Flowers

Here's a new section I typed out today. I'm still editing it and everything, but I wanted to get something up, so I actually rework this into a fiction piece. At the moment, all of this stuff already happened. I'm not sure how much of the novel I will have to rework, but at the moment, I'm just trying to get stuff down.

Shortly after my mother was diagnosed in February, I went to visit her briefly after school. Downtown was salt-stained and belching steam from the sewer grates. Bundles of clothes, presumably containing people, littered the streets. They all hurriedly rushed from here to there to get out of the cold. I passed them in my 93’ Dodge Shadow, affectionately known as “The Beast.”

I found a parking spot near the hospital and made my way inside.

“Hi, mom.” I replied after finding her room.

“Hey you.”

A curtain separated my mother’s room. Beyond the divider, I saw a portion of another hospital bed. A woman lay on it, asleep. Her hair fell languidly to her shoulders while she slept.

“Who is that?” I whispered.

“I dunno,” my mother sat up slightly, and adjusted the pillow behind her back. “She came in earlier today.”

“Has she had any visitors?”

“Nope. How was your day?

When I left my mother about a half and hour later, it wasn’t her I was thinking about. It was that derelict who shared a room with her. Who was she? Why was she there? I fabricated a complete story about this stranger’s life, until I felt nothing but empathy towards her.

Later that afternoon I walked into a floral shop to buy something for Ms. Unknown. Roses were overpriced, and I couldn’t afford most of the displays either. I settled on a basket of daisies that said, “Get Well.”
By the time I got back to the hospital and secretly crept back to the room, I realized it would be impossible to give the flowers to Ms. Unknown without alerting my mom. Both her and this strange women would have to be asleep.

My sneakers shuffled against the linoleum. My heart thudded against my chest, and as I stood at the door, it dropped completely. The woman was gone. The divider was pulled against the wall, and this stranger’s bed was empty.

Had it not been for my mother seeing me hovering in the doorway, I would have returned home without greeting her.

“Hey,” she said curiously. “What are you doing here?”

I looked at the flowers in my hand, and guilt creased every pore in my body. “I—brought you these flowers.”

Her face brightened and she sat up. “They’re beautiful. You didn’t have to do that!”

“Oh, I know. I wanted to,” I lied.
It was obvious how pleased she was. How appreciative she was of my apparent kindness.

“You could put ‘em over there,” she pointed to the windowsill, which contained
several vases and baskets of flowers from others wishing her well. “Just make some room.”
I moved some wilting daisies and turned to face her. I was ashamed of myself.

“C’mere,” she stretched her arms out. “I love you.”

I accepted the hug. “I love you too. I should let you get to sleep. It’s getting late.”

My shame poked and prodded me to escape. Taking recognition for a selfless act I had wanted to selfishly keep from my mother.

“Thank you for my flowers.” Her mouth broke in to her characteristic crescent.

You’re welcome,” I forced myself to grin. “G’night, mom. I love you.”

As I left the room, I saw her cast another sidelong look at the flowers.

Days later, Pastor Steve and I met on Tuesday to talk. Something we started doing around the time my mom’s hospital visits started. We met at a McDonald’s near the church.

“I saw your mom the other day.”
“Oh yeah?” I fidgited with a French fry slathered in ketchup.
“She showed me the flowers you gave her.”
“Yeah, I got them on Saturday.”
“That was really nice. You could tell how much she loved them.
“It was nothing.” I replied.
It was nothing.

My mother’s birthday passed without drawing much attention. It’s hard to celebrate someone’s birth, while his or her demise is tucked so closely around the corner. “Happy Birthday: You’re Dying!” With Valentine’s Day approaching, my entire family went to visit her at the hospital. My work schedule kept me from having to go.
When I got home that night, I threw my jacket on the kitchen chair and grabbed a Diet Coke from the fridge in the basement.

“Daniel?” my father called from upstairs. Something in his voice made me pause. Something had changed.

“Yeah?”
“C’mere. I need to tell you something.”

I climbed the stairs and somehow knew it was about my mother.

He sat on his bed with his feet on the floor.

“What’d the doctors say?” The question lingered in the air for a moment.

He took a deep breath and chose his words deliberately. “The doctors said that anytime the family could see her in the next two weeks, that would be good.” He paused. “It could be that quick.”

The color drained from my face. There was still a chance he wasn’t saying what I thought he was saying. Not even the slightest possibility. It could mean something else. Maybe with the treatment she’d undergo—she’d be too tired to see anyone—No. “It could be that quick.” That meant—My mind stalled.

“Two weeks?” I gasped. “She could die in two weeks?”

“It’s just the doctor’s guess,” he replied calmly. “Nothing is certain yet.”

I blinked and held his words close to my chest. Nothing is certain. Nothing is certain. Yet, somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew it could only really end one way. Perhaps that is why I was so ashamed about the flower incident. I suppose the brutal truth of it was that I never thought about buying her flowers. Maybe because “Get Well” rarely crossed my mind. Even at the beginning with her migraines—gall bladder—bile ducts—pancreatic cancer, when I was honest with myself, I didn’t think she would make it. When I went even further and explored the darker aspects of my psyche, I wasn’t sure that I wanted her to. Which made me feel that much worst about everything. It made me feel guilty about seeing my mother because I’d given up on her getting better, and ashamed of myself for not being more worried about it.

No matter how many prayer meetings they held at church, or how greasy my mother’s forehead get when they anointed her with oil, a part of me could already see how it was going to end. And all the conversations with God, the casseroles my “church family” brought for us to eat while my mother was in the hospital, or my mother recommitting her life to Jesus, wasn’t going to change that. The faith they possessed failed to carry me.

And yet…two weeks. Two. Weeks. That wasn’t much time at all. How could she be gone so soon? In all honesty, I wasn’t ready. I had just convinced myself that I was. But in truth, I was terrified. I couldn’t imagine life without my mother, but the truth of that reality would greet me soon enough.