Tell Me Something Real Read online

  Marie nods and resumes her reading. I hug her close. Marie still has a girl’s body, and her small stature only emphasizes her youth. She takes after Dad, with the same warm eyes, round face, and high forehead. Plumper than Adrienne and me, Marie’s body consists of small circles, baby-faced with round cobalt eyes. She quit her soccer team when Mom and Dad told us about the diagnosis, and now she looks even softer than before. I part her mermaid hair, weaving piece after golden piece until it falls down her back, a long fishtail.

  The front door opens with a bang, and I hear the familiar thump of Dad’s heavy briefcase as it hits the floor—the telltale sign he’ll be sketching building designs after dinner. Marie hops up and pulls me down the hall, hollering, “Daddy! Daddy!”

  “Iris! You and the kids okay? Can you believe this weather? Ash Street is flooded. No one knew what to do when the traffic signals went out. It took me ten minutes to go three blocks.”

  Envy pays a brief visit as I watch Dad lift Marie off the ground. Adrienne lined the tabletops with candles, something straight from a movie set. Even Mom’s wedding candelabra is aflame.

  Dad takes a deep breath when Mom walks in wearing one of Lupe’s hand-embroidered dresses. Roses climb the length of her torso, and she’s pulled her hair into a loose bun. “You look very pretty in the candlelight,” he says.

  “Thank you, darling.”

  Depositing Marie on the ground, he walks over and kisses her cheek. “I’m glad you got home safe and sound.”

  “Barely, right, girls?”

  “Yeah,” I say. The little hairs on the back of my neck rise to attention. “It was rough.”

  Mom smiles at Dad. “Now that you’re home, I can put the day behind me.”

  “Thanks to the rain. If the power hadn’t gone out, I’d still be at the office. Richard thinks we’re going to miss the deadline. What’s the plan for dinner?”

  “I made sandwiches,” Adrienne says. “Salad too.”

  “It’s a picnic, and a fancy one,” Dad says. “Let’s eat.”

  I join Adrienne in the kitchen. “Nice look,” she says. I’ve changed into sweats and an oversize black T-shirt covered with dancing piano keys, a favorite from music camp. “I definitely can’t see your boobies in that.”

  I pass out sandwiches, and Adrienne chatters away as she scoops fruit onto Marie’s plate. Mom recounts the drive home, comparing it to her hometown storms back in Charleston. “You would have been proud of the girls,” she says to Dad. “They were very brave. And strong. You should have seen us pushing the car.”

  The lights flicker on and the phone rings, announcing the return of electricity. Dad answers and runs his hand through his hair. “I know the power’s back, but I can’t reach the freeway with the flooded roads.”

  I hear the sound of an insistent voice come through the line. Dad regards us with a concerned expression. Mom tenses in her seat, staring at him with a desperate look.

  “I brought the plans home and they’ll be done by the morning. We’ll have time to run through the presentation, Richard. I assure you.” He turns his back to us. “I’m well aware that I can’t work on the model at home. I’ll come in early. Name the time.”

  “Who won?” Adrienne asks when he hangs up the phone.

  I watch Mom watch Dad. This isn’t the first time we’ve witnessed one of his negotiations. His boss usually wins, reminding Dad of deadlines and bonuses, of how the work can only be done at the office with the entire team present. The firm depends on him—as if we don’t. Sometimes I want to grab the phone and remind his perpetually sweaty boss about Mom and cancer and needles and the clinic. It shouldn’t take a flash flood for Dad to stay home.

  “Me,” he says. “I’m home until five in the morning. God, forgive me, I completely forgot—what’d the doctor say about your tests?”

  Mom closes her eyes and takes in a deep breath. Even the candles still in anticipation.

  “Iris,” he says, “what is it? What’s wrong?”

  I watch the color drain from her cheeks. She opens her mouth to speak, but closes it again. She looks at each of us, and when her eyes meet mine, I hold on, knowing something is about to change, something irreversible. Our tear ducts race, our eyes filling.

  She looks down at the table. “I’m terminal.”

  I swear the blood in my veins pauses. I hear it churn, the blood working its way from my heart to my fingertips. I feel my heartbeat where my palms bruised from pushing the car.

  Adrienne drops her fork, but it is Marie who speaks first. “You’re going to die.” I marvel at the surety of her tone, not at all questioning. I have seven years on her, but lack her certainty.

  I can’t look at Mom—or any of them. My eyes wander around the room in search of a safe place to rest, somewhere quiet, but the rain continues to pound and I watch water seep through a windowpane.

  Two

  Paper litters the floor like confetti, crinkling with my every step. I’ve had the same locker combination all year, but now, on the last day of school, I struggle with the combination:

  10 09 37:  Mom’s birthday

  01 14 76:  Diagnosis Day

  11 25 76: Thanksgiving, six months after her terminal prognosis, the last month she’ll likely be alive.

  I’ll be a motherless junior.

  In my memory, the day of the storm feels both compressed and drawn out. I don’t remember the next morning or going to school. I don’t remember climbing in and out of the car. I can’t tell you what played on the radio. The only thing I remember is the expression on Mom’s face and the stark realization that in a matter of months, a yet-to-be-determined number, she will leave us for good.

  Jasmine, my best friend since sixth grade, cruises by, pausing long enough for me to notice. Before the diagnosis, we had a rhythm of sleepovers, beach days, and evening phone calls. I told her everything—until the diagnosis. I became more consumed with Mom’s sleep and eating habits. I lost track of conversations about boys and crushes. I stopped answering the phone. My friends tried, asking questions and offering to help. They gazed at me with such suffocating pity that I couldn’t be alone with them. Adrienne and I fled campus for lunch, driving through McDonald’s, dividing chores over Happy Meals. We returned late, tossing our crumpled burger wrappers out the car window and ducking into classes long after the bell rang—not once punished with a tardy slip. Jasmine persisted through months of my monosyllabic answers to her kind questions. But patience has an expiration date, and she moved out of our locker. No one took her place. It didn’t take long before they all avoided me.

  My fingers twirl the lock, this time the right combination. I press so hard that the numbers emboss my skin, briefly obscuring my fingerprints. I empty the contents of my locker into the trash before heading to the music room.

  Surrounded by concentric circles of music stands and chairs, my orchestra teacher boxes up sheet music. The chalkboard urges us to practice, the word written in her spidery cursive.

  Mrs. Albright raises her head and smiles. “I’ve been waiting for you.” She passes me a thick folder before brushing silver hair from her face. “I’m giving you twice as much as anyone else.”

  I glance at the grand piano, levitating on the stage like one of Marie’s saints. Freshman year, I didn’t like the separation from the winds and strings. It made me feel fake, like some sort of imposter who bullshitted my way up there. I couldn’t look down at the seniors who played with ease. The flautists terrified me the most, the girls who puffed air into flutes, cheeks as full as squirrels, yet still looked beautiful. The cheerleaders’ instrument of choice.

  Now, though, I welcome the distance and bulk of the instrument. I think of my little spinet tucked away in a dining room corner, the only place Mom would allow. After my middle school music teacher pronounced me gifted, she urged my parents to invest in a piano. Dad drew up sketches that required rearranging the living room, entertaining the possibility of removing a wall. He’d forgotten about his promise to
Mom and their original design of the room: sunken, a clear separation between family and adult space.

  Mrs. Albright isn’t the swooning type. While she acknowledges my skill, she says it’s worthless unless I work. The piano chose me and I am in its debt. When I told her about Mom, she doubled my workload, saying, “I know grief. We’ll play through it together.”

  Chopin. Beethoven. Bach. Mozart. Haydn. She spares me Satie, whose notes sound like tears.

  I shroud my piano in blankets, topped off with an Amish quilt, to muffle the sound. It’s the only way to practice without waking Mom.

  I flip through the pages, a year’s worth of pieces. “I can’t get through all of this.”

  Mrs. Albright squeezes my hand and I meet her eyes. I want her to be family. A grandmother. An aunt. Someone bound by blood or vows. “You just have to play. This might be too much. It might not be enough. Promise me you’ll keep up with it. Conservatory work is rigorous.”

  For the first time since I hit puberty, I’ll miss summer music camp in LA—trapped at the clinic instead. I can’t imagine getting into one of the conservatories, playing for hours a day, leaving home for the luxury of music, replacing regular high school with a performing arts education. Mrs. Albright and I spent hours filling out applications and recording cassettes, but in the end, only three schools invited me to audition after I applied last fall—before the diagnosis. Back then, my only hurdle was getting in. There are so many obstacles now, but that doesn’t change my dream of going. I want to spend my days at the piano, hours on end, losing myself in the notes. I didn’t think I could want anything so much. Until Mom.

  “I don’t know how much I’ll be home,” I say. “We’re in Mexico so much. There isn’t a piano there. Honestly, with how things are with my mom, I don’t know if I can even go. I haven’t even told my parents.”

  “Would it better if I have the schools send the acceptance letters here? We won’t hear for a couple more months.”

  I’m filled with relief that I won’t have to worry about telling Mom and Dad now. Or Adrienne. The last thing I want is for her to intercept my mail. “Yes, that would be better.”

  Mrs. Albright gives me a tender smile. “But you need to practice whenever you’re able. Agreed?”

  I promise with my whole body, eyes squeezed shut, hands clutching the music, head nodding.

  “Good,” she says. “Turn over the folder.”

  Louise Albright

  555-3722

  269 Mariposa Street

  “In case you run out of music.”

  I want to hug her, but something about her, maybe her perfect posture, prevents me from doing so.

  “Play every day,” she says.

  In the hall, Adrienne and Zach lean against the cinder-block wall near the door. Tall and lanky, Zach bends his head as he listens to Adrienne. She shakes her head. He speaks. She shakes her head again. Poor Zach.

  “Hey, Vanessa, tell her I can come with you.”

  “For the millionth time, no. Babcocks only. It’s tradition.” Adrienne flashes a smile, half-playful, half-dangerous.

  His eyes meet mine and I shrug an apology.

  “We’ve got to get Marie,” she says as she reaches for her art supplies. “See you soon.”

  I turn away when she gives him an enthusiastic kiss good-bye.

  Half of the parking lot waits at the exit, bumper to bumper, so close they resemble boxcars hitched to a steam engine.

  Adrienne tosses her stuff into the backseat. Mom hasn’t driven the car since the storm. I’m promoted to shotgun.

  I lean my head out the window. “Marie’s going to freak out if we’re not there,” I say.

  She backs out of the space and drives in the opposite direction of the honking line. “These fools don’t spend half their time driving through TJ.”

  Our wheels crush a patch of marigolds as Adrienne barrels over the sidewalk, off the curb, and into the street. Seamless and daring. She raises her middle finger at the school. “See you later, motherfuckers.”

  Chaos hasn’t consumed Torrey Pines Elementary. Parents sit behind steering wheels, anxious and smiling. A small gaggle of mothers, wearing a uniform of pastel clam-digger pants and jelly sandals, huddle near the entrance. Probably moms of kindergartners, a club to which Mom once belonged. I don’t remember running through the doors and into her arms. I can’t imagine a time when she was strong enough to lift me.

  Marie walks out alone. She wears a butter-yellow shirt with a drawing of one of her saints, horrible portraits sketched with an amateurish but sincere hand. Bloody-eyed Lucy. Flame-licked Joan. Marie only wears pastels because she believes God prefers pale colors. Adrienne likes to tell her that God is a smoking pile of horseshit and maybe she should wear the color red once in a while. Marie sticks to baby blue, sherbet orange, and carnation pink.

  The kindergarten moms call her name. One strokes her hair. Our tragedy has blazed through the gossip mill.

  She beams as soon as she sees us, excited as when she scores a goal at a soccer game. “Come on, come on, come on!” she says. “I’ve been waiting all day!”

  Adrienne doesn’t rely on her south-of-the-border driving technique to get us to Luigi’s. They sit us at a small table in the back, not our usual family-size one in the front. I stare at the empty chair.

  “We should get something for Mom,” Marie says.

  Adrienne shakes her head. “She won’t eat it.”

  Marie frowns. “But she always comes with us.”

  I tug Marie’s braid and focus on the menu, even though we always order the same thing. Personal pan pizzas, pepperoni for us and veggie deluxe for Mom and Dad. “We’re already bringing one home for Dad,” I say. “Might as well get Mom a cheese just in case.”

  Adrienne cocks an eyebrow. “Couldn’t hurt.”

  The waitress offers the parlor’s annual graduation day fanfare: lemonade decorated with those little paper cocktail umbrellas, and pepperoni smiley-face pizzas. Marie savors her ice-cream sundae, eating so slow that the ice cream melts before she finishes. She raises the metal bowl to her mouth and slurps the last few drops. Mom, with her South Carolina manners, never would have let her get away with that, but I laugh at Marie’s messy face as I wipe her clean.

  Dad beat us home and we find them both sitting at the kitchen table. Mom cradles a cup of steaming tea. Maybe it’s the warmth, but she has more color in her cheeks than usual. She smiles when Marie presents her with the pizza.

  Dad sets a speed-eating record, polishing off his meal in under ten bites. My stomach clenches as I watch Mom sample a slice, marveling as she eats the whole piece except the crust. She catches me staring.

  “It’s a good day, Vanessa. How does it feel to be an upperclassman?”

  “You mean, how does it feel to be a senior?” Adrienne asks. “Amazing.”

  Dad relaxes into his chair. Yesterday, his boss flew to Vermont for his son’s college graduation. Gone for an entire week, which means we have Dad home for breakfasts and dinners, and he can take Mom to the clinic. I can play the piano as much as I want.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to come?” he asks me. We celebrate matriculation almost as enthusiastically as graduation, and Marie’s gift is a visit to Mission San Luis Rey, a historic museum glorifying the conquering and converting of local tribes, completely disregarding genocide. I hate the idea of going. While I know Marie will love the gilded ceilings, she is more interested in the gift shop. She collects saint prayer cards with the fervor of a baseball fan.

  I shake my head and ignore Adrienne’s glare. She knows I’d rather eat glass than go to the beach and watch her make out with Zach. I’ve never been to one of their infamous bonfire parties, and I have no intention of starting now.

  “Looks like it’s just you and me,” Mom says, smiling.

  She’s pulled her hair back into a ponytail, and even though I spend my days looking at both of them, I still find it startling how much Adrienne is a carbon copy of Mom. O
ver the past month, Mom looks like she’s aged about ten years. They warned us about that at the clinic, how the more aggressive treatment will erode her like the walls of San Clemente Canyon.

  She swears she will keep fighting. She’ll continue with the Laetrile until her body can’t endure the treatment any longer. Sometimes I open my dictionary and read the definition of “terminal” as a reminder. Miracle drug or not, Laetrile won’t save Mom. She says so herself. When we point this out to Dad, he tells us that hope gives her strength, gives us all more time, more days, maybe weeks, maybe even months. He looks like he’s aged ten years too. I didn’t know you could watch someone’s hair turn gray. His full head of hair has lightened from sandy blond, the gray almost looking sun bleached.

  Mom picks the cheese off a second piece of pizza. “What time is Zach picking you up?” she asks Adrienne.

  “In an hour.”

  “Let’s play a game. Why don’t you get Parcheesi?”

  We crowd around the kitchen table taking turns playing the Royal Game of India. Marie teams up with Dad and we all let Mom win. She knows we’re doing it, and with each roll of the dice, she looks happier reaching this small victory. It’s like we’re carrying her over the finish line.

  After Adrienne, Dad, and Marie leave, I rinse the dishes. Dad came home with a dishwasher the week we found out about the leukemia. In my mind, I link the machine to Mom’s decline, another failed attempt to treat her illness. I only remember seeing her use the dishwasher once, loading it for the inaugural wash.

  “Do you want to rest, Mom?” This is a record: two hours straight without needing to lie down.

  “I’m okay. I have some energy. Do you wish you had gone with your father instead of babysitting me?”

  “I’m not babysitting you,” I say.

  “Want to play another round of Parcheesi?”

  Suddenly, I want to do anything but sit in the kitchen. Last year, it would have been inconceivable to scatter in different directions. Mom and Dad would have planned something special, like dinner on a boat—anything to mark the beginning of summer. Last year we went to the Hotel del Coronado and listened to music, a dozen men playing trumpets and clarinets. Dad loves big band jazz, and he’d persuaded all of us to dance. I flinch at the memory.