Happy Birthday to Me

by Brian Rowe

  How come I’ve never noticed this girl before?

  “You know, it’s funny,” I said.

  “What is?”

  “I’ve treated you like you were invisible for so long. And here we are, nearing the end of my senior year, and you’re one of the few people at this school… hell, this town… who’s even making an effort to talk to me.”

  “That’s not true,” she said. “Everyone loves you, Cameron. They cheered for you at the basketball game. And your friend’s filming that movie about you.”

  “You know about Wes’ movie?”

  She smiled, revealing her tantalizing pair of pearly whites. “You’ve got people who care about you,” she said, resting her elbows on her textbook and looking right into my eyes. “You’re just not looking hard enough.”

  I leaned in to her and crossed my arms. “I’m sorry, you know.”

  “About what?”

  “About everything. All those times at the restaurant. Treating you like you were nothing. Demanding that stupid free birthday dessert. I’ve been a real jerk. And I’m just… I’m really sorry.” I leaned my head back. “I wish there was some way I could make it up to you.”

  “Cameron…”

  “You knew it was never my birthday, right?”

  Liesel nodded. “I knew.”

  “And yet you always played along with it, anyway.”

  “I did.”

  “Why?”

  She opened her mouth but nothing came out. She looked to her left and smiled, letting out a slow exhale, as if she were keeping a secret from me.

  “Tell me,” I said.

  I realized our voices were getting louder. Some freshmen studying close by eyed the two of us with animosity. But Mrs. Gordon was in charge, and she was a happy camper today. I didn’t think a little library chitchat was going to change that.

  Liesel’s eyes met mine as she made a funny cackle noise with her tongue. “I guess you could say I always had a little crush on you, Cameron.”

  Didn’t expect that. “Really?”

  “A big one, actually.”

  I started shaking my head. “You’re kidding me.” I shook my head and closed my book shut. “Well, that’s life for you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean I spent all that time at Uncle Tony’s hanging out with Charisma or talking about Charisma or wishing I was with Charisma. I thought she was the love of my life. I thought she was perfect.”

  Liesel wouldn’t take her eyes off me. I felt like I could actually see her left hand reaching closer for mine.

  That’s when I said, “All that time I could’ve been with you.”

  I could sense her trembling. She started shifting in her seat, breathing heavily, and moving her head from left to right, like she was going to faint.

  “Are you OK?” I asked.

  “I’m… I’m fine.”

  She grabbed her textbook and backpack and jumped up from the table.

  I stood up with her. “Hey! Where are you going?”

  “I just… I have to go.”

  “Why?” I was baffled. “Was it something I said?”

  “It’s nothing,” she muffled.

  “Wait. Please stay.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, her voice increasingly more high-pitched and frantic. “I just need to get out of here.”

  “No. Wait!”

  My shout disrupted the whole room. Even Mrs. Gordon stood up from her tiny office with a look of concern.

  Liesel froze and turned toward me. I motioned with my index finger for her to follow me toward the bookshelves in the back. She put her stuff down against a chair and walked toward me.

  I found myself in the same section where Charisma and I had passionately kissed just weeks prior. The atmosphere of the space felt different, like it wasn’t so much a hidden sweat spot but a few feet of land that now promised great things to come.

  Liesel stopped in front of me. “Look, I’m sorry, but I think I should—”

  “I know it might be crazy of me to ask you this,” I said, interrupting her, “given that I probably look older than your own father, but—”

  “I don’t have a father,” she blurted out.

  I hesitated. “Oh.”

  I wasn’t sure if I should continue. Her not running in the other direction screaming gave me the confidence to go on.

  “Look, Liesel, I was wondering… you know… if nobody’s asked you yet…” I took a deep breath and stepped closer to her. “I was wondering if you wanted to go to the prom with me?”

  Her eyes instantly lit up, and not in an ambiguous way. I could actually see minty blue sparkles in her bulging eyeballs.

  Wow, this disease is playing tricks on me.

  “Me?” she asked.

  Her reaction dumbfounded me. “Yes, you. Of course, you. I’m a creepy old man, so I won’t have any hard feelings if you—“

  “I would love to,” she said, no sarcasm, no hesitation.

  I don’t know what came over me, but the next moment seemed like a blur. I picked up her left hand before she could stop me, and I kissed her on her palm.

  A light above, which had forever been without a working bulb, started flickering. And as soon as I looked up, I felt a bunch of books smash against my left side, as if Liesel had taken her right hand and pushed them off the top bookshelf.

  “Whoa,” I said, bringing my head down, trying to make sense of the momentary craziness. “What the hell happened?”

  “What time is the prom?” she asked, ignoring my question, completely oblivious to the weird happenings around us.

  “Oh… uhh… starts at seven, I think. On Saturday night.”

  “OK.”

  She wrote her phone number on a piece of paper and handed it to me. “Just call me this week and we’ll coordinate travel and what not.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  “OK.”

  “OK.”

  She waved at me as she walked backward out of the library, somehow not tripping over any of the books sprawled out on the ground.

  As soon as she turned the corner and made her way out of the library, Mrs. Gordon appeared to my left, her mouth agape.

  “What in the dickens happened over here?” she asked.

  I looked down. There must’ve been twenty to thirty books scattered on the ground.

  “Oh,” I said. “I just… uhh… I don’t know what to read next. There’s so many choices.”

  She seemed to buy the white lie as she proceeded to grin at me in a way that made me feel momentarily nauseated. She started picking up the books on the ground as I slunk around the bookshelf behind her and made my way out of the library.

  The bell for first period rang a few minutes later. The ear-splitting ring marked the beginning of another average week of classes, average albeit that I’d be attending them as a man in his sixties. The thought of it depressed me at first. Then it just made me scared.

  But there was a bright, shining light at the end of the week.

  I have a date to the prom.

  23. Sixty-Four

  The little pains were adding up—simple tasks like standing up straight and urinating were starting to take a toll on my body. There were days when my breathing became erratic, when I would wake up at three in the morning unable to go back to sleep. I wasn’t getting any better. Even though I didn’t want to admit it, I was fading.

  But no matter the circumstances, no matter how tired or achy I felt, I sure looked great in a tux.

  Standing tall and confident in front of my bathroom mirror, I slicked back the little gray hair I had left and finished securing my purple tie against my black tuxedo. I smiled, noticing one aspect of my appearance that hadn’t changed since the beginning—no matter how ragged my skin increasingly looked, my teeth were still as white as ever.

  I turned to the window above the toilet and marveled at the gorgeous Nevada sunset.

  It’s showtime.

  “Oh, honey.”
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  I turned to my left to see my mom put her hands on her cheeks as she stared at my classy outfit, clearly trying not to cry.

  “Oh, Cam, it looks perfect.”

  “You think so?”

  “Yes. You look so handsome! I need the camera. Where’s my camera?”

  She raced down the hall, and I took my extra few seconds alone to glance at my face one last time.

  Keep thinking positive, Cameron. You lived to see your senior prom.

  I made my way into the hallway to see my mother returning with one of her rarely used digital cameras. She was already taking pictures on her walk up to me, which suggested ninety percent of her photos would turn out blurry and un-viewable. My dad followed her. He had a big smile on his face, even though I could see a tinge of sadness in his eyes.

  “Son,” he said, “your mom and I are so proud of you.”

  “Thanks, Dad.”

  “Come here.”

  My dad brought his hands down to my shoulders and pulled me close to him, something he only did in the past to signal an oncoming screaming fit. But this time was different. He patted me on the chest and looked at me like there was nothing out of the ordinary about my appearance.

  “You look good, Cameron. You look really good.”

  I nodded and turned toward my mom, who was still taking a thousand photos a second.

  “Say cheese!” she shouted.

  She took some pictures of me and my dad together. Then my dad took the camera and took a few cheesy shots of me kissing my mom on her right cheek.

  Just as the picture taking reached an inevitable climax, Kimber started stomping down the hallway toward the three of us.

  “Wow, Cameron!” my little sister shouted. “Look at you!”

  She walked up to me and gave me a big hug.

  “Have fun tonight,” she said.

  “Thanks.” I gave her a playful punch against her right shoulder. “And, look, I want you to have some fun tonight, too. Can’t you go one night without practicing?”

  “Who do you think you’re talking to?” she asked with a not-as-playful slug back. “Of course I’m practicing. The spring concert’s just two weeks away. It’s the last show of the school year!”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah,” my mom butted in. “I haven’t told you about that, Cam. I know you’ve missed a few of Kimber’s shows.”

  Yeah. All of them.

  “But this one you can’t miss. Guess what your sister will be performing?”

  Kimber started rocking her body back and forth, like she was so excited that to keep still would drop her legs out from under her. “I have a solo.”

  “A solo!” my mom screamed.

  “Wow,” I said. “Sounds like a big deal.” I winked at Kimber. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

  She didn’t seem convinced. “You promise?”

  “I promise.”

  She frowned and placed her hands on her wide hips. “Yeah, but you promised you’d come to the last one, though, and you didn’t make it.”

  I leaned down, bringing upon a sharp pain in my lower back that I tried my best to ignore. “I know, I’m sorry. I’ve been selfish, Kimber. I’ve been a really crappy older brother. But I will be there for your solo. Do you understand me? No matter what.”

  “No matter what?”

  I nodded.

  Now she was convinced. She gave me another hug before running into her room and slamming the door behind her. Barely five seconds passed before her violin playing started up again.

  “You got her all excited,” my dad said.

  “I’m serious,” I said. “I want to go. I want to see her play.”

  “We know you do,” my mom said, wrapping her left arm around me.

  “All right,” I said. I looked at my watch. I should’ve left ten minutes ago. I took a step back and brought my hands to my sides. “How do I look?”

  “You look wonderful, Cam,” my mom said.

  “What’s the name of the girl you’re taking?” my dad asked.

  “Liesel.”

  “Great,” he said. “I hope we can meet her sometime.”

  I could already see my mom about to burst into tears as I walked down the hallway, so I raced down the stairs and out of the house as quickly as my frail body would let me. I didn’t want to see them cry. I wanted to believe everything in my life was sweet, sentimental, and normal, like that little episode. I knew what they were doing. I knew that inside they were hurting terribly, knowing full well there was nothing they could do to stop my disease from destroying my entire body. But masking their pain and showing me smiles and love in such a difficult time made me realize just how special my mom and dad were. I always knew my mom was a strong, caring person, but it was my dad who had changed for me the most. I don’t know if it was that story about the man’s kid who died that changed him, but I really appreciated it.

  More than he’ll ever know.

  ---

  I rolled my window down on the short drive to Liesel’s. The full moon was out on this eerily quiet Saturday night. The weather was a perfect seventy degrees and the roads were mostly empty.

  I took a few wrong turns along the way, but I finally found myself at the corner of Vista and Arbor Way, where Liesel’s apartment complex stood at a deserted, creepily dark corner of the intersection. I closed my door and grabbed the pink-and-white corsage from the back seat.

  I walked up three flights of stairs and down four cramped hallways to find room 336. I looked down at my notes to make sure I wasn’t about to knock on the wrong person’s door. I was in the right place. I was positive.

  I knocked. And I waited. I took a deep breath, knowing that no matter how beautiful Liesel would look, she still had to go to the prom with a man who looked four times her age. But I hoped she would be able to have fun tonight.

  She did have a crush on me once. Maybe she’ll allow me one spin around the dance floor before ditching me completely for a more youthful gentleman.

  I was stuck inside my thoughts for a while before I snapped myself out of my daze and realized it had been at least a minute since I knocked on the door. I knocked louder this time, with four bangs instead of three. Still nothing.

  I searched the walls for a doorbell, but I didn’t see anything. I glanced down the hallway. This apartment landlord apparently didn’t believe in doorbells. I imagined somebody with arthritis having to bang his or her head against the door to get somebody’s attention.

  “Liesel?”

  I knocked five more times as loud as I could. Still, there was no answer.

  “Hmm.”

  I walked to the end of the hallway and shoved my back against a wall that felt like thorns had been used instead of plaster. I took out my phone and started dialing her number.

  Did I write down the wrong address?

  The call went to voice-mail. I immediately hung up and tried calling her a second time. Again, voice-mail.

  “Hey Liesel, it’s Cameron. It’s a little after seven, and I’m at what I thought was your apartment. I’ve been knocking for a few minutes and you’re not answering, so I must have the address wrong. Text me or call me back so I can find you. Thanks.”

  I stood there for another five minutes. My phone didn’t make a sound. But even more disconcerting, not a single person made his or her way down the hallway. It was as if I had stumbled upon a ghost apartment complex, and Liesel was playing some kind of cruel practical joke.

  She sent me to an abandoned building, didn’t she.

  But then I heard a noise, loud and clear, coming from inside room 336. I heard the door lock.

  I rushed up to the door and knocked again. “Liesel! Are you in there?”

  I couldn’t tell for sure, but I thought I could hear the sounds of sobbing emanating from inside. It might not have been Liesel.

  Of course it’s Liesel.

  I shook my head, feeling more stupid in this moment than I had in my entire life.

  Of course she’s cr
ying. Of course she’s not coming. She took one look through that peephole and ran. Look at me. I’m a hundred years old.

  I’m a freak.

  I wanted to start screaming. I peered down at the corsage. It looked so banal, essentially colorless in the darkly lit hallway. I set it down in front of Liesel’s door.

  Maybe she’ll get some use out of it.

  I walked down the hallway, faster by the second, until the walking turned into an awkward grandfatherly sprint out of the apartment complex. I felt defeated. I felt like this whole night, which was supposed to resemble a perfect dream, was slowly turning into a potential nightmare.

  I made it to my car and turned around. I took out my phone and thought I’d give her one last try. I dialed her number. I waited, and I waited some more. Again, voice-mail.

  “OK,” I said out loud. “Fine.”

  I got in my car and slammed the door so hard I thought the driver’s side window might shatter. I turned on the ignition and sped down the empty road, ready to crash my senior prom completely and utterly alone.

  But first, there’s a quick stop I need to make…

  ---

  I stumbled into the Reno Convention Center around 8:15 and peered down a hallway to see a young man and woman walking hand in hand, both dressed in fancy attire. I didn’t know which way I was supposed to go, so I followed them. I almost fell once during the short trek, but I maintained my balance and kept walking

  This is your prom, Cameron. You don’t want to miss your special once-in-a-lifetime prom, do you?

  I turned another corner and found dozens of my fellow students standing in packs, mingling, smiling and laughing with one another. I could see a sign-in book on a large wooden table, an oddly themed photo booth in the back corner, and bright, rainbow-colored decorations draped along the busy walls. The door to the dance room was wide open, and music, which sounded like hits from the late 1990’s, blasted through four over-sized speakers. I looked inside to see a few people already out on the dance floor, but most were still just socializing.

  I turned around to see everyone staring at me.