It was only a piece of cake, but was everyone’s favorite. The slice even had eight candles atop it, holding a neat and orderly post. Yet, it stood solemnly at the counter top, left behind to rot in the hot September heat.
“Rachel, I’m tossing this last piece of cake into the trash!”
The little girl walked to the entrance of the kitchen, leaning nervously against the door frame so only half of her body peeked through. Lip quivering, she mumbled, “No, leave it. I asked daddy if we could go to the graveyard and surprise her with her favorite cake. You should come, too…”
Heart throbbing at the reminder of the past month's mayhem, and she set the cake down before her trembling hands could give away.
“Surprise!!”
Lucy gasped, startled by the crowd of smiling faces greeting her at her doorway. As soon as she had hit the lights, dozens of her loved ones jumped out from behind her cushions and couches to meet her with confetti, congratulations, and, from her oldest daughter, a piece of her favorite cake. Placing a hand on her chest where her pounding heart leapt, Lucy first turned to playfully punch her smirking husband who, she knew, planned the whole thing.
“Mommy! Congratulations!” Three pairs of arms lunged at her, each racing to be the first to hug their mother and earning a bout of laughter from the crowd.
Lucy, eyes watering, bent down to pull all three of her children into a single, tight hug, planting a kiss on the forehead of the eldest who handed her the of cake.
“Mommy, Grandma Tutu and I made that cake for you today! She said it was your favorite.” Jessica beamed as her mother took the dessert.
“I put on the icing!”
“And I put on the sprinkles!!” the two other children cried out zealously, each desperate to not be shown up by the other.
Lucy, the tears now brimming out of the corners of her eyes, turned to give her two younger children to their own forehead kisses. “Thank you. The three of you are my little angels. And the cake looks scrumptious. Thank you.” She murmured again, but this time to everyone else who had spared the time to see her home, as she wiped at the tears that were starting to roll down her cheeks.
“And, mommy!” her youngest, named Matthew, exclaimed as he stood up on his tip-toes, “Grandma Tutu also bought you a new wig to wear! Congratulations!!”
The doctor shuffled the pages before setting them down on his desk, his expression apologetically helpless. The canyons of his forehead deepened as he gazed at the mother and father who clung desperately to one another, the bitter news a crushing blow. “I’m sorry Mr. and Mrs. Moyer. It has reached stage four in just the few months that you’ve been out of the hospital. I am sincerely sorry to say this, but there is very little help I could offer you.” He stated in a somber voice.
The mother only shook her head, still in disbelief as she tightened her grip around her husband’s hand, holding back the wails of anguish she could only wish to share with the world. She tried to speak, but there was a lump in her throat the size of her fist. Every time she tried to say something, she would only choke on a sob.
“We just hoped it would take a while longer, until Jessica was at least 18.” Her husband, somehow conjuring the strength to speak past his shaking tears, said what Lucy could only think.
The doctor stared back at the two, his eyes visibly watering over as he was unable to further express his sympathies for not being a better doctor, for not being able to rid her of this tumor. He furrowed his brow, trying to keep a professional image. “With chemo and a tight watch, we may be able to pull through, but it would be a long shot and—”
“Pain. It will be plenty of pain that I know all about. But doctor,” Lucy straightened up, suddenly gaining composure despite the tears crawling down her face and the lump still caught in her quivering throat, “If you’re saying there’s a chance,” she turned to her husband who gave a reassuring nod, “then we’ll take it. We’ll fight to keep us all together.”
With a soft smile, the doctor nodded. “I knew you’d say something like that, Lucy. We’ll have a room ready for you tomorrow.”
Lucy couldn’t contain her cries of agony at the sight of so many tubes, more tubes than she has ever witnessed in her four years of battling cancer. She shook her head, praying the lord would simply make her better so that she may whisk her family away from the incessant mechanical beeping of four different machines, from the uncontrollable sobs coming from different rooms every other night, from the buckets and bins of yellow bile and shed hair, the byproducts of the chemotherapy fighting in vain to rid of her tumor.
Lucy prayed so fervently every night, until her frail body grew too heavy for her will to carry alone, and every night she would collapse into an unwanted slumber, drenched in her anguished tears and shaking alone in her cot.
She woke one night to find Jessica smiling warmly at her through the railing of the hospital bed. Startled, she wiped the tears from her eyes, asking why she wasn’t asleep like the siblings who were cuddled beside her.
Jessica shook her weary head, whispering, “I want to keep seeing you, mommy. Before it’s too late, and I can’t see you anymore.” Her voice cracked and her smile wavered, her eyes moistening. “I don’t want to stop seeing you. Your hair, your eyes, your smile, your kisses and hugs, mommy I don’t want you to go…!” her face twisted into a knot of pure agony, an emotion too complex to suit a child.
Lucy lovingly hushed her daughter, caressing her soft cheek and wiping away her tears. “Mommy will always be here with you, Jessica. She’s not going anywhere. No one is going anywhere, okay? We’re all going to get better and leave soon, and have another congratulations party.”
“And will we celebrate Rachel’s birthday?” Jessica sniffled with a pout, petting her sleeping sister’s head.
“We will celebrate Rachel’s birthday.”
“And can I make Grandma Tutu’s cake for you on your birthday every year?” she asked hopefully.
Her mother let out a soft chuckle. “I would love to have your cake every year. Just sleep. Mommy will go to sleep, too, okay?” She smiled gently at her eldest daughter who nodded back before finally shutting her drowsy, wet eyes and letting peaceful sleep embrace her.
With a heavy sigh of relief, Lucy settled back in her hospital bed, listening to the soft breaths of her three tiny angels rather than the ticks and tocks of the bustling hospital. Their little snores enveloped Lucy in a calm she hadn’t felt in days, allowing her heart to warm in joy despite the heartrending circumstances. She smiled at the sight of her slumbering children, and her vision began to blur in her drowsiness.
She realized that she was no longer in pain, nor was she spending all night coughing into a metal bin. It was their first peaceful night in weeks; the sunlight was peeking through this ominous black cloud. Maybe she was getting better, healthier, and stronger. Her conscious drifted off, finally falling into peaceful respite.
There was no congratulations party the next day, and none of Grandma Tutu’s cake. The Moyers arrived at their empty home, tear drunk, each wondering how they’ll get along now that she's gone. In the father’s grasp was a pink sweater, one that had lost its purpose overnight and now weighs heavier than his thumping heart in his hands.
Rachel had her seventh birthday party, asking only for her Grandma Tutu’s cake. Only her father and brother had the heart to join her in having a slice. As she began eating the fragrant sweetbread, tears spilled onto her frosting, running the colors off the rainbow sprinkles as bite after bite was only an attempt to muffle a growing sob, reminding her of who she had lost. Reminding everyone of who they lost.
Wiping the snot of her nose off on her arm, she reached for another piece of cake.
“Whoa Rachel, do you really think you can finish another?” Her father asked worriedly, stretching to take the plate from her.
Rachel shook her head and, still weeping, pulled the candles off her cake and lined them up on her second slice. “I want to bring this to her tomorrow. This was her favorite cake, too.”
Her father stared in silence, caught off guard at his younger daughter’s request. “You want to bring this to the cemetery?”
Rachel nodded, breaking up into more tears at the thought of her tombstone, her childishly round cheeks red and swollen from crying.
Her father sighed, thinking it over before saying, “Fine. You can save a piece of cake for her. But don't forget to tell your mother that it's for Jessica. And ask if she'd like to come, too.”
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