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Drip...drip. I woke up to the sound of medicine being put into my mom’s body. Last night was a blur, but I remember learning that my mom had breast cancer. I guess I had fallen asleep here at the hospital, but I didn’t feel like going to school today. I looked around the room. Where was Aunt May? My mom was still asleep so I quietly crept out of the room, on the search for my aunt.
Aunt May and I were always close. My father died when I was only four years old, so I don’t remember much about him, but ever since then, my aunt has lived with my mom and I. It was just the three of us from then on, so I relied heavily on my aunt as my big sister, since she is fifteen years younger than my mom. I know I can trust her with my secrets and I love having her as a supporter.
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I was walking down the corridor, when I spotted my mom’s nurse, Nicole.
“Hi Nicole! Have you seen my aunt?” I asked her quickly, so she could get to her next patient on time.
“She left early this morning and said she would be back later,” Nicole replied and continued on her way.
“Thank you,” I called after her and made my way back to my mom’s room. My mom was awake when I entered and I greeted her good morning. She asked where Aunt May was and I told her what Nicole had told me. I crawled up on my mom’s hospital bed, and we turned on the TV and awaited my aunt’s return.
…
Three weeks later, my mom took a test to see whether the chemotherapy was killing her cancer cells. We were all anxious to hear the results, but they wouldn’t be ready for review for another week. I had begun to go back to school, visiting my mom at the hospital every afternoon. Aunt May opened the bakery up again and recruited the help of her friend to keep the business going. We were getting back to our normal lifestyles, and if the results were good from the test my mom took, then she would be able to come back home for a short time. We were all just hoping for the best.
It was a rainy day and I was just getting back from a long day at school. I walked in the door and my aunt was on the phone. I put down my backpack and walked over to my aunt.
“Ok. We’ll be right over,” I heard her tell the person on the phone and then she hung up.
“Who was that,” I asked.
“That was your mom’s doctor. The results from the test are back and they want us over there now,” she explained. We got in her car and drove straight to the hospital. In my head the mantra, please be good news, please be good news repeated. We arrived and quickly made our way to the room. This route we had walked for four weeks straight now was engraved in our brains. When we made it upstairs, we found my mom and her doctor in the room, making small talk. They turned their attention to us, and the doctor changed the conversation to the outcome of the test.
“We looked over the results, and they weren’t stellar,” the doctor started. This was not going to be the good news I was hoping for.