Positively Beautiful (32 page)

And we're kissing, and man, oh man, it's not like kissing Ted Hanson in ninth grade or even Michael. I tangle my hands in his hair, and his hands slide up my back under my shirt
and they feel
hot
, burning, and the taste of him is like wild honey.

I'm not sure how long we kiss, but when he finally pulls away, my shirt is unbuttoned and my lips feel bruised and swollen, and I'm already missing the feel of his lips on mine.

“Dammit,” he says, looking at me.

“Wow. Not exactly what a girl wants to hear after she's been kissed.” I'm smiling though, because I can tell he felt it too, that unbelievable heat between us. “Can we do it some more?” I playfully reach for his hand to draw him closer to me.

“Erin. No,” he says, standing up. “We … can't. We're friends. It has to stay that way.”

“Friends can't kiss?”

“No!” he says explosively. “Not like that they can't.”

“Okay.” I get up and stand in front of him. “This calls for an experiment. We need to try it again and see if we still feel like friends.” I cup his face in my palms and draw it down to mine.

If anything, it's better the second time. How can I even think about removing my breasts when it feels this good to have someone touch them? I had no idea. None whatsoever. I wonder what else I don't know. Then I don't think anymore and just
feel
.

“Erin, stop.” He takes me by the shoulders and physically moves me back a step.

“What?”

“
We can't do this!
”

“No, I guess we can't, not as friends. But I think I might like to kiss you some more. So where does that leave us?”

He takes a step away from me. “Don't you understand? I can't fall in love with you. I think I have, a little already. I feel happy whenever you're around, and when I talk to you, I want to keep talking to you forever. But I can't fall in love with you. There's no future for us. I told you. I
warned
you. I will not fall in love. I can't risk us falling in love and down the road you having to watch me get cancer. If we can't just be friends, and after this,” he waves a hand at my unbuttoned shirt and I reflexively cross my arms over my chest, “I don't think we can, then I don't think we should talk for a while. We need some distance.”

“Are you kidding me? How can you say that?” My heart is pounding and I feel shaky, sick. I can't believe this is happening.

“I'm trying to protect you!”

“I don't need you to protect me!”

We stare at each other angrily, and he sighs, running his hand through his hair. “But don't you see? That's exactly what I've been doing since I brought you to the island. The way you feel about me is all tied up with that. You've got to find your own happiness, Erin. You can't rely on someone else to provide it for you. It's my fault, because I
liked
helping you, I liked being there for you. But I'm not always going to be there, and you need to know you can do it on your own, without me.”

“What are you, my father? I don't need a protector, Jason. I need someone who feels the same way about me as I feel about them.”

“And I can't be that for you.”

“No, you are
refusing
to be that for me.”

“I think we should take a break,” he says quietly. “Until we can just be friends, I don't think we can be anything at all.”

“Then I guess we can never be friends,” I say, and my voice is shaking.

“Maybe not.” His voice sounds anguished, but his face is determined.

“This is the guy who is always talking about living in the moment and not worrying about the future until it happens. You're such a hypocrite!”

I call the words after him, because he is already walking away from me, along the shore the way we came.

Words crowd my mind as we make the short trip back to his house, but by the time we arrive I've slicked over the fear and anger with a thick layer of glacial determination. If he doesn't want me, well, I don't want him either. I won't let him see how much he has hurt me. I talk with Ashley and Miriam as I wait for my mom to arrive, and my smiles and words skate across the slippery ice of my armor.

When Mom arrives, Jason comes from his apartment and without speaking, helps me load my stuff into the back of her car. When it is time to go, Miriam gives me a hard hug, whispers, “
I don't know what's going on but it'll be okay
,” Ashley gives me a small smile, and his dad shakes my hand firmly.

Then Jason and I are standing in front of each other.

“So long,” he says, and it is casual, friendly, unbearable.

“Yeah,” I say. “See you later.”

My heart is breaking as I get into the car, but there is no way to change anything.

Mom seems distracted on the ride back, but I am in misery and don't pay much attention. I tell her Jason and I are fighting, and she says, “Oh, honey, I'm sorry” and I spend the rest of the trip staring out the window in silent agony.

When we are almost home, she clears her throat. “I have something to tell you, Erin.”

I turn to look at her and see she is pale, her jaw clenched in pain. Her pulled muscle didn't get any better the week I was gone.

“What?” I say. “What's wrong?”

“I went to the doctor while you were gone. They did a PET scan and—Erin, the cancer is … everywhere. It's in my bones, in my liver … It's bad, honey.”

“
What?
” I stare at her in shock. “I thought you were better! I thought they cured you!
How could this happen?
”

“It was an even more aggressive form of cancer than they realized. It had probably already spread back when I had treatment before, we just didn't know it.”

My mind whirls with horror. Oh no, not again, my poor mother …

I try for casual, this-is-old-hat-but-what-can-you-do? “Okay, what next? Surgery?”

She shakes her head. “It's too widespread for surgery. I'll go back on chemo, radiation, to keep it from spreading any
more, and hopefully that will shrink the tumors some so I'm not in pain.” She puts a hand to her back and in horror I remember talking to a lady in the radiation waiting room, the skin-and-bones one who said cheerfully, “Got to radiate the little bastards before they break my bones. Before long I'll be glowing in the dark!” Talking about the tumors, growing like rocks inside her bones.
Oh God …

“How long will you be in treatment this time?” The thought of more rounds of chemo and radiation is nauseating.

“You don't understand, Erin.” Mom reaches over and grabs my hand. “This is not curable. I'll be in treatment for the rest of my life.”

“How's she doing?” Miriam asks when she picks up the phone on a beautiful spring day in late April. No “Hello, how ya doin'?” because I'm on her caller ID and she
knows
how I'm doing.

“Not good,” I say and my voice wavers. “They told her today the latest round of chemo isn't working, and it was so much worse than the last time, so they're going to try something else, but … I don't know …”

Miriam is comfortable with silence and is not one to offer insincere platitudes, like,
It's okay, honey, I'm sure it's all good, and let's talk about the bright side, you know, getting ready in the morning is so much easier without hair!

I've been talking to Miriam since January, right after Mom started her first new round of chemo and I spent the entire night holding her as she lay on the bathroom floor. (
Look, Mom, it's nice down here, cold and smooth and I agree! Let's hang out here all night!
) The next morning, I picked up
the phone and dialed Jason's mom. I needed someone to talk to, someone who would really understand, and Miriam was the only person I could think of who understood exactly what I was going through.

I'm still talking, babbling, my thoughts gushing from my mouth. “But I go to school, because it upsets Mom when I don't, and everybody
knows
, the teachers know because Mr. Jarad told them that's why I've been missing so much school, but the kids know too. I walk through the halls and everyone is nice to me, and it's just
wrong
. I'm walking along and everybody is talking about stupid stuff, math tests, senior projects, and parties, and what so-and-so is
wearing
, and I'm like a shadow nobody can really see. Don't they understand none of that stuff
matters
?”

“But it does, Erin.” Miriam's voice is firm. “It
does
. That's life, every little bit of it. It's silly, it's terrible, it's messy, it's pure, it's
life
. Dying is just one small part of it. The vast majority is made up of those frivolous, glorious moments. That's what those kids are doing, they're
living
. And I'm afraid you're not. You still need to appreciate the funny shape of a cloud, or a joke that makes you want to pee your pants, the way the warm breeze makes your skirt flip up around your knees. You still need to feel the sunlight on your face.”

“What, are you telling me to stop and smell the freaking roses?” I ask, incredulous.

She chuckles, sympathetic but with a touch of humor, which is exactly how she's been helping me get through this. “Every once in a while, yes. Give it a try.”

I'm silent, because I'm sure she's wrong, but a little part of me knows exactly what she's talking about. I cannot dismiss
the words of this woman who has held her mother and sister in her arms as they died.

“I don't know … I don't know if I can do it, Miriam. I'm trying, but it's not enough, and I need to stay upbeat for her, but sometimes it's
hard
…”

“You're doing it, Erin. You already are. Some things are simply too much for a person to bear. And yet people do. Every day. They do it because they have to. They do it for love. It takes courage to live in joy instead of despair.”

“How … how is he doing?” I ask after a while, because I always do at the end of these conversations, and the ones I have with Ashley as well. It seems like I am talking to everybody in Jason's family except for Jason.

She sighs. “Erin, I wish you would let me tell him. I feel dishonest not telling Jason I talk to you, and what's more, he would want to know about your mother. It's not fair to him, and it's not fair to me.”

“I'm sorry,” I say miserably. I know it's wrong to ask her to keep this secret, but I can't help myself. “Please don't tell him. If he knew about my mom it would make him feel guilty and I don't want him calling me out of pity. And I don't want to put this on him either. I wanted so much from him … it wasn't fair. I see it now. And I'm scared I'll do it again, because it's easier to lean on him. I just want to know … is he okay?”

“He's hanging in there, honey,” she says and her voice is soft. “Just like you.”

I go downstairs and Mom is lying on the couch, gently crying. The tears stream silently down her face and I'm not sure she is even aware of them as she stares at the TV. I look to see if there is something sad on, but it's some sort of game show. She is lost in her thoughts, staring unseeingly at the screen as the tears drip onto her pillow.

“Mom,” I say softly. I kneel beside the couch and take her thin body in my arms and she sobs soundlessly. I don't ask what's wrong, because she does this often, and what is she going to say?
Oh, don't mind these silly little tears, Erin. This cancer thing? A real bummer!

“I'm scared,” she says, clutching me. I am all she has. Jill has come for weeks at a time, and the fridge is stuffed with casseroles from friends and neighbors, but in the end it is her and me, swirling slowly in a sinking life raft.

“I know,” I say. “But it's going to be fine. We're going to beat this thing. Look how hard you're fighting. You are a
warrior
.”