by Rob Harrell
Her face fell, and I’m pretty sure her summer tan faded a bit.
There are some fields behind Abby’s subdivision that lead down to a small creek, where we’ve spent hours splashing around and catching crawdads. It’s kind of our spot. Or one of them, anyway.
We climbed over the rail fence and set off into the waist-high weeds and grass at the back of their property. I walked quietly for a minute before I started in.
“The news isn’t, um . . . good.”
Abby watched me while I grabbed a big stick out of the path and threw it to the side. “So, it’s cancer?”
“Yeah.” I let out a slow breath. “It is. And it’s some rare kind or something. Of course.”
“What kind is it?”
“I don’t know.” We both hopped down a small embankment. “I don’t really want to know. At least not right this second. It’s a mugga-mugga epi-carny lacri-cancer or something. It’s super bad and aggressive, apparently. Whatever that means.”
I heard Abby behind me and realized she’d stopped.
“Oh, Ross.” I turned around, and she had watery eyes. “I’m sorry.” She put her arms around me in a big hug. I felt tears stinging my eyes and nose.
I told her what I remembered about the specialist and all the horrifying eye stuff as we took off our socks and shoes and waded into the creek. Everything looked . . . different. I was looking at the world through post-cancer-diagnosis eyes.
I wondered if this was the last time I’d be able to look around these woods.
When I was finished, Abby sat on her rock and wrapped her arms around her knees. “Have you told Isaac yet?”
I shook my head. “No. I’ll call him.”
She closed her eyes for a few seconds. “So, are you . . .” Then she kind of ran out of gas, like she didn’t know what she wanted to say.
I looked up at the trees above us.
“Right?”
We sat that way, quietly, for a while.
I think Bad Day #2 was the longest I’ve ever heard Abby go without talking.
7
LASER BEAMS AND FRENCH FRIES
Back in the present, my dad’s waiting behind the wheel when I come out of school. Time for my second treatment. It’s only a few minutes to the proton radiation center, but he’s been through McDonald’s to pick up Cokes and a couple orders of fries. “For sustenance,” he says, cramming a handful in his mouth.
I straddle one of my dad’s big accordion files crammed full of legal papers in the footwell.
He shifts the car into gear. “You ready for Day Two?”
I pick out a single fry. “Do I have a choice?”
“No. No, I guess you don’t.” He washes the wad of fries down with a sip of Coke. “You okay?”
I think about that for a minute, watching some guy rake bright orange leaves out of his yard.
“I think so. I mean, I guess so?” I look over at him, and he still looks tired. “Are you okay?”
He looks over, surprised. “Me? Yeah. Just busy. Why?”
I give a quick shrug. “I dunno.” A big gust of wind comes along and sends half of the guy’s neatly raked pile of leaves flying. “You’ve been through it before. I mean, I’m sure it was awful—with Mom. It had to be. And now it’s happening again. I feel . . . guilty.”
My dad is facing forward, but I see a look flash across his face that’s almost angry. “Ross . . . no. I don’t ever want you to feel that way. Don’t even think that. You didn’t ask for this.”
I lean my head back. “I know. It just doesn’t seem fair.”
He turns a corner a little wide, distracted. “Oh, it’s not.” He gives me a funny smile. “But who ever said life is fair?”
I take a long drink.
“Nobody, I guess.”
“Ya got that right.” He drives for a few moments in silence. “You and I are in it now. Together. Our job is just to roll with the punches.”
I grab another fry. “Punch rolling. Got it.”
“Life punches, we roll.” He raises his eyebrows. “Right, dude?”
He leans over toward me. He’s being dorky to be funny.
“I told you not to say dude.”
“Okay, dude.” He leans in more. Raises his eyebrows farther. He’s such a dad.
I give him half a smile just to stop him, and something pops into my head.
“Hey . . . Would it be totally weird if I wanted to go in and do this by myself? Like, I don’t know . . . so I’m not like a little kid?”
He sits back, surprised, but thinks for a second. “No, that’s not weird.” He nods. “I get that.”
“You sure? I’m not even sure why I’m asking.”
He looks out of his window for a bit. We’re in the parking lot outside the radiation center. When he looks back, I see his eyes are shinier than usual. Teary. I wasn’t really going for a touching moment here, but it looks like it’s heading that way.
“Have I told you how proud I am of you?”
Oh boy. “Yes, you have, Dad. About a thousand times.”
“Ha.” His laugh is wet. “Right. But I am. The way you’re handling this, it’s . . . Your mom would be—” His throat catches, and he shakes his head. Then he’s wiping his eyes and waving me out of the car. “Okay. Whatever. Out! Out! Before I start blubbering and snotting all over the place.”
I open the door and climb out. “Too late!”
In the lobby, Jerry is in the same chair with a cup of coffee like he never left. He looks up from his AARP magazine. “There he is. Young Ross.” His voice is so gravelly it sounds like it hurts. “How’re you doing today?”
I sit on a couch across from him. I waggle my hand. So-so.
“I hear ya. You come straight from school?”
I nod. He nods back.
I busy myself digging around through my school folders.
“So. What kind?” Jerry asks. He’s rolling his magazine up in his big hands.
I look up. “What? What kind of school?”
“Your cancer. Where is it? Mine’s here.” He points a large, crooked finger at his lap. This stops me cold, and he waves a big hand at me. “Never mind. I was just bein’ nosy. Nosy old man.” He chuckles, and it turns into a loud, wheezy coughing fit.
I wait until I’m pretty sure he isn’t going to die. “My eye.”
Jerry wipes his mouth and chin with a yellowed handkerchief. He sniffs a couple of times. “I wondered. Is that where you got this?” He points at the middle of his forehead.
Between my eyebrows, I have a scar. It looks like an inch-long slit right about where your brow would crease if you were mad.
I nod. “Yeah. That’s where they shot BBs into my skull. So the machine knows where to put the beam.”
There are actually four scars, but the rest are hidden in my hair. For the moment, at least.
Jerry’s nodding. “It’s like your own personal dime slot.” He rubs his forehead.
“Dime slot?”
He waves his big hand. “Like a coin slot. Where you’d put a dime in a pay phone.” He raises his furry eyebrows and chuckles. “Pay phone. Okay. Never mind. Your age, it’s probably more of a ‘Harry Potter scar,’ I’d guess.”
This surprises me. “You know about Harry Potter?”
He laughs and unrolls his magazine. “I’m old, son, not dead! And I have grandkids. I’ve seen a couple of the movies.” He gives me another look-over. “Is that why that one eye is shut too?”
“Yeah.” I look away.
The hallway doors fly open, and Frank walks in. He stops for a second to survey the situation.
“Okay, Ross. Let’s us young people go have some fun with protons. Leave the old man to read his old-people magazines.”
I grab my bag and follow him, giving Jerry a wave.
He lifts a hand and smiles. “See ya round, Dime Slot!”
Frank looks over at me. “Dime Slot?”
I roll my eyes and point at my scar. Frank barks a laugh.
“Love it.”<
br />
“U2?!?”
Frank looks disappointed. He sighs, staring at the CD in his hands.
“Okay, Ross. I was . . . This is Dad Rock, but it’s . . . it’s better than last time. Sort of . . .” His voice dies off as he slowly turns and plods toward the radio shelf. Like he’s dragging his feet through quicksand.
I spent some time digging through my dad’s CD collection last night, and I was pretty sure I’d picked a winner.
Callie hasn’t put the U-lock piece down yet, so I can still kind of talk. “Just so I don’t let you down in the future, what exactly were you hoping I’d bring?”
This stops Frank. He comes back to the metal table. “U2’s fine. They are. They’re a good, solid band. But don’t you ever go off-roading? Musically, I mean? Listen to some stuff that’s off the beaten path? Or on the edges of the path, at least.”
I just lie there, as I can’t move. “I guess not.”
“Okay. Tomorrow I want you to bring something you love, but you’re not sure anyone else would like. Something off-the-wall. Something maybe a little dangerous.”
I wait a second before I respond. “Well, I would . . . but CDs are kinda for . . . old people.”
Frank stares at me.
“Did you hear what he said, Callie? Did you hear that? I told you there were signs of life in this one.” As Callie reaches over with the mouthpiece, he steps aside. “Callie kept saying you were a big dud, but I said no. I said, ‘You watch. This kid has an inner something—we just have to keep digging.’”
Callie smiles and shakes her head at me. “If you’d like him removed, blink twice.”
Frank turns and walks to the CD player, waving his hands theatrically. “Here you go, Ross! Here comes your stadium-ready, corporate-approved Jock Rock! Off we go to where the streets have no name!”
Callie checks the placement of my blob of blue nose clay and tells me not to mind him.
The treatment feels long today, and I’m not sure why. There are several times when I realize my eye is drifting and I curse myself out in my head. Last thing I need is a deep-fried eyeball.
As we’re walking out, I tell Frank he should bring some of his CDs in tomorrow, as I’ve always had an interest in antiques.
“Says the kid who brought in an album from thirty years ago.” Frank punches the button on the electric doors, and we walk into the mostly empty waiting room. Jerry must be getting zapped in the other treatment room.
“You watch. I’ll have you off that spoon-fed Top Forty junk in no time.”
Just then, the receptionist calls to me and tells me Dr. Throckton—the Man with All the Answers—wants to see me if I have a minute. Two minutes later, I’m sitting across from him in an exam room, and I learn things are about to go from bad to catastrophic.
8
HATS AND HOW TO HATE THEM
I’m at Abby’s. There are three wide-brimmed hats spread out on her bed.
“Boy.” She has her hands on her hips and blows a curl out of her face. “Wow . . . This is some choice.”
I groan.
“Tell me again what exactly the doctor said?”
So, I tell her for the third time how Dr. Throckton had pulled me into his office after my treatment to announce:
I have to start wearing a hat. A big wide-brimmed one, to keep the sun off my face. Apparently—because of all the radiation I’m getting from the treatments—I need extra protection from UV rays.
And not just when I’m outside. Oh, no.
Everywhere.
Indoors. Everywhere there are windows. At home. In the car. At the hospital.
IN SCHOOL.
“Doctor’s orders,” he’d said. “The risks from sun exposure are blahfully blahblah. Not to blahm, but blah a blahgerous blahtuation . . .” The rest of our talk is a blur to me, because all I heard in my head was panic. Rushing blood. Brain static. All chances at being a halfway normal seventh grader are slipping away from me.
Now Abby and I are studying the only wide-brimmed hats my dad and I could find at the mall. My dad insisted on getting all three, so I could think about it.
“What am I gonna do? Throckton’s, like, the smartest guy in the world, so if he says I need it . . . but . . .” My shoulders slump.
“Ooh! Look at this one,” Abby says, grabbing a hat. She’s wearing these green, furry monster gloves that she found at the Halloween store—her new favorite find. “It has a little . . . a little cape in the back here.” She pulls a strap, and a flap unfolds. “To keep the tsetse flies off your neck. That’s smart.” She places it delicately on my head. Tightens the chinstrap.
“Okay . . .” She steps back and looks me up and down. “You look like you should be wrestling crocodiles on Animal Planet, but that’s not all bad.”
“Fantastic.” I take off the hat and put on the one that makes me think of Gilligan’s Island.
She smiles. “Heyyyyy. There’s my Little Buddy!”
We’ve binged all the adventures of the S.S. Minnow at least twice over the years. In her basement, over Cheetos and Dr Pepper.
I try the third hat on. It’s a straw cowboy-hat-looking thing with the edges of the brim rolled up.
“Okay, that one really isn’t that bad. I mean . . . it’s horrible, but it’s less horrible than the others. Pardner.”
I walk over to the floor-length mirror on her closet door . . . and see a cowboy staring back.
I just need a piece of straw sticking out of my mouth. “I look like I’m going to a hoedown.”
Abby pushes the other hats aside and sits on the edge of her bed. “It’s not that bad. You’ll get through it. Maybe you should draw one of your characters on it or write DOCTOR’S ORDERS in really big print.”
I fall into her papasan chair. “I might. Or Prescription-Strength Hat.”
We sit in silence for a minute.
“On the plus side,” she says, “it’ll cover things up when you start losing your hair.”
I sigh and look around the room. It looks like Halloween in here, but it has nothing to do with it being two days before Halloween. Her room looks like this year-round. Every inch of wall space is covered in eBay purchases—posters and photos—representing her two biggest passions. Monster/horror movies and some weird band called Vampire Weekend. Godzilla, King Kong, Frankenstein’s monster, and a giant tarantula are all looking down at us from the walls.
Back to the hair loss, Abby’s tried several times to talk me into shaving my head—ahead of it falling out—saying it would be “EPIC.” I’ve assured her that I’m not going for “epic” the way she is. She even offered to shave hers along with me. She seems to have a hard time understanding my whole wanting-to-blend-in thing.
Her mom leans into the room. “How’s it going in here?” She sees me and gets that sad, sincere look on her face. Concern Face.
“You doing okay, Ross? With the treatments?”
I nod and give her a big smile. “Yep. Getting along. Yep.” A brief pause. “Yeppers.”
I really need to figure out how to respond to these questions.
She nods back. “Okay. Good. No Isaac?”
Abby shakes her head, and her mom makes a thinking face. Makes a hmmmm sound. Then her comfortable mom smile is back. “Want me to throw in a Totino’s for you guys?”
Abby lights up. “Ooh! Do we have triple cheese?”
“I’ll check. I think so.” She knocks the wood of the door frame twice, ducking out.
Abby catches me glaring at my reflection in her mirror. I’m not liking what I see there.
Cowboy Ross. He of the Goofy Hat.
“It’s gonna be fine, Ross.”
I nod. Sort of a half nod.
“I’m telling you, Ross,” Abby says, “you need to grab this thing by the reins. If you have to be the weird guy, own it.”
I put my head back and let out a long groan.
9
GIDDYUP
The next day, I’m not prepared to deal with the bus in a cowbo
y hat, so Linda gives me a ride to school. She tries to make me feel better during the drive. Granted, it’s in her Linda Way.
“Maybe this could be a whole new look for you, you know?” She waves her venti green tea at my hat. (Of course we stopped at Starbucks. Bucky’s. Whatever.) “Own it. Be Ross the Hat Guy inside and out. Tip the brim at girls like a movie rancher.” She mimes it. “Like that.”
I know Linda is only trying to help, and she’s saying the same stuff Abby did, but I feel sick.
It’s raining, but I ask Linda to drop me off before we get to the parking lot. I cut across the soggy lawn. What’s a couple of wet feet compared to impending social death?
Abby’s waiting at the bike rack by the front door, wiping off her viola case. She studies me and refuses to feel sorry for me. “It’s just a hat, Ross. Seriously. You look like your dog died.”
I get a few funny looks and a handful of pointed fingers as I walk down the hall to my locker. One kid gives me a thumbs-up and a loud “NOICE!” I hear “Get along, little doggy!” as I pass the biology room. But the biggest reaction comes in Ms. Bayer’s class. I’ve been dreading this one.
“What the . . .”
Jimmy.
“Not cool!” he sputters. “How come you get to wear a hat, Butt Crack?”
“It’s not by choice.” I point at the front where I really did end up writing DOCTOR’S ORDERS like Abby suggested. My dad wasn’t happy about the ruined hat but decided to let it slide.
Jimmy scrunches his face up. “Whatever. I wore one last year, and Mr. Phillips took it. I had hat hair for two days!”
I choose not to mention that he has a pretty serious case of hat hair right now.
My eye is killing me, so I grab one of my little eye drop vials and (as quick as I can) put in a couple of drops, wiping away the gooey liquid before it can dry there and get all crusty. I’ve had a few days where I get home and it looks like I rubbed a glazed donut on my eye.
I realize Jimmy’s still watching me. “What’s up with you and those stupid drops?”
I tuck the vial back in my jeans.
“I don’t have tears in that eye. They took out the gland that makes tears during my surgery, so I have to use ’em.”