It's My Life

by Stacie Ramey

  “Hey,” Julian says with a wave. “I just wanted to bring… Oh, it’s your birthday. I used to know that,” he says, making this situation even more awkward, if that’s possible. “Anyway, I won’t stay. I just wanted to say I’m so sorry about—”

  “Is that your boyfriend?” Whitney asks, making everyone laugh. She pouts. “Why is everyone laughing at me?”

  Julian sidesteps the question and my little cousin and puts the flowers on the dresser across from my bed. He shoots me a look that’s supposed to mean little kids are ridiculous. I return it. “How are you feeling?”

  “Let’s let Jenna have a minute with her friend while we go find cups,” Mom says, ushering the crew out into the hall. “I forgot to pack those.”

  Kevin reaches into the bag Aunt Betty brought and says, “Mom has some right—”

  “She doesn’t have the right ones,” Rena adds, rolling her eyes at me. “Come on, it’ll be fun.”

  Everyone leaves except Dad, who stands next to my bed, arms crossed, as if he’s daring Julian to try something. I couldn’t be more mortified.

  “Sir?” Julian extends his hand.

  There’s an uncomfortable silence. I want to hit Dad’s arm, but I’m too busy holding my covers over myself.

  Finally, he extends his hand. They shake. “Not too long. She needs her rest.”

  “Of course, Mr. Cohen.”

  The door shuts, and that’s when Julian’s eyes crawl from the floor to my face, which makes my hand fly there. It leaves my chest vulnerable, but dispatching my hand to the covers would make the entire situation even more uncomfortable.

  “Hey,” Julian says. “I feel really bad about the other night.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I say.

  “I can’t stop thinking about how it sounded when…” His face gets a little white.

  I want to reach my hand out to him, but that seems too intimate. “It’s okay,” I say. “I’m okay. It wasn’t your fault. It’s just my stupid body.”

  His face gets red when I mention my body. And that makes me feel good in a weird way. “I was afraid you hated me.” His eyes stay on mine. His voice gets shaky. “Please don’t hate me.”

  “I could never hate you, Julian,” I say.

  “I just wanted to say I’m sorry. My friend told me that no girl wants—”

  “You to see her in a hospital,” I finish, then realize I’m a total idiot. “People say that all the time,” I add, hoping to fix my major blunder.

  His eyes narrow, and I try to read his expression. He might be suspicious. He might be figuring things out, or he might just be uncomfortable, but then there’s a knock, and Mom pops her head in. “Okay to come back?”

  And now I blush three shades of tomato because how embarrassing can she be?

  Julian says, “I’m just leaving.”

  Mom says, “Stay for cake.”

  Julian looks to me.

  “Sure,” I say. “Stay.”

  He smiles and then Eric is back in the room and the two of them replay all the glory of the game. Rena corrals the kids. Mom slices the cake. I get the first piece, but no way am I going to eat chocolate cake in front of the boy.

  After I’ve gotten all of my presents—a $50 iTunes card from Eric; a makeup set and cute little purse from Rena; a charm bracelet with books on it from Uncle Steve; and Grimms’ Fairy Tales, a collection of Edgar Allan Poe’s works, and a collection of Shakespeare from Aunt Betty and crew—the nurse comes in.

  Mom offers her a piece of cake, and Dad hands me a little box. Rena helps me open it. It’s a gold necklace with three charms: an oval with my name and birthday, a birthstone gem, and a Jewish star. I love it. Aunt Betty puts it around my neck, forcing me to shift forward so she can do the clasp.

  The nurse gives me another dose of pain meds in my IV and they work so fast that soon I can only really think of one thing: sleep.

  My eyes close.

  I hear everyone pack up and leave. Mom kisses me on my forehead. “I love you, Jenna Cohen. You may be grown up, but you are still my little miracle.”

  * * *

  Saturday, 8:17 P.M.

  This has been a hard week.

  I know! How’s your friend?

  She’s okay, I think. I’m not.

  I’m sorry.

  I just can’t stop thinking about it.

  Think about Gatsby. You’ve got a test coming up.

  Hey, how did you know that?

  There are always tests. Right?

  True. True.

  Gnite, Elsa.

  Gnite, Julian. Sweet dreams.

  I was hoping you’d say that. Sweet dreams, you too.

  Nineteen

  There are stories we tell ourselves to get through dark times. I’m no different. No matter what is going on in my life, I find consolation on the printed page. Stories prepare us for difficult times. Stories scare us away from dangerous choices. But most of all, stories distract us.

  This morning, the stories I’m telling myself are distracting me from what’s happening with my body. With my leg in a cast and me not being supercoordinated to begin with—and also having an extreme tendency toward muscular spasms, you know, because I have spastic CP—Mom’s going to have to help me bathe. Hurrah.

  Mom pulls out the Hoyer lift, and I can’t help but groan.

  “I’m sorry, Jenna, but we don’t have a choice.”

  Rena used to dress my Hoyer lift with props from the drama department. Long, golden-haired wigs for the Into the Woods performance that won her Best Actor for our school at State. A sword from Othello. Eighties wedge heels underneath, as if it had feet. Fashion-forward feet, of course. We used to throw things at it as it stood waiting in my closet. We’d boo and hiss.

  “It’s the thing in the woods…” Rena would say. “The bad thing.”

  Mom hoists me onto the shower chair, and I try my best to cover myself up while Mom struggles to wash me without hitting my cast. It’s wrapped in a plastic bag for protection. I grab the washcloth and try to clean myself, but I’m off balance with the cast, and all I can think about is how this is all Dr. Jacoby’s fault. Even though this moment of humiliation was really brought on by my foolishness.

  In the book about my life, I decide, I’ll definitely have to include this scene. It would be crucial for the low point. It would propel my story forward. You know, if this were the book, or even the movie version where some new kid actress would get her breakout role. And if Ben were there with me on the movie shoot, as the producer, he’d say, “Look at you, girl, changing lives.” And we’d have the crew get us Pellegrino water with the bubbles stirred out, heavy ice, and a juicy twist of lime. Huzzah.

  I stay silent as Rena stumbles into the bathroom, her hair a mess. “God, Mom, give Jenna a break. She’s got skin under there. Or she used to.”

  “Very funny, Rena. If it weren’t for your recent stunt—”

  “God, Mom, people break legs,” Rena retorts. “It does happen.”

  “That’s true,” I say. “See? Proof.”

  Mom just makes a face. This mom-ologue is going to be bad.

  “I realize that, Rena. But answer me this: Do you think you are more likely or less likely to break a leg ice-skating when you are taking muscle relaxers and also happen to have cerebral palsy?” Mom’s lips are pursed and her expression is sour.

  “I didn’t take my muscle relaxers, actually,” I say. “Just to be clear.”

  “Yeah.” Rena jumps in. “And we brought her skates. Julian was with her.”

  “I’m right here, Mom. If you want to be annoyed with anyone, be annoyed with me.”

  Mom looks me over. “Don’t worry, I’m super annoyed with you as well. Turns out there’s plenty to go around!”

  She wraps me up then Hoyer lifts my ass onto the bed, throws
my clothes on the bed, and leaves me to put on my bra and shirt. Then she retrieves huge-assed granny panties I’ve never seen before from my top drawer. Which irks me on so many levels.

  “Don’t make a face at me, young lady. These are the only kind that will go up over your cast easily.”

  I let her pull them up for me, and I cringe as she does.

  “Of all the stupid things, deciding to climb out of the house in the middle of the night, for what? To go skate? For God’s sakes. I thought you were smarter than that. I thought…” Here’s the anger I knew would come. Finally. I try to leave my body a little bit. To think of a story that will lift me as she pulls a skirt on me, then puts one boot on my other foot.

  “You could have broken your neck.”

  Ah. There it is. The “you could have broken your neck” part that Eric promised.

  I breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. I try to imagine I’m flying, like I was when I was in the MRI tube. I try to feel the same things I felt that day. The breeze. The voice. The hand that brushed my hair back. Then stroked my cheek. The magic I’m always looking for. But there’s nothing. Just me and the big mess I’ve made.

  “Jenna, are you even listening to me?” Mom’s tone is decidedly harsh until she realizes I’ve completely zoned out. “Jenna? Sweetie? Are you okay?”

  “Yeah. Just a little dizzy.” All of this being swung around is catching up to me.

  “Maybe you should stay home?”

  “I hate missing.”

  “Jenna?” Mom uses the soft I-haven’t-given-up-on-you tone.

  I just stare. It’s like I’m exhausted from being showered. My body feels done. “I can’t go to school,” I say.

  She nods. “Okay. Let’s get you to bed.”

  I congratulate myself on dumbing down my expectations of myself and taking easier classes. It makes staying home easier, no doubt. But I let my mind drift over the essay I would have written for my AP Language midterm as Mom helps dress me and put me to bed. It would have been about the use of symbols in The Scarlet Letter. I would start off easy, talking about the letter A and how that symbol changes over the course of the novel. Then move to the meteor as a symbol, and finally, Pearl, herself, who is less of a child and more of a symbol of her mother’s love.

  I’m thinking about Mom and her love. How she’s annoyed sometimes, downright furious at others, but how, no matter what I do or how I act, she still does love me.

  * * *

  I listen to the sounds of Rena getting ready and Mom rushing as I recover from my morning defeat. I hear Mom on the phone with Dr. Rodriguez. She’s got it on speaker, probably because she’s busy getting my meds ready. And with Mom, speaker is pretty freaking loud. According to her, she’s killed her hearing by listening to music with headphones turned up too high and now she can’t hear.

  “Yes. She’s lethargic and kind of spaced…”

  “Her body is telling her what she needs,” Dr. Rodriguez responds. “Right now mostly she needs to rest and to heal.”

  Mom answers. “Yes. That makes sense.”

  So I guess I’m not dying. That’s good news.

  “I was hesitant to bring this up, but Jenna’s rehabilitation needs may be more than what you can handle at home.”

  “What do you mean?”

  My hearing goes into supersonic mode, but to no avail, because at this point Mom takes it off speaker.

  I can still hear her responses, though. “I’m not sure about a rehab center. Isn’t that kind of drastic?”

  More of Dr. Rodriguez talking while I strain to read Mom’s mood from a room away.

  Then Mom. “I’ll speak with her and her father, but I’m not sure it’ll go over so well.”

  Dr. Rodriguez says something superintelligent and persuasive because then Mom says, “Well what would happen with her school?” and then the moment of understanding. “Oh. Okay. That might work.”

  And I think, hells to the no. There is no way on God’s green earth I’ll be going to a rehab center like our grandfather had to last year after his hip replacement. How could she make this decision without even talking to me? I text Uncle Steve.

  We need to expedite our plans.

  Why what’s going on?

  They are talking about sending me away. To a rehab center.

  We’ve got the paperwork completed for medical emancipation. I just have to file it.

  Thanks.

  I blow out a big breath. This is all too much. My body is aching. My muscles hurt, so of course I pretend for a second that I’m Jennifer. The one who isn’t saddled with medical concerns or, God forbid, a trip to a rehab center. The one who is going off to college, having just graduated top of her grade after all her AP classes. I’d be so full of potential, bursting with possibilities. Maybe I’m taking the train out to school, so Julian drives me to the station. We park in the drop-off part of the parking lot. People are all around us and Julian looks so damned sad I can’t even take it. He puts the car in park and then stares straight ahead. I put my hand on his. “It won’t be that long.” In my fantasy, even going to different colleges can’t keep us apart.

  We would sit there, me not wanting to leave, him not wanting me to go, but neither of us able to stop the ticking clock. If I don’t leave soon, I’ll be so tempted to chuck it all and follow him to his school, where he’s gotten a spot on the hockey team. But then I’d realize that wouldn’t be good for either of us. The Jennifer I would be would need to get back to my school, back to my life and my purpose.

  So I’d hold his face in mine. I’d look into his eyes, hazel rimmed with brown, with the gold flames jutting out from the center. I would bring his lips closer to mine and everything else would stop existing. It would just be the air and the space between our lips, then the feel of his lips on mine, the explosion when my tongue presses against his. We’d be some kind of electric circuit, the power pulsing through us.

  Our feelings would generate more feelings until there would be so many feelings there wouldn’t be enough room in the world for them. And then my cell would beep. An alarm. Reminding me that I have to leave. And I’d pull my lips away from his. I’d feel the release of breath that would become air. He’d make a tiny moaning sound. A small complaint. And that would make me smile. “There will be more where that came from. In two short months.”

  And he’d pretend to push his head in with both of his hands. Like it was going to explode. And I’d laugh and kiss him again. Then turn away and open the door. And the sound of the door handle opening feels so real that my hand is still making that motion as Mom comes in and says, “Oh no, are you having spasms? Do you think it’s a seizure?”

  And I’d remember where I really am. Stuck in this house. In my bedroom, gathering my strength to do battle on the latest front.

  I will not go to a rehab center.

  “Let’s get you back to bed. I know you’re disappointed, that you wanted to go back to school, but it’s going to be fine.”

  “Is that what you think I’m upset about? I heard what you and Dr. Rodriguez were talking about.”

  Mom helps smooth out the covers, then pulls them back. She’s been doing this same routine for years.

  It’s like a calming rhythm, only this isn’t the time to get calm.

  “It was just a suggestion. I’m not saying we’re going to do it.”

  “Right,” I say, “because we don’t get to decide. I do.”

  “Well, my dear, if you’d like to prove the doctor wrong, why don’t you start resting now and hope that speeds the healing process?” She hands me a pill.

  I take it, but make a mental note to check back in with Uncle Steve when I wake up. By the time Mom leaves the room, I feel these tiny places on my body heat up like they’re being stung by a million bees. Then cool down. It feels like I’m flying, and I struggle to open my eyes.
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  But I can’t, and I kind of don’t care. It’s such a relief not to be in my body anymore. So I let go and let myself be Jennifer on her way back to college. She’s on the train, and she’s tired and sad from already missing Julian. She closes her eyes and lets herself go. And then she is free and so am I. And it’s so easy.

  * * *

  Monday, 7:25 A.M.

  I think we should meet.

  7:30 A.M.

  I mean, we don’t have to. If you don’t want to.

  7:33 A.M.

  Omg I made you mad.

  8:40 A.M.

  I’m sorry!

  10:05 A.M.

  Don’t hate me!

  11:13 A.M.

  I’m sorry.

  Home sick.

  Just woke up.

  Phew. I mean, I’m not glad you’re sick, but I thought you were mad at me.

  I’m not mad.

  So what do you think?

  About?

  About meeting.

  Oh. That.

  Yeah. That.

  Well, I really like the way things are going. You know, the way it is now.

  And meeting would change that?

  Maybe.

  Why?

  I don’t know. It’s just…

  So meet me. Are you going to Hockey Homecoming in a few weeks?

  I’ve never gone before.

  Well. The players wear our dirty jerseys. Ok that doesn’t sound fun, but it’s a tradition.

  Okayyyyy

  And the girls ask the guys to dance.

  That’s fun!

  And if you go, you could ask me to dance, and if you like the dance you could tell me it’s you.

  No pressure. Smiley face emoji.

  You’re allowed to use the real emojis if you like.

  No. I like our system.

  So? Hockey Homecoming?

  Maybe. If you win the final game with Danbury.

  Deal!

  Oh. And btw, I’ll Febreze my jersey.