senior in high school.”
“You’re a real loser, you know that?”
I was just about to hang up when he said this:
“I, ah—killed my mother today.”
I thought this was a great joke, so I played along.
“Yeah? I killed my mom three years ago.”
This wasn’t a lie. I might not have done it with my own hands, but inside it felt like I had.
* * *
They found out Mom had ovarian cancer just when I entered junior high in April. She passed away in October of my third year in junior high, so it was like my whole junior high school days were occupied by my mom’s illness. Cancer takes a long time to kill you, so it’s really rough on your family. It wasn’t like she came to terms with it. There were some days when she did, I guess, seem calm about it, but other times she wailed about her fate like she was possessed by an evil spirit. She was only thirty-eight, and most of the time it was the latter. Dad was hardly ever at home—it made me think he might be having an affair—and Mom was so emotionally unstable that the rest of us didn’t know how to handle her. One day she’d suddenly hug me tight and apologize, the next she’d push me away. We had to deal with these violent mood swings. I recoiled from this. I was worn out and had no idea how to handle it. On top of this was my dawning realization that I was a lesbian. I realized my mom was too preoccupied with her illness to think about my troubles, and I grew lonely, sad, and totally depressed. After agonizing over it for a while, I finally decided to abandon her. I decided in my heart that the moment she became sick was the moment she died. The person in the bed was a living corpse and nothing else.
When my mother was close to death, my father came to get me, but I refused to come out of my room.
“Come on. Your mother wants to see you.”
“I’m not going,” I said.
I held Teddy to me and kept on shaking my head.
“I know you’re scared, but it’s okay. She’s dying and you should see her.”
Dad was almost in tears, but I wasn’t going to fall for that. Say I did go see her when she was dying and I had this phony smile like everything’s all right, would that be it? What about my feelings? All kinds of outrageous thoughts ran through my mind.
“But Mom will be sad,” Dad said.
“So what? Everybody’s sad.”
“Don’t you feel sorry for her that she’s dying? You’re her only daughter.”
Well, she’s my only mother, too, I wanted to tell him. I didn’t deserve this, either. I wasn’t aiming to get revenge, just to get my mother, at least in her final days, to think about her relationship with me. My father gave up and left the room, and soon after this I heard this ping at the window. There was a crack in the glass. A small pebble must have hit it. Teddy was frightened and was shivering. I opened the window and looked outside. The sun had long since set and the streetlights were lit. The street was deserted. Not long after this the phone rang with the news that my mother had died.
* * *
“So what you mean is that pebble was your mother?” this guy on the phone said after hearing my story.
“I don’t know. It sounds too much like a ghost story, so I never told anybody about it. You’re the first.”
“Why didn’t you tell anybody?” he asked.
“I didn’t want to. If I told them the truth, then—”
I stopped. Why in the world was I telling all this to some guy I’d never met?
“If you told the truth, then what? Tell me. I want to hear it.”
He’d told me his secrets, so maybe I should tell him mine. I searched for the right words.
“I thought my mother was blaming me,” I began. “That she hated me. When you hate someone like that, your spirit still hangs around and you can’t properly pass on. That’s when I started to get scared. Not scared of my mother or her ghost or anything. Scared of how strong the bonds between people can be. So when I decided I’d abandon my mother it felt like I’d
“You’re a real loser, you know that?”
I was just about to hang up when he said this:
“I, ah—killed my mother today.”
I thought this was a great joke, so I played along.
“Yeah? I killed my mom three years ago.”
This wasn’t a lie. I might not have done it with my own hands, but inside it felt like I had.
* * *
They found out Mom had ovarian cancer just when I entered junior high in April. She passed away in October of my third year in junior high, so it was like my whole junior high school days were occupied by my mom’s illness. Cancer takes a long time to kill you, so it’s really rough on your family. It wasn’t like she came to terms with it. There were some days when she did, I guess, seem calm about it, but other times she wailed about her fate like she was possessed by an evil spirit. She was only thirty-eight, and most of the time it was the latter. Dad was hardly ever at home—it made me think he might be having an affair—and Mom was so emotionally unstable that the rest of us didn’t know how to handle her. One day she’d suddenly hug me tight and apologize, the next she’d push me away. We had to deal with these violent mood swings. I recoiled from this. I was worn out and had no idea how to handle it. On top of this was my dawning realization that I was a lesbian. I realized my mom was too preoccupied with her illness to think about my troubles, and I grew lonely, sad, and totally depressed. After agonizing over it for a while, I finally decided to abandon her. I decided in my heart that the moment she became sick was the moment she died. The person in the bed was a living corpse and nothing else.
When my mother was close to death, my father came to get me, but I refused to come out of my room.
“Come on. Your mother wants to see you.”
“I’m not going,” I said.
I held Teddy to me and kept on shaking my head.
“I know you’re scared, but it’s okay. She’s dying and you should see her.”
Dad was almost in tears, but I wasn’t going to fall for that. Say I did go see her when she was dying and I had this phony smile like everything’s all right, would that be it? What about my feelings? All kinds of outrageous thoughts ran through my mind.
“But Mom will be sad,” Dad said.
“So what? Everybody’s sad.”
“Don’t you feel sorry for her that she’s dying? You’re her only daughter.”
Well, she’s my only mother, too, I wanted to tell him. I didn’t deserve this, either. I wasn’t aiming to get revenge, just to get my mother, at least in her final days, to think about her relationship with me. My father gave up and left the room, and soon after this I heard this ping at the window. There was a crack in the glass. A small pebble must have hit it. Teddy was frightened and was shivering. I opened the window and looked outside. The sun had long since set and the streetlights were lit. The street was deserted. Not long after this the phone rang with the news that my mother had died.
* * *
“So what you mean is that pebble was your mother?” this guy on the phone said after hearing my story.
“I don’t know. It sounds too much like a ghost story, so I never told anybody about it. You’re the first.”
“Why didn’t you tell anybody?” he asked.
“I didn’t want to. If I told them the truth, then—”
I stopped. Why in the world was I telling all this to some guy I’d never met?
“If you told the truth, then what? Tell me. I want to hear it.”
He’d told me his secrets, so maybe I should tell him mine. I searched for the right words.
“I thought my mother was blaming me,” I began. “That she hated me. When you hate someone like that, your spirit still hangs around and you can’t properly pass on. That’s when I started to get scared. Not scared of my mother or her ghost or anything. Scared of how strong the bonds between people can be. So when I decided I’d abandon my mother it felt like I’d
Similar Books
