Crashdown

By Chloe Scott

Someone to tell it to is one of the fundamental needs of human beings.

~Miles Franklin

"She's like a Disney character," a friend joked one time at our regular cafeteria lunch table. "It's as though she's fallen out of the pages of a fairytale and doesn't have a clue about the real world!" Surrounded by my friends in the security of my small private school, I would giggle and wrinkle my nose. I was always a bubbly, energetic person, the type some people just roll their eyes at, annoyed that anyone could be that perky. A dancer, student council member and International Baccalaureate student, I was on top of the world. At least, that's what it seemed like from the outside.

After two years of commuting from a small town to a private school in the city, my family moved to be closer to dad's office and the school. While it was sad to leave the town I had grown up in, I was thrilled to be living in the same area as my friends and only a fifteen-minute drive from my school, a place where I not only took classes, but spent tons of time after school participating in extracurricular activities and tutoring. My family moved the first week of September while I was away at a camp with my schoolmates as a way to kick off the new school year. I just knew it — junior year was going to be my year.

My world started to crumble when Mom started to feel sick. Two and a half years before, she had been diagnosed with a rare and complicated disease called Systemic Mastocytosis. The disease resulted in her having too many mast cells that had formed a large tumor on her ovaries. After her operation, she had recovered, and while the disease is incurable, it is livable. She continued to be an active member of the community and manage her regular busy-mom schedule. After the move, however, things weren't right. Her doctors ran a number of tests, and because her disease was so rare, her results were sent to the famous Mayo Clinic. We waited and waited, not really knowing what we were waiting for.

A week and a half before Christmas, Mom got the results back. She picked my youngest sister and me up from school. After initial small talk, she began explaining what the doctor had said. "So, it's not cancer, right Mom?" asked Ryleigh rhetorically. When silence hit the air and tears started rolling down her face, we knew. Mom had cancer.

"It's like we're in a movie," Ryleigh whispered, as the two of us collapsed onto her bed. We were in hiding from our other sister, Devyn, who didn't know yet. It was all too strange being around her — both frustrating and refreshing at the same time. Before long, we were sitting formally in our living room, hearing the news officially as well as the details. It was leukemia and had been caught very late, meaning it had spread throughout her body.

I didn't know what to do. Suddenly, the plans I had made that weekend, the conversations I had had that day, the biology test I was supposed to be studying for lost all importance. I went out that night, and when I came home I ran straight to my room, threw on my pajamas, sunk into the covers and sobbed. Mom came in and snuggled me like I was a little girl, saying, "I promise I'm not going anywhere."

The next day was a Saturday, and I composed myself enough to call a classmate I had worked on a school project with and who was supposed to be coming over for dinner that night. I had not planned to tell him why I was canceling, but when he asked me how I was, I started to half laugh, half cry. "Actually, I'm not so good," I told him. "I just found out my mom has cancer." All of a sudden, he was no longer just someone I went to school with. He was a friend. We met for waffles the next day, talking about cars, film, school, and occasionally the cancer. Sometimes we just sat in a peaceful silence that only true friends can appreciate. I don't remember every detail of that day, but I will always remember the true kindness and friendship he exhibited.

This has not been the year I planned. In many ways, it has been the worst year of my life. I hit some pretty low lows, including developing an eating disorder as an attempt to control my emotions. But the waffle day stands out in my mind as one of the saddest and greatest days of my life. It was the day I created the best support team I could have ever wished for. "It's when you first find out, that's the hardest," my friend had advised me gently. He was in many ways right, and in other ways wrong. There are some days that are harder than others, and other days where the glass is half-full again. Cancer introduces all sorts of scary thoughts: Will my mom be there to see my sisters graduate? Will she be there when I get married? Will she and Dad grow old together? Someone once said that the only certainty in cancer is the uncertainty. While I fight the uncertainties, I know I am not fighting them alone. I have my family, I have my friends, I have teachers who are there for me. Most importantly, I have my mom. And no matter what happens, I will always have her with me.

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