Fire with Fire

I WATCH MY ALARM TICK DOWN, AND A MINUTE BEFORE it’s supposed to go buzz, I turn it off. I close the photo albums I pulled out last night and set them on my floor. Then I pull the blankets back up over me. My head finds the still-warm dent in my pillow, and I lie there for a minute.

Since she passed away five years ago, I’ve made it a tradition to stay up the entire night before the anniversary of my mom’s death to think about her. I don’t sleep, not one minute. It’s like some depressing form of meditation, I guess, but it’s how I do. I think about her all through the night.

I can trace that whole last shitty year of her life back to the moment it started, to the day Mom had to drop me off at school early because she had to go off island for an appointment with some specialist doctor.

I think about the day she and Dad sat us down at the kitchen table to tell us. How it didn’t look good, but we still needed to have hope. Mom was calm and Dad cried so hard he couldn’t breathe, and Pat ran straight out the back door in his socks and didn’t come home for three whole days. I felt anything but hopeful.

I think about telling Rennie when we first got the diagnosis. I rode my bike over early, before she was even awake, and basically ambushed her. She sat in her bed, still half-asleep, while I knelt on her floor and cried and cried. There was a sick part of me that was happy to have such a sad story. By then she was already starting to pull away from me. She was completely obsessed with Lillia and creaming her pants over the fact that Lillia was moving to Jar Island full-time after next summer. It’s pathetic to admit, but I remember hoping that Rennie might pity me enough to be close with me again, at least while I went through this terrible shit, but my mom getting sick only made things weirder between us.

I think about how Mom was strong for so long, until she couldn’t be, and then over a single freaking week she evaporated. Cancer eats you from the inside out, and I watched her waste away to skin and bones, to a hollow body, in literally seven days. The last day, she only opened her eyes once, and I don’t know if she saw me standing there, at the foot of her bed. Dad called out her name and Pat said he loved her, but her eyes didn’t focus. It was like we all saw the door closing. I wanted to say something meaningful, but I couldn’t get it out before her eyes shut again. We brought a stereo into the room and played “Suite Judy Blue eyes” on repeat.

It was almost a relief to see her go.

All those memories, plus the good stuff from before she got sick, typically take up most of the night. Once the sun rises, I shift gears and wonder how things might have been different if she’d lived. I go through the old photo albums, the letters she wrote to me as soon as she found out she was sick.

I do it all and I never, ever sleep.

The bonus to this is that I can sleepwalk through the actual day it happened. I’m so tired I don’t have to feel anything. That means I won’t cry in front of strangers; I won’t break down. It keeps things nice and tidy.

When I come downstairs, Dad is already at the table, staring over his newspaper off into space. Pat is quietly eating a slice of cold pizza over the sink. Well, as quietly as Pat can eat. Dude is a wildebeast. This is exactly what this day is like. Our loud, crazy family turns the volume down as low as it can go.

I give Dad a hug, and it brings him back into reality. He taps the newspaper and says, “Found a coupon for the store. Half off a pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving.”

Thanksgiving used to be awesome. Mom would entrust me with her recipe box, a wooden thing Dad had made to keep all her index cards. I’d set out the ones we’d need, each one sticky and stained with use. It would be my job to line up the ingredients on the counter for each of the recipes. Sugar yams, green bean casserole, turkey rubbed with sage and butter, cranberry sauce and sausage stuffing.

Needless to say, it’s not like that anymore.

Dad tried, and failed miserably, at recreating the family meal the first few years after Mom died. Every time it was a disaster, and he’d feel bad about the money he wasted and how he couldn’t survive without Judy, and the whole thing was so awful that we started buying a rotisserie chicken and frozen veggies. The only thing we’d make at home was baked potatoes. And even though it’s nearly impossible to fuck up a baked potato, it still never tastes right to me.

Suddenly Dad starts weeping at the table. I wonder what memory he’s thinking about. And like every year that this shitty anniversary falls on a Monday through Friday, I hate the thought of spending this day without him.

Even worse, this time next year I won’t be on Jar Island.

“I’m not feeling well,” I tell my dad, my voice soft and quiet, like my throat hurts. “Maybe I should stay—”

“Don’t even,” he says, sniffing.

“What? Come on, Dad.” I know the sick sound is gone, but seriously? “I never skip!”

“I know you don’t. And that’s why you’re going to school. Your mother would never forgive me for letting you miss school on her account.”

I open my mouth to keep arguing, but Pat shoots me a look. He’s right. This day is hard for everyone, and I don’t want to be starting shit with my dad. So I trudge back upstairs, get dressed, and head out the door.

One good thing—I don’t think many people know that I don’t have a mom. Not besides Ms. Chirazo, anyhow. It’s not like I come to school and everyone treats me different. Which I’m glad for, because I couldn’t deal with any pitying looks. But part of me does wonder if Lillia remembers. If she’ll say anything. She wasn’t around for the funeral—her family still lived in Boston back then—but they made a donation in my mom’s name to some cancer society.

I walk past Lillia in the hall. She’s talking to Ash, and she sees me and gives me a tiny smile, but it’s the same one I get every day. No different.

I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned my mom to Mary, but it’s not like I told her the exact day she died.

It’s weird, even though I’m totally used to going through this day alone, somehow this year it’s worse.

I open my locker door to chuck in my jacket. There’s one white daisy inside, laid at the very top of my pile of shit.

Daisies were my mom’s favorite flower. Everyone placed one on top of her casket before it got lowered in the ground.

I spin around and look behind me. Who did it? It wasn’t Lillia. And it wasn’t Mary. She wouldn’t know that.

And then, for a second, a split second, I see Rennie peering at me from around the corner of the hallway. Our eyes meet.

The weekend when Mom had her last round of chemo, nobody felt much like celebrating. She’d gone through the treatments, even though things weren’t looking promising.

A month before, her doctor had said something like, “It’s your call, Judy.” Which is basically the worst thing a doctor can say. It means that even he doesn’t have much hope. Still, at dinner we’d had a family discussion about whether or not she should do it. Dad spoke first. He thought she should take it easy, enjoy what she had left, but Mom looked at me and Pat and said, “How can we not try?” Dad started sobbing. We all did. Nobody touched the lasagna.

Mom had her last treatment on Thursday, and three days later Pat had a dirt-bike race. It was his first off-island one since Mom got sick. Usually Pat’s races were a family affair, and Rennie would tag along too. obviously Mom wouldn’t be able to go this time, and, unspoken, maybe never again. Pat promised her he’d win her a trophy. He did a good job not crying in front of her. He waited until he was out in the garage to lose his shit.

I loved watching my brother race. Every other racing family knew who he was, because he was that good. We were like minor celebrities on the track. Even when I’d be hanging out on the swings or in line for a hot dog, the other kids showed me respect. But I didn’t just go to cheer Pat on. I had a job, too. After each heat I’d wipe Pat’s bike down until it shone brand-new. I’d get all the grit off. His helmet, too. Rennie gave herself the job of making sure Pat always had a cold can of Coke.

Dad and Pat had loaded up the trailer. I went to pack a bag of rags, and Dad pulled me aside. “Katherine,” he said, setting his hands on my shoulders, “I want you to stay home this time. Make sure your mother doesn’t need anything.”

This might have seemed obvious, but it wasn’t to me. I was looking forward to getting out of our house, away from Jar Island for an afternoon. Also, there was Rennie. “But Rennie is supposed to come with us! We made plans weeks ago! She’s expecting us to come get her.”

“Sorry, kiddo. Next time.” Dad quickly put Mom’s afternoon medications inside a teacup. “I’m sure Rennie will understand.”

I called Rennie, and she did understand, though I could hear in her voice that she was disappointed. I watched from the front window as Dad and Pat drove away.

“Kat! I need you!”

It was my mom. A side effect none of us had expected was that Mom was now cranky as hell. She’d never been like that before. Everything seemed to bother her. How messy the house was getting, what Dad would make her to eat, the smells coming from Pat’s bedroom. I had always been Mom’s girl, her baby, but even I wasn’t immune. She flipped out when I put some special sweater of hers through the laundry.

Honestly, I was a little afraid of her.

“One sec!” I shouted upstairs. And then to Rennie I said, “Can you come over?” I hoped it was obvious in my voice. I didn’t want to be alone with my mom. I needed Rennie.

“Um . . .” I could hear her switching the phone from one ear to the other. “Actually, my mom needs my help with taking down some wallpaper. Sorry. I’ll call you later!”

I was furious. But not at Rennie. At my mom. I blamed her for making my friend not want to come over, not Rennie for being a sucky friend.

I trudged upstairs. Mom was in bed. Her eyes were slits. She’d kicked off all her blankets; she was sweating in the bed. “Can you please turn off the heat? I’m dying!”

“Anything else?” I said it so bitchy. So incredibly bitchy.

“No,” she said. “Sorry to bother you.” She said it sadly, which I knew was my opening to apologize. Instead I walked out and closed her door, hard.

I blamed the wrong person. Not my mom. She was sick. She needed me. It was Rennie. And maybe if Rennie had been a better friend, maybe I would have had more patience. Taken better care of my mom that day. It’s unforgivable, really.

I take the daisy, the one Rennie put in my locker, and I throw it into the garbage can. I don’t know if she’s still watching, but I hope to God she is.