“Fine,” Stella said, looking at up Mom, shaking even more than before.
“Did she feel any kind of nausea this morning or last night?” the doctor asked, looking at Mom, assuming, I guess, that Mom was the mom and I was the sister, who just happened to get the curly hair.
“Stella?” Mom looked at Stella.
“No, I’m fine,” Stella said with a hoarse voice.
“Good. Well, whenever you’re ready. Okay?” The doctor smiled and started to walk toward the door. “Carol here will walk you down there,” she said halfway out the door.
Mom offered Stella her hand. “Ready?”
“No,” she said reaching for Mom’s hand. Mom pulled her up and wrapped one of the blankets around her neck. “Not ready at all,” she mumbled into the blanket.
“We’ll be right here when you wake up,” Mom assured her by the doorway.
Stella nodded and wrapped her arms tight around Mom.
“It’s gonna be all right,” I heard Mom whisper.
As we watched her walk down the hallway with the big-bosomed Carol next to her, we could tell she was shaking even harder now. Poor Stella.
I FLOPPED ONTO THE couch in the waiting area and kicked off my flip flops and looked at Mom. She was sitting in a chair right next to me, flipping through a worn-out Living, shaking her head, I guess, in awe of all the intriguing pictures of food.
“Was it always like this?”
She looked up and nodded. “Pretty much.”
“What was the worst part?”
“Ah,” she said, exhaling, “everything?” She forced a smile and looked in the direction of the entrance. A girl, even younger than Stella, entered the door. She was all alone and from the look on her face and her oversized sweatshirt, she was here for the very same reason. She went straight for the whispering woman at the reception desk, constantly looking over her shoulder as if to see if anyone was watching her. Quickly, I looked down, catching Mom’s eyes on the way.
“Actually,” Mom said and tossed the magazine on the table. “And I know this sounds a little vain, but each and every time, well, except for that first time, you know...” She paused and glanced at the girl again. “I couldn’t help thinking, what if they think I’m here because I choose to be? What if they think I’m having a, um, you know.” She looked at me and nodded. Even in a place like this, it was still hard to say out loud. “I guess I just felt really ashamed of being there.” She looked straight at me and shook her head. “Not that I think there’s anything wrong or—”
“—Mom,” I cut her short, “you don’t need to be, quote, politically correct, unquote, with me,” I said, clearly trying to make fun not only of the over usage of the political correctness phrase, but also the quote and unquote thing (Mom and I just hate it when people do that—especially if it’s accompanied by the visual quote signs as well).
Mon couldn’t help smiling. “Thanks, El, my, quote, spring child, unquote.” She did the quote signs, twice. “But seriously, I hope you understand what I mean.”
I nodded. “I get it, Mom. I really do. Even more than you think.” I looked down at my bare feet. I had spent the entire last week (approximately one hundred and sixty-eight hours) dealing with the whole choice versus life, guilt versus morals, me versus Mom. An abortion meant giving away something—whereas a miscarriage meant something was taken away. There was a world of difference between the two tiny words. Mom had never had a choice those eight times. I had.
“The worst part was actually coming home to you,” Mom said, looking in the direction of the girl in the oversized outfit.
“To me?”
She nodded, still with her back to me. “Oh baby, don’t you make me cry now. I told myself I wouldn’t cry.” Her eyes were soaked with tears. She reached for her bag and pulled out a small package of Kleenex. I guess she had prepared for some amount of crying.
“To me?” I repeated.
She nodded and grabbed another Kleenex.
I looked at the thinning package of tissues in her hand.
“Coming home to you made me feel so blessed,” she continued, “and it made me realize that I already had all the kids I wanted in this world: you.” She grabbed another Kleenex and dabbed at her eyes. “And, of course, when I saw your pretty little face, I started crying all over again.” She leaned over and kissed me on my forehead. I could smell the salt on her cheeks. “I know it’s not really the right time or the right place,” she continued, “but having a child is nothing less than a miracle. You’ll find that out yourself ... pretty soon.” She looked at me with a tender look on her face and handed me one of the last Kleenex.
“Thanks.” I blew my nose. “You said you wouldn’t cry,” I teased her, “and now you have me crying too! In sync, as Dad would have observed.” I smiled at her through a set of tears.
The truth was, I wasn’t really crying because of her. This time I was actually thinking about myself and the choice I had made to not be here as a patient—wearing a gown fastened in the back, shaking with a blanket of fear. Somewhere behind those closed doors, Stella was sound asleep having “it” removed, as she had said herself. Here inside of me, my “it” was growing by the minute, eventually turning into a baby with arms, legs, head, hair, and a heartbeat, and it felt even more surreal thinking about all of this set up against the sad, gray walls of Evergreen Surgical Center. But somehow the contrast only made me more convinced that I had made the right choice. The right choice for me.
Mom smiled and blew her nose hard. “I’m so sorry to leave you like this,” she said, looking at her watch, “but I really have to go. I’m so sorry.” She smiled and gave me her I’m-so-sorry-face.
“You’re leaving me. Here?” She was leaving? What was she talking about?
“I have to. My appointment, remember? You’re the one who made it for me, silly.” She threw her hands into the air and smiled. “The OB!”
I had totally forgotten about her doctor’s appointment. So far, the morning had been so intense, that I had almost forgotten that there was actually a world outside the anonymous and sad walls of The Surgical Center. I had made the online appointment for her the very same morning she had found out that we were going to Evergreen. “See, I was just meant to go,” she had said, turning over some overcooked bacon. Now sitting at the hospital with her, I knew she was right. She was meant to go. I couldn’t have made it without her.
“Now all of a sudden, I’m the one feeling nervous.” She stood up.
“Why?”
“Because I know I’m not getting any younger. Hell, we probably both aged like five years on a morning like this.” She smiled and grabbed the almost-empty package of Kleenex. “I don’t really mind getting older, but to have someone—wearing scrubs and with a medical degree as long as my grocery list—face me with the cool facts, well, that’s another story.” She looked down at her lap and sighed. “It’s just a totally different ballgame. I know we’re not that old, but, let’s face it, we are getting older. Dad can’t see without glasses anymore, even though he won’t admit it, and I...” She paused and looked out the window. “From now on, I’ll officially be a woman in menopause. This is the first step in becoming old, as in grandma-old.”
I couldn’t help laughing. “C’mon, Mom. Grandma?”
Mom could never become like Grandma. They just couldn’t be any more different. Mom says tomato, Grandma says potato. Mom is a democrat, Grandma a full-blown Reagan republican. Grandma wears Prada and little sensible heels, Mom wears Doctor Scholl’s and recycle shopping bags. Grandma goes to church, Mom goes berserk. And Mom’s never going to be old, as in old. I mean, she still kinda looks like she did when I was a little kid. She still wears the same kind of clothes (except, since the U-Haul mix-up, she has now gone from aunt Annie’s style to Value Village style), she still weighs one hundred and twenty-five pounds, she still hasn’t learned how to parallel park or eat olives, she still blushes, and I don’t think she has as much as a single gray hair. Mom’s n
ever going to be old.
I got up and stood face-to-face with Mom. “Mom, trust me, you’ll never be like Grandma, seriously.”
“Well, maybe not like Grandma then.” She shrugged her shoulders. “But old. Forgetting things, names, Beatles lyrics, where I parked the car. Forget if I even have a car. That kind of old.”
“If that’s the criteria for being old, then I’m sorry to break it to you, Mom, but you’ve been old as long as I can remember.” I smiled and kissed her right on her mouth.
“Ha, ha, ha. Very funny.” She grabbed her bag from the back of the chair. “Now, let’s go and get you some hot cocoa. There’s a little coffee shop just across from the gynecologist’s office.” She started walking and I followed in her footsteps.
“But what about?” I gestured toward the hallway, where we had seen Stella shaking about ten minutes ago.
“Oh, it’s going be a while. We’ll tell them to call us when she wakes up. Plenty of time. You have your phone?”
I nodded and pointed at her bag.
“Go figure,” she teased. “Here!” She grabbed my phone from her bag. “I’ll drop you off at the coffee shop, but I promise I’ll be back before she wakes up.”
SHE WASN’T.
They called me from the Surgical Center about an hour and three cups of hot cocoa later. “Ella?” the voice said at the other end of the line.
“Um, yes.”
“She’s more or less awake now, asking for her sister.”
“Her sister?” I said, clearly not thinking.
“Yes, her sister,” the voice repeated.
“Oh yeah, her sister, me of course. I’m her sister. Me. That would be me,” I said, immediately thinking how incredibly stupid I sounded. I mean, could it be more obvious?
“Well,” the voice said a little hesitantly, “she’s still a little sleepy, but the anesthetics are beginning to wear off.”
“I’ll be right there,” I said, already running as fast as I could toward what I believed to be the right elevator, but when I got there, the fifth floor had been mysteriously erased, so I figured it was the wrong elevator, and so I headed back the way I came. When I finally found the right elevator, I waited for what felt like hours for it to get there, and so I decided to take the stairs instead. Half a marathon later, I finally made it back to Stella, who, thank God, had fallen asleep again.
For a minute or two, I just sat there, on the edge of the bed, and watched her breathe while trying to catch my own breath (lost somewhere between the first and second floor). When she didn’t show any signs of waking up right away, I tiptoed to the sink in the far end of the room and splashed my face with cold water, constantly keeping an eye on Stella. For a brief moment, I turned my eyes away from Stella and looked at myself in the mirror above the sink: OMG! The face looking back at me was downright scary. My face was beyond the color “blazing flames,” my eyes seemed way too big and almost bulgy, and my hair was frizzy and wet—just waiting for ninety-nine frizzy curls to kick in. I turned and looked at Stella. She, on the other hand, looked very calm and peaceful, lying on a bed with her straight blond hair brushed neatly around her.
Carol, the big-bosomed nurse from before, opened the door and popped her head in. “Still asleep?”
I nodded.
“She’s just really worn out. Don’t you worry, now,” she said, still standing in the doorway. She looked at me and smiled like only a nurse, or someone’s mom—my mom—can smile, that everything-will-be-just-fine smile. “Are you okay, dear?”
I nodded and tried to smile, but what I really wanted to do was cry from the top of my lungs, “I want my mommy!!!”
“Do you need anything?” the soft nurse voice asked.
My mommy, I almost cried out loud. “No thanks. I’m fine,” I lied, “but if my mom gets here—” I stopped to clear my throat. “If you see my mom could you please let her know, that we’re still in here?” I looked at Stella and held my breath.
Quietly, Carol stepped into the room and put her hand on my shoulder. “She’s going to be just fine. And I’m sure your mom will be here any minute now.”
I looked at her and nodded. I was just one breath away from crying (at this point pretty much everything could have knocked me over, especially the word Mom), and just as I was about to throw myself into Carol’s big, soft bosom, Stella woke up and Mom came marching through the door, almost knocking down Carol in her path.
Stella sat up as Mom took a seat in the chair right next to her. I looked at Stella and then at Mom. I guess Mom had been running all the way to get here as well; she was covered in sweat. I grabbed a couple of paper towels from the sink and handed them to Mom.
“Thanks,” she whispered and wiped her forehead. She looked even paler than poor Stella, who was staring at the both of us. “How are you?” Mom finally said in between broken breaths.
“Okay, I guess. A little lightheaded.” Stella grabbed one of the pillows behind her back and wrapped her arms around it like it was a teddy bear—an old, familiar friend.
“It’s the anesthetics,” a voice said from behind my back. I turned around. Carol was still there, intact. She had a glass of water in her hand. “Here you go,” she said as she moved a little closer to the bed. “Just a tiny sip.”
Stella sat up straight and took a few sips.
Carol pulled a chair over next to the bed and sat down. “There will be some cramping and light bleeding,” the nurse explained, looking at Mom, “but if the bleeding gets worse, or if the cramping gets worse, then I want you to call immediately, okay?”
Mom nodded and cleared her throat. “I know,” she whispered. Of course, she knew. “Don’t worry; we’ll take good care of her.” She leaned over and grabbed Stella’s tiny cold hand. “We will,” Mom assured both Carol and Stella, I guess.
Carol stood up and patted Stella gently on her head. “Well, you can go whenever you feel like it, okay?”
Stella nodded.
Carol turned toward Mom again. “I have put her clothes right there next to the prescription for the pain killers, and there are also some instructions for you to read. It’s pretty much about what I just said about the bleeding and cramping.” She turned and looked at Stella again. “Take care now. Okay?” And then she left, quiet as a mouse.
“Are you still cold, Stella?” Mom grabbed both of her hands.
Stella nodded. “Again, it’s only natural,” Mom assured her. “It’s probably the drugs.”
“It’s probably the thought,” Stella said, with no emotion in her voice.
I looked away and down at the big parking lot. The morning was still gray and dark, and I could see the refection of both Mom and Stella in the window. They were both looking out the window, too. No one said a word.
Suddenly Stella got up and started to take off the hospital gown. “Let’s just go. I can’t stand it another minute in here.” Her voice was very hostile.
“Are you sure?” Mom got up and grabbed her arm. “You don’t feel dizzy or anything?”
“Yes, I’m sure,” she snapped from the inside of the hospital gown. “Now!” she cried.
And so we left. And if passers-by—with nothing better to do—had watched us closely, they would probably have been wondering about the weird constellation of this little family unit: in front, marching out the doors, was a skinny, little teenage girl with long, straight blond hair, shivering in her warm UGGs and big sweater. In the back, trying to keep up with her, was a girl and a woman with wet and curly red hair, sweating in their matching tank tops and flip flops.
The motley crew had left the building.
Bill & Ben
Mom didn’t say a single word all the way back to Stella’s house. She just sat in the backseat with her head against the window, looking out on traffic. She had asked me to drive when she’d unlocked the car. “I’m just tired,” she had said, when I had asked if she was okay, but I could tell that she had been crying, and when we left the Surgical Center, heading for the car, she ha
d gone in the totally opposite direction—away from the hospital altogether. I know we have a family weakness when it comes to left and right and getting lost in the backyard, but she seemed lost in the world. I figured the whole “getting old on paper” was even harder than she had imagined. Or maybe it was just too hard to be back at the hospital, back with all the memories.
I looked at Mom’s face in the rearview mirror. Still lost. I took a firm grip on the steering wheel and exhaled loudly. I should never have agreed to bring her with us. Too many ghosts. Too many wings.
WE DROPPED STELLA OF at the exact spot where we had picked her up early that morning. It had only been a couple of hours, but somehow it felt like a lifetime ago.
When I hugged her goodbye, she looked at me with a long face and mumbled something about keeping in touch. “Sure,” I said, even though I already knew that we would never see each other again. She reminded me of the choice I could’ve made myself, and I guess I reminded her of the choice she didn’t make. The choice she couldn’t make. It was a lose-lose situation.
When it was Mom’s turn to say goodbye, she turned toward Stella and reached for her hands. “You give me a call whenever,” she said with tears in her eyes. “And if you have any kind of severe bleeding or cramping or both you let me know ASAP. I’ll come and get you right away. You know that, right?” She moved closer and placed a gentle kiss on top of Stella’s cold, shivering hands.
Stella nodded and looked down at her hands still securely placed between Mom’s. She looked like she had a hard time letting go. I guess letting go meant going back to her own world where no one cared, where no one understood, where no one knew.
And then only a few minutes and hugs and promises-to-keep-in-touch later, we were on our way, leaving Stella and her world behind, waving goodbye until she was just a little “it” herself—standing on the curb waiting for the lights to turn green. Next week she would turn sixteen but, as Mom had said earlier that morning, after today she would be a lot older on the inside.
Lost in Seattle (The Miss Apple Pants series, #2) Page 38
