Happy Birthday to Me Again (Birthday Trilogy, Book 2) (23 page)

I turned around to see Wesley standing by
his car and removing his sunglasses. “I guess Ryan was right,” he said. “I
guess you did have a pretty wild night.”

“Wes…”

I stood completely still, frozen to my
spot in the grass, as Wesley looked
down
at me for the first time in his life. Wesley, always a few inches shorter than
I was during our time growing up, was finally the giant towering over me he
always wanted to be.

He kneeled down
and hugged me. “Cam, we’re gonna fix this, OK?”

It felt good to be hugged, by Wesley, by
anyone. I hugged him back and brought my chin up to his shoulder. “Thanks for
coming.”

“Of course,” he said.
“I’m not heading back until you’re back to normal.”

I just shook my head as he got back on
his feet. “No. What? You have school, Wes. You have your own life now. I’m not
gonna let you re-arrange everything just for me.”

Wesley didn’t really respond; instead he
just stood there, arms crossed, looking me over. “I never thought I’d see
anything weirder than you at age eighty-five. And then there was the whole
floating incident at graduation, which I was able to look past. But then you
stay with this girl, and then you’re engaged to her, and now she’s missing, and
you’re getting sick again, now you’re aging the other direction, now you look
ten years old. Can I ask you one question, Cam?”

“OK,” was all I
said to his rambling.

“Why is this
Liesel chick still a part of your life?”

Chick
. The word seemed so degrading. “What do you want me to say,
Wes? I love her.”

“She’s brought you nothing but problems
ever since she cursed you at Uncle Tony’s last year. She’s caused
everything
. She’s threatening your life,
time and time again. That’s not love, Cameron. That’s assisted suicide.”

“Whoa! Whoa,
whoa, whoa! Wait a sec!”

“What?”

“How did you know about the Uncle Tony’s
incident? I haven’t told anybody about that.” I thought for a moment. “Wait…
except for…”

That’s when I saw Kimber step out from
the back of Wesley’s car. Her face was bright red. She brought her hands down
to her pockets and stared at me with a frown from afar, the wind blowing
through her curly brown hair.

“Do you want to
get some breakfast?” she asked.

I looked up at Wesley, who nodded toward
me. I could tell these two were the only people right now, besides the missing
Liesel, who could help me.

“I’m starving,
actually,” I said.

“Good,” Wesley
said. “Come on.”

He put his arm around my shoulders and
walked with me over to the car. I was barely to the sidewalk when Kimber rushed
up to me and gave me a hug ten times bigger and stronger than Wesley’s. I
hugged her back, and found it extremely disconcerting to look up into the teary
eyes of my own baby sister.

I plowed my fork into the plate of
scrambled eggs and hash browns, remembering just how much I loved and savored
breakfast foods. I hadn’t eaten much in the last few days, but now, at age ten,
I could tell I needed all the grub I could get my little kid hands on.

“Don’t eat too
fast, Cam,” Kimber said, sitting across from me, “or you’ll throw up.”

“Thanks for the advice,” I said, my mouth
full of food, “but remember, Kimber, no matter what I may look like on the
outside, I’m still your older brother, and I’m the one to give the advice, OK?”

I tried to make my remark humorous, but
nobody laughed. Wesley sat next to Kimber, and he was only picking at his
oatmeal. It still seemed odd to see Wesley, not only without his signature
curly hair, but also ordering food that was actually healthy.

I took a few more bites, noticing awkward
tension at the table. I looked out the window of the Reno diner and noticed how
quiet the city was on this chilly Sunday morning.

I turned back to
Kimber. “So. You told him?”

“Everything.”

“Everything? I
asked you to keep it confidential. Did you not hear that part?”

She put her hands up in the air in
frustration. “It’s
Wesley
. It’s your
best friend. He just randomly showed up from L.A. and wanted to find you. What
did you want me to say? I had to tell him. You’re sick.
Again
.”

“And you
believed everything she told you?” I asked Wesley.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s the only thing that makes
sense. I don’t know if I’m a believer in witchcraft and spells and what-not, but…
come on. Progeria, an accelerated aging disease—
that
we could buy. But there’s no such thing as going
back
in age. Unless your name’s Benjamin
Button. I mean, look at you! You’re a child! You look the way you did when we
went on that horrible field trip to Virginia City, remember?”

I spit out my
orange juice, laughing. “Oh God, how could I forget?”

“Remember? When we got lost in the mine?
It was like two hours before somebody found us. I had to poop so bad I went all
over the—”

“OK, OK,” Kimber
said. “Can we talk about something else, please?”

“This is weird, Cam,” Wesley said. “It’s
surreal. I feel like I’ve stepped in a time machine and gone back eight years,
back when things were… well… a lot more simple.”

“I know,” I said. I went to take another
sip of my orange juice but stopped. “Wait. How did you guys even
find
me today?”

“It was a matter of luck, really,” Wesley
said. “I just happened to call Ryan this morning as I was coming into Carson
City, asking if he knew where you were. He told me they left you on the lawn
behind the casino, that they offered to take you home but that you shouted at
all of them to just leave you there.”

I looked at Kimber. She was biting her
lip. “I don’t want to go home,” I said. “I don’t want Mom and Dad to see me
like this.”

“You
have
to come home, Cam,” Kimber said.

“No. I can’t.”

“You don’t have a choice.” She clenched
her fists together and sighed. “Cam, there’s something happening with Mom and
Dad.”

“What is?”

“I told Mom that
you were coming home tonight, that they’d be expecting you.”

“I don’t want to scare them. I don’t want
them to think I’m dying again. It’ll kill them way faster than this thing kills
me.”

Kimber shook her head. “Showing Mom and
Dad what you’re going through right now… well… it might be the one thing that
can
save
them.”

I opened my mouth and looked at Wesley,
who seemed to better understand what Kimber was talking about. I took a deep
breath and tried to relax my brain, which was feeling at this point like it
might explode.

“Kimber, what
the hell are you talking about?”

She sighed again, looking away from me
for a moment. “Mom told me about something… something bad.”

“What?”

“Cam, Mom and
Dad are separating.”

A sharp pain struck my stomach a second
later, and I placed my arms on top of the table. I didn’t know how to respond.

“Cam?” Wesley
asked. “Are you all right?”

I didn’t take my
eyes off of Kimber. “What do you mean they’re separating?”

“Mom hasn’t been happy for a while,
apparently. I don’t know, she didn’t give me details. They don’t want to go
into it until you get back. Remember, they don’t even know you’re in Reno.”

“They don’t even
know I’m
sick
!” I screamed.

I knocked my
empty plate to the ground and stormed out of the diner.

I stepped toward Wesley’s car at the back
of the parking lot, the harsh winds blowing at my face, a light rain dusting
the cement ground from above. With each step I could feel my emotions
overwhelming every pore in my body. I started crying about halfway across the
parking lot, and I started bawling by the time I reached the back bumper. I
grabbed hold of my stomach and fell to the pavement, my eyes unleashing too
many tears to count.

“Cam!” I heard
Kimber shout from across the way.

I covered my face with my hands and
knocked my knees against the bumper, allowing my face to stay hidden. I just
kept crying, trying to make sense of this new revelation about my parents.

“Cam… it’ll be
OK…”

I looked up to see Kimber towering over
me. I tried to talk through my sobs, but it was difficult. My stomach hurt
beyond belief, and I thought I was going to pass out.

“How… how could this be happening…” I
said. “Everything was going so perfect… now Liesel’s gone… I’m dying… Mom and
Dad are getting a divorce… what the hell is going on…”

“Mom didn’t say anything about a
divorce
. She just said she and Dad need
to spend a little time apart.”

“That’s a divorce, you moron!” I screamed
at my sister, more vindictively than I had ever spoken to her in my entire
life.

She swallowed loudly and licked her lips,
but she wasn’t backing down. “Cameron. You and I both know there’s no way
they’re gonna go through with this if they find out what’s happening to you.
You have to see them tonight. You are the best chance we have to keep Mom and
Dad together.”

“Until… what? I
get healthy again? And then they split up…
forever
?”

“I don’t know,”
she said.

“I had no idea
Mom was unhappy. How long has she been unhappy?”

“Dad’s never around, Cam. He works
eighteen hours a day. Honestly, I figured this would have come years ago.”

I didn’t say anything for a minute or
two. I tried to compose myself, and finally did. I stood up and gave my sister
a half hug.

“OK,” I said. “I’ll see them.” I looked
over at Wesley, who was on his phone in the distance, clearly trying to give
the two of us space. “Wes?”

He turned
around. “Yeah?”

“Can you take us
home?”

Wesley nodded.
“Sure thing.”

He started walking over to us, as Kimber
brought her hands to my shoulder. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. It’s gonna be hard. But they need
to know about what I’m going through. And trust me… I’m gonna have a few choice
words to say to Dad.”

“Cam… don’t
blame Dad…”

I didn’t respond. I just turned around,
waited for Wesley to unlock the door, and sat down in the back seat.

I crossed my arms and didn’t say a word
during the twenty-minute drive.

---

We arrived home to find neither of my
parents’ cars in the garage. We made ourselves comfortable on the family room
couch inside as Kimber called Mom. She talked to her for a minute and then told
me and Wesley that she would be home in the next hour, that she had been
meeting with a friend for lunch.

“And,” Kimber
said, “guess where Dad is today?”

“No,” was all I
had the heart to say.

Dad had apparently gone into work at 6
A.M. to perform one of those awful, longwinded rhinoplasty surgeries, which
meant he probably wouldn’t be home until late.

What would Dad do with his time if he
didn’t have that job? I swear.

I looked around the house. Our home up in
the Reno mountains was huge, a 6,500 square-foot beauty that would look more like
a palace if I hadn’t spent the last twelve of my eighteen years in it. But it
was true—Dad had provided well for us. Emotionally he hadn’t provided
much at all. Even though he showed compassion when I was sick last year, he
still hadn’t come around enough lately for me to say that he was truly a
changed man. He still had a long way to go, and it was going to be interesting
tonight to see how he’d react to my new illness.
 

Will he try to give me another facelift?

Since we had an hour to kill, Wesley, Kimber,
and I walked my dog Cinder around the Reno neighborhood on the Steamboat Ditch
trail. The loop takes about forty-five minutes, but we were walking so slow and
talking so much, about my illness, about Liesel, about Los Angeles, about
Wesley’s movies, about my dreaded lip-lock with Kimber, that we lost track of
time. When we finally returned home an hour and a half later, my mom was in the
garage, unloading bags of groceries.

She caught sight of Kimber first. “Hi
honey!” Cinder raced for the garage, and my mom started petting the dog pronto.
“Did you get a nice walk? Huh?” She turned back to Kimber. “Did she go poop?”

“Yes!” Kimber
shouted. “Twice!”

“Good,” Mom said, and then her jaw
dropped when she saw Wesley. “What the
hell
?
Is that
Wesley
?”

Wesley walked out in front of me, and I
tried to remain inconspicuous on the sidewalk in front of the house. I was
afraid to enter the driveway. But I knew I had to.

He put his arms out and gave my mom a big
hug, followed by an overdramatic kiss on the cheek.

“What are you
doing here?” she asked.

“It’s nice to
see you again, Mrs. Martin.”

She smacked him playfully on his head.
“Mr. L.A., being all formal. You know better. Just call me Shari.”

“OK.”

“But
really. Answer me. What are you doing here?”

“Oh… uhh… well…
it’s Spring Break…”

“That’s what I
figured, with Easter coming up. How’s USC?”

“It’s… uhh…”

My mom took
Wesley by the arm. “Is everything OK?”

“Mom,” Kimber said, pointing toward the
top of the driveway. “Mom, someone’s here to see you.”

“Who?” My mom looked
up toward me, finally seeing me.

“Mom, please
don’t freak out,” Kimber said.

“Why would I
freak out?” she asked. “Who’s that? Is that one of your friends?”

“No,” she said.
“It’s Cameron.”

My mom turned to Kimber with a smile.
“Cam? Where?” She darted her head all around, almost as if she expected me to
jump out from behind her.

“
There
.”
Kimber said, pointing toward me. By this point I was about halfway down the
long driveway.

Again, my mom
didn’t get it. “Where?
Him
? That’s
just a boy—”

When I reached the bottom of the
driveway, she turned into a stone cold statue. Her mouth hung open, my mom in
complete disbelief at the impossible sight in front of her.

Please don’t die of a heart attack, Mom.
I need you right now.
 

First, my mom stretched her hand in the
air, looking as if she was going to lose her balance. But then she took a few
steps forward, a tear noticeably falling from her right eye.

“Cameron…” she
said.

She got down on her knees as I stopped
myself in front of her. I couldn’t tell if she was going to hug me, or punch
me, or scream at me, or just start asking me questions. I was at a loss. I
figured my dad would be the first to punch me, but I had no clue what my mom
was going to do. She looked too sad to do much of anything besides cry.

“Cam, is it really you?” She brought her
hand out and caressed it against my softer-than-ever cheeks. I took a deep
breath and nodded.

“Mom… it’s me…”

“No…. No,
Cameron… not again… I can’t take this again…”

“Mom, please.
It’s going to be OK.”

“No… No… No, no,
no, no!”

She stood up and stormed inside the
garage and inside the house, leaving the back door of her car wide open, and
the four of us, including the dog, outside in the cold.

---

Over the next few hours, I was able to
calm my mom down through a series of talks. I wasn’t prepared to tell her about
Liesel’s powers—that would be far down the road—so I told her that
I was suffering a rare side effect of the condition I suffered last year. She
didn’t seem to buy it, but as long as I kept insisting that it would go away
before the disease would kill me, just like last time, she seemed to feel
better.

“It’s just so weird,” she said as she
watched me scarf down two grilled cheeses. “You’re still my boy. But now you
look you did when I was… Oh, God, in my
thirties
…”

I finished my dinner and pushed the plate
forward. I turned to Kimber and Wesley, who were also eating some grilled
cheese sandwiches, and then turned back to my mom. “OK, Mom. I wanted to give
you a few hours to come to terms with my condition, but now, I think it’s time
we talk about
you
.”

“Me?” she asked,
bewildered as to what I could be referring to. “What about me?”

“I know, Mom.
Kimber told me.”

That did it. She half-smiled, and exhaled
loud enough to wake Cinder in the back of the kitchen. “This is hardly the time
or the place—”

“You want to
separate from Dad? How long have you been unhappy?”

She clenched her hands together and
leaned forward on the table. “Cam, just know this has nothing to do with you,
or your sister. This is between me and your father. We’ve had some problems
for… God… the last three or four years, at least.”

“Three or four
years
? Are you serious?”

“What you went through last year… that
brought us together again… temporarily. But lately, your father’s
become—” She stopped and took a sip of her water. “I really don’t think
we should be discussing this right now. It’s absurd. I mean… you’re sick. We
need to get you better. Do you want me to make an appointment with that Dr.
Carol guy for tomorrow?”

“No,” I said. “No doctors. Mom, I want to
talk about this. I want to know what Dad’s done to you—”

Everyone hushed as we heard the garage
door opening. I looked at the clock to see that it was a few minutes past seven
o’clock, which meant he had been in surgery for upwards of twelve hours. He was
going to be cranky. And he was going to be irritable.

How’s he going to react?

There wasn’t much time to plan an escape
route, as he quickly raced up the garage stairs and entered the house, loudly
talking on the phone to someone from work. He sped into the kitchen, wearing
his purple scrubs, of course. He didn’t take note of any of us sitting at the
table. He simply set a couple of plastic bags on the kitchen island and
continued talking on the phone.

“No, Robert, I don’t! You hear me? Hayley’s
not gonna need the follow-up for that. It was standard procedure. If she needs
the extra tummy tuck, so be it. But I think if she just gives the swelling a
few more days to heal, she’s going to be OK. This is ridiculous. I have enough
on my plate as it is—”

He poured himself a large glass of water
and turned around, finally noticing us for the first time.

The first person
he caught sight of was Wesley. “Uhh… Wesley?”

“Hi Mr. Martin,”
Wesley said, sitting calmly at the back of the table.

“Robert, I’m gonna have to call you
back.” He hung up the phone, set his glass of water down, and raced over to the
table. He didn’t even acknowledge me. “Wesley? What are you doing here? Is
something wrong?”