s do it. Let’s sell our house and rent this apartment.” We both felt that our lives were sprawling out of control. We were too busy. Our house was too big. Our lives were too complicated. I, in particular, was at once too worked up and too exhausted to even enjoy our Malibu reprieve. Maybe what we needed wasn’t a summer in Malibu. Maybe we needed a different life.
We considered it. I tried to imagine life without work. That line of thought always brought me back to the age of twenty-six. 90210 had just ended. I spent most of my time home, alone, brainstorming. Maybe I got more spontaneous pedicures than I do now, but I didn’t enjoy the freedom because I was so worried about never working again. I still had some income from the show, and I didn’t have to worry about supporting anyone but myself. But what I did worry about was securing everything that I have now. A happy family, a place for us to live, an income to support us. It’s impossible for me to long for that time when this is what I wanted.
Dean and I talked about these things, but the fact was that I was still the same person who made those choices in the first place. I couldn’t really imagine living any other way. No amount of work, stress, missing the kids, or envying Kathleen was going to change me. I don’t think Dean meant to call my bluff, but as soon as he signed on to a simpler life, I saw that my threats were a worthless exercise in self-pity.
Then I thought about the kids’ toys. And my closet. All those shoes. All those beautiful designer shoes. They needed a proper home.
• • •
In the end, Malibu didn’t add up to a vacation for me. But let’s not blame Malibu. Malibu held up its end of the bargain (if Malibu and bargain can be used in the same sentence). It’s not Malibu’s fault that I’m afraid of flying and incapable of unwinding. It’s not Malibu’s fault that I got called for jury duty. It’s not Malibu’s fault that even when I did have time there, I tried to relax, mostly failed, and then it was over and we came back home. A week later I loved our house again. I loved my work. I never stopped loving my family. But I still yearned for a real vacation.
The Haunting in Maui
I have to rewind a little. Malibu wasn’t the first time that summer I failed to properly relax in an oceanside paradise. Before we booked our Malibu rental in Kathleen’s building, we’d already planned a trip to Maui for the beginning of the summer. Once we rented the Malibu apartment, going to Maui definitely fell into the category of taking a vacation from a vacation, but we had committed to going to the Maui Film Festival. It was to be a most-expenses-paid trip, and I wasn’t about to turn it down.
Maui is my favorite place on Earth. I haven’t traveled much (the whole flying thing), but I’ve been to Maui several times. This wasn’t my first time going with Dean, but I hoped it would go a little more smoothly than the last. When I first met Dean I told him how much I loved Maui and that I wanted to go there with him. He wasn’t gung ho about the idea because he knew I’d been there with several exes. I told him that if we went together, our new memories would overwrite all my past experiences there. He didn’t buy that argument. Finally I said, “Once we get there, you won’t think about the exes. It’s Hawaii. You’ll love it.” Eventually Dean was convinced, and after Liam was born we planned our first trip to Maui. We booked it months ahead of time. It was an outrageously expensive trip, but Dean and I were celebrating the new success of our show, and I couldn’t wait to relax with him on the beautiful beaches and to take walks with him and baby Liam by the ocean.
But our dream vacation wasn’t meant to be. By the time the trip rolled around, I was in the first trimester of my pregnancy with Stella and sick as a dog all day, every day. (Not Maui’s fault.) It rained the whole time, from the moment we landed till the moment we left. (Bad, Maui, bad.) Dean went diving every day, spending hours underwater—turns out rain doesn’t matter as much when you’re in an ocean—but it wasn’t exactly the trip of my dreams.
I always wanted us to go back. The film festival was perfectly timed—it came right after we finished shooting the fourth season of Tori & Dean—and they offered us a good deal: they were paying for our flight and four nights at the Four Seasons; we were paying for Stella’s baby nurse, the kids’ flights, and the extra nights at the hotel. Our only commitment for the film festival was to attend one party, and it was in the very hotel where we were staying.
In Maui, the night of the film festival, we weren’t due downstairs until ten p.m., an hour past our usual bedtime. The kids were sleeping soundly; Patsy, Stella’s baby nurse, was on duty; and Dean and I were lying on the bed, all dressed and ready, watching TV until it was time to go downstairs to the party. And then who knows what I was doing with my hands or why, but I felt something weird under my armpit. A mass. A lump.
My heart was pounding. What was it? Was I imagining things? I felt it again. Something was definitely there. I made Dean feel it. He’d be a voice of reason. Dean said, “Yeah, there’s definitely something there. I’m sure it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.”
Don’t worry about it? Hello? I’m a hypochondriac! I invent potential danger and death as a way of being. For all the irrational worries and fears that I lived with every day, here was something actual—a mass that even Dean admitted was there—and he was telling me not to worry. As if that was remotely possible. Shouldn’t he be concerned that his beloved wife had a potentially life-threatening tumor? I tried to impress on him the seriousness of the matter.
“I just never thought this would happen to me,” I said.
Dean said, “That is so you. You don’t even know what it is and you’ve already written your death sentence.”
I was indignant. In my head I hadn’t written my death sentence. I mean, maybe in my mind I had breast cancer, which we all knew was life-threatening, but I wasn’t saying I was going to die! After all, I’d survived amnesia, a coma, stalkers, and various psychopathic would-be murderer boyfriends—in my made-for-TV movies at least. Okay, I’ll admit that maybe I was just indignant because he was saying I was overreacting. But for once I was afraid of something that actually existed. It wasn’t some cockamamie fantasy about psychopaths lurking outside dark windows. This time I was confident that I wasn’t overreacting. I had a malignant lump that was metastasizing as we spoke, and Dean wanted me to relax? Did he even know me?
I lay on the bed, frozen and silent. Dean was no use. He had shut me down. Ordinarily if Dean was unavailable (emotionally or in person) I’d talk to Patsy. Patsy and I had developed a mother-daughter relationship over her years as my children’s baby nurse. I knew that she understood the problems I brought to her. She always found a way to comfort me. But Patsy’s daug
hter had died of breast cancer. I couldn’t bring it up with her. And I didn’t want to call a friend right there in front of Dean, who had just made it clear that he thought it was no big deal. Internally, I stroked my own hair (well, my hair extensions), saying, “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”
Finally, after what seemed like a silent eternity, I quietly texted two people: Dr. J, my friend and obstetrician, and Mehran, my gay husband. I wrote, “Oh my God I’m freaking out.” I told them about my discovery. Mehran said, “Don’t panic, describe it to me, let me talk to my dad.” His dad is a doctor. Moments later he texted again to say, “Based on the texture and movement my dad’s thinking it’s nothing, just a fatty mass.” At the same time Dr. J texted, “You’re going to be fine, don’t worry. You’ll come in and see me the day you get back, but I can almost promise you it’s fine.”
When the time came, Dean and I headed down to the event. I was in heels and makeup but just a casual shift sundress; Maui is beachy and relaxed, and I looked beachy and relaxed on the outside, but inside was a different story. Then the press asked for a photo op. Just what I wanted—the final photo of me before my fatal diagnosis. They asked me to pose with Kristen Bell and Anna Faris. So I stood between them. I was wearing my sundress. They were both wearing sparkly ball gowns worthy of the Golden Globes. I thought, here we are, three cute blond actresses, two of whom are younger, have bigger careers, are wearing fancier dresses, and are presumably lump-free. Perfect. Smile.
As we took those pictures I never stopped thinking, I have a lump. As we toasted with champagne: I have a lump. I moved my upper arm against it to see if I could feel it. When I went to the bathroom, I checked to see if it was still there. There it was, a hard little reminder that life was in the balance.
There were a few days left before I could go home to be examined by Dr. J. By the light of day I didn’t worry too much about the troublesome lump. After the breakfast buffet, Dean and I set up camp next to the kiddie pool. We played in the pool most of the morning. I took Liam down the slide more times than either of us could count. After a poolside lunch, the kids napped, then we all went back to the pool.
I ran into Denise Richards lounging there. She was on vacation with her kids, her best friend, and her father. The last time I’d seen Denise was about a pig.
I guess I should explain about that pig. Right before Stella was born, Dean and I brought Liam to Denise Richards’s daughter Lola’s birthday party. There was a ridiculously cute pig running around the party. Liam saw the little pig and was really excited about it. Although she certainly already knew it, I said to Denise, “You have a pig!”
She said, “I have a ton of pigs.” She took us to the back of the house where, indeed, there were a bunch of pigs running around like chubby, stumpy-legged dogs. I thought they were adorable.
A few months later Denise called to tell me that one of her pigs had given birth. She said, “I remember how excited Liam was when he met the pig. Would you ever consider owning one? They’re great pets.” Dean and I talked about it. My beloved pug, Mimi La Rue, had recently passed. I wasn’t ready to get a new dog. I didn’t want Mimi to feel replaced. But I thought a pig might be fun.
We went back to Denise’s house. She had some big pigs outside and smaller ones inside. There was a new little pig in a rhinestone collar that I hadn’t seen last time. Denise said her name was Stella and that she walked around on a leash like a little lady. I froze at the name Stella. Who had come first—my Stella or this one? I decided not to ask.
Denise showed us a litter of little pigs, all old enough to leave their mother. She picked out one that she thought would grow up to be small—maybe fifteen pounds fully grown—and who had a sweet disposition. She said that the pigs were very smart, friendly, and clean. All we had to do was show him a kitty litter box once, and he’d use it from then on. Denise had a kennel for us, so we brought our little piggy home and named him Milton La Rue, in memory of Mimi.
By the time we got home from Denise’s, poor little Milton had shit all over himself in the carrier. Dean gave him a bath in the sink. I thought pigs were supposed to like baths—aren’t they supposed to, like, wallow?—but Milton was traumatized. He squealed the entire time. I’d never really heard a pig squeal. This wasn’t the jolly oink, oink that Liam’s talking farm puzzle emitted. It was a horrifying, torturous, dying pig scream. I thought my eardrums were going to explode. Our dogs, Chiquita and Ferris, both small dogs but still bigger than Milton, hid under the table, quaking in fear. Milton screamed and screamed. Nothing would comfort or distract him. He was totally freaked out for the duration of the bath and afterward.
After the bath, we brought our new little pig to his room. We were living in our previous house, and—guess where this story is going—we’d just finished decorating it. We gated off a bathroom for Milton and furnished it with a doggie bed and a kitty litter box. We showed him the bed and the box. He looked terrified. He promptly shit all over the bathroom, all over the floor and his bed, everywhere except the kitty litter box. We cleaned it up and showed him the kitty litter box again, but he kept messing up his own space and lying in his own shit.
The next day we took him to the vet. The vet said, “This pig is going to be one hundred pounds.”
We said, “No, no. You’re mistaken. He’s going to be fifteen pounds. Our friend has lots of pigs. She knows.” I thought about little Stella-piggy walking around with her stylish collar.
But the vet said, “No, he’s going to be big. This pig is a lot of responsibility. Pigs are messy.”
“Really?”
“They’re pigs.”
At home, Milton chased the dogs all over the living room. Ferris was hysterical. Chiquita looked at me reproachfully as if to say, “How could you do this to us?”
I love animals. I rescue animals. I was committed. I would never give up on animals. So I had Dean call Denise.
“We love Milton, but we can’t handle him,” I heard him saying as I cowered in the next room. She was very gracious and took him back.
• • •
Now, in Maui, Denise said that Milton had a really good home. I was happy to hear it, but I knew we’d dodged a giant, everywhere-shitting bullet. I hadn’t let guilt and fear of confrontation make the decision for me. For once I’d had the wherewithal to extract myself from a responsibility that was more than I could handle. (Thank God, since I was clearly on the cusp of chemotherapy and pigs would be the least of my worries in the short remainder of my life.) Denise, for her part, was open and pleasant about the whole thing. When she said, “Don’t worry about it,” I could tell she meant it.
Liam’s favorite part of his Maui days came as the sun set. The hotel had a nightly traditional ceremony during which a guy in a grass skirt and headpiece ran through the resort blowing a conch shell and lighting torches. Liam watched him, shouting, “Fire! Fire!” Most of the time after dinner we retreated to our room for our own equally traditional ceremony of watching pay per view, but that night we took the kids to the lobby lounge.
I’ve been to Maui at many different times in my life, and all of them involved spending time at the lobby lounge in the Four Seasons, which is much more family-friendly than it sounds. As Liam and Stella ran in circles around the bar, someone who worked there looked at Liam and said, “Didn’t he sit on the piano here when he was a baby?” and I thought about how I’d been there when I was pregnant with Stella, with nine-month-old Liam sitting on the piano. I’d been single at this bar, with boyfriends, with my brother. I’d been young and drunk at this bar. This bar had seen my whole adulthood. It had suited me as a frolicking twenty-year-old, and now, as Liam and Stella circled the bar stools, I saw that it was actually amazingly family-friendly. The lobby lounge was growing up with me. All the stress of the night before was forgotten as I soaked in the nostalgia.
• • •
But that night Dean and I watched The Haunting in Connecticut, a horror movie on PPV. The underlying story line was tha
t the main character’s son had cancer and moved to Connecticut for treatments. He was sixteen and likely to die. It couldn’t be a coincidence. I really did have breast cancer.
At night, in bed, when everyone else was asleep, I was in my head, which was the worst place to be. I’m no stranger to irrational fears and usually I can talk myself down off the wall. I told myself, I’m only thirty-six; I probably don’t have breast cancer. But the lump was still there. For the first time, my life felt completely out of control. No matter how much I worked or wished or invoked my various talismans, nothing would change the reality of that lump. I had no control over it. There was nothing I could do to make it good or bad news. It was what it was. And because of it, my whole life might change. And then I went down the painful, awful route that every mother must tread at some low point. I thought about how much I wanted to see Stella become a woman. What if I never got there?
I pictured having to videotape messages to Stella that she could play as the years went by. Happy birthday messages for year after year of her childhood. Advice about boys. Hopes for her future. Explanations of the tabloid photos of me humping a reindeer. (Actually, I’ll explain that later. For posterity.)
That night in Maui, after watching The Haunting in Connecticut, I decided that I was going to live my life differently. If I couldn’t control the cancer, I could correct other flaws. It was time to stop thinking I was going to fall off a balcony, crash in a plane, be stabbed in the back in a movie theater or shot through the window of a restaurant. That stuff was irrational. The lump was real. If it was nothing life-threatening, then it had to be a sign that it was time for me to stop living my life in fear. If the lump meant I was dying, well then, I’d balance out that unthinkable truth by living. No more fear of flying. No more walking down the street looking behind myself every second, no more waking the children up every night to make sure they’re still breathing, no more checking under my bed every night before going to sleep. No more fatalistic what-ifs, no more irrational fears, no more fear of confrontation. I’d be spontaneous and adventurous. I would book the family a trip to Argentina, no matter the twelve-hour flight. I’d call up the 90210 castmates who weren’t speaking to me (more on that to come). I’d try skydiving (okay, who are we kidding?). Except for the cancer, my new life sounded pretty good.
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