Chapter twenty-two

22.

“I love you! I love you!”
I groaned as I pulled the bear out from under me. I had jumped onto my bed, exhausted, and had landed on 'Sophia'. It's (her?) face smiled up at me, and I started talking to it. Yes, I was really tired.
“You need a better name. No way am I calling you Sophia.”
“Did someone say my name?”
I jumped as I heard a voice outside my door. “Come in?”
Sophia Markson entered the room. “Hi, Shane. Casey said I could come on up.”
I stared at her, and then realized I was still holding the teddy bear. I dropped it. “Casey. So now you and my mom are on a first-name basis?”
She raised her eyebrows at me. “Um, is that a problem with you?”
Stupid girls. “No. What do you want, anyway?”
“I just stopped by. Mostly to talk to Casey, but I guessed I shouldn't leave without at least saying hi to you.”
“Thanks ever so much.” My mood was turning slightly sour. I didn't know why, but I guessed probably because I was so wiped out from finishing my homework.
“What's with you? Somebody get out of the wrong side of bed this morning?” She noticed.
I sighed, and flopped down so I was on my back. “Sorry. I just don't feel that good. Really tired. If you had come right after I got home, you would have gotten Mr. Happy-ville.”
She smirked. “Well, I'm glad I didn't come earlier, then.”
“Ha ha ha.”
Settling down on my chair, she asked, “So where did you go today that made you so happy?”
I felt a little silly, but I told her. “Oh, uh, Kyle and Mike kind of kidnapped me. Then they took me to Build-A-Bear and we made stuffed animals.”
She just smiled. “Was that what you were holding when I came in? I was wondering.”
“Yeah, ha ha. Here, you can hold it.” I tossed it over to her, and she actually caught it. Hmm. Impressive.
“Cute bear. What's its name?”
I froze. “Well, um, uh, there's, it's, uh...”
Sophia looked at me like I was a complete moron, of course. “Did you name it yet?”
Ah! “No, I didn't. Kyle and Mike gave it some stupid name, but I refused. What do you think I should call it?” I just realized how funny we must seem to some people. Two teenagers, sitting in my room discussing a Build-A-Bear teddy bear and what I should name it. But Sophia didn't seem to notice anything strange.
“Aw, man, I don't know. I've never been good at naming things. When I was four I named my cat Mr. Kitty Pookums. Affectionately known as Pook.”
I laughed. “In that case, give me back the bear. I don't want you naming it!”
She laughed too, and tossed it back. “Whatever. I was only four!”
We were silent for a minute. Awkward silence. Then I spoke up. “Hey, if you don't mind me asking, why are you so close to my mom anyway?”
“Oh. I'm actually kind of surprised you didn't ask before. It's just, well, my parents are divorced, see? And I live with my dad. They got divorced a long time ago, when I was only little. I barely remember my mom. But, well, your mom was friends with her back in high school. So she's been telling me about what Mom was like, and I've just been getting to know her and stuff. Casey is a pretty cool person. You're lucky.”
I stared again. My mom, a cool person? Lucky? Yeah, I thought I was lucky, but because my parents weren't strict, not because they were cool. “Lucky? Really? I don't think so.”
“Yes you are! I hate it when people don't see just how good their lives are. My life compared to yours is a dump. You have two parents who both love you. I know my parents love me too, but I haven't seen my mom in years. Yours lives with you. So be thankful, Shane. Don't take it for granted.”
When Sophia left, I laid on my bed and thought about what she had told me. My mom, a cool person? I knew she had done some interesting things back in school, maybe, but I would never have classified her as cool. That got me curious. I left my room.
“Hey Mom? Where are you?”
“In here!” She called, from her bedroom.
I walked over and peered in the doorway. She was immersed in a book. “Hey, watcha reading?”
Mom looked up and gave me a smile. “A Stephen King novel. It's a great one. What do you want?”
I went over and sat down on the edge of her bed. “Stephen King. Wow, that's cool. I didn't really want anything... well, actually I did. I want to talk.”
She looked at me, amazed. I probably didn't utter those words to her very often. “You want to talk? Okay, what about?”
“Anything. About you. Sophia was telling me how she's been getting to know you, and it made me feel bad, since I haven't been doing that. So, let's talk.”
Various emotions crossed her face, and before I could stop her, she leaned forward and gave me a big hug. “I love you, honey.”
I was surprised, but I said back, “You too, Mom.”
She sat up straight, then, assuming (correctly) that it would probably feel weird to hold the hug any longer. “But what do you want to talk about?”
“Anything. I dunno. Tell me about what stuff was like back when you were in high school. Tell me about the fads. I don't really care, just whatever.”
“Okay,” her face lit up with an idea. “Let me tell you about the time that I went road tripping across the middle states in the summer after my senior year of high school...”
And so I listened to my mom talk about the zany trip she had taken with three girl friends of hers. I laughed and laughed. We would smile, and laugh together. I learned a lot about my mom during that one conversation we had in her room. And I had to agree with Sophia – my mom was a pretty cool person.

It was Saturday, and I had gone to visit R. As I stepped out of my parent's van, yelling bye to my dad, I shivered. It was freezing outside. I hurried up to the doorstep, ringing the bell and stepping back a little ways. Soon footsteps came to my rescue.
“Oh, Shane! Come on in,” R's mother, Barbra, opened the door for me. I couldn't help myself, I felt a little awkward. I knew that cancer isn't catching. I knew that she was still just the same person as she had been before, just a bit weaker. But the thought that she had this disease inside of her body, eating at her cells, it made me catch my breath. I could have slapped myself across the face right then, I was so ashamed.
“Hi, Barbra,” I forced a smile as I entered her house. “Is R in his room?”
She shook her head regretfully. “I'm sorry, Shane, he told me he would be home by now. He went fishing with John early this morning, and I really don't know why they aren't back by now. I guess you'll just have to wait.”
I shook my head. Oh, R. It was typical, actually. Always late.
“Okay,” I said, and went over to the couch and sat down. I felt awkward again, but not guiltily. I just didn't know what to do. R could be another hour or so, if he was fishing.
Barbra settled into her computer chair, and I paid no attention to her at first. But my eyes wandered around the room, and I couldn't help but notice her. It looked like she was playing – a video game. My curiosity won over my shyness that time.
“Barbra, you're playing Mario?”
She spun her chair around and smiled. “Yeah, I started when I found out I was sick. It's something good to do when I've run out of energy. And that little Mario guy is just too cute!”
I couldn't decide whether to stare or laugh. An amazing women was in front of my eyes. She talked about her sickness so much more openly than I ever could, and I wasn't the one with the cancer. And she was playing Mario! I couldn't tell what game exactly, but it had caught me attention right away. My mom would never be caught playing a video game, especially not one that I liked.
“Have you heard of Legend of Zelda?” She asked me. I was so surprised. I thought I would be the one asking that.
“Yeah, of course. I've played most of the games.”
She smiled again, saying, “I think I'll play that one next. Is there anything else you'd recommend?”
And then there I was, swept up in a conversation with my best friend's mom, and not feeling weird at all. Of course we didn't talk just about games. She asked about school, and stuff like that, but I found myself being very open with her. And I learned a bunch of stuff about R, too! It's strange, I thought, that I'm just now figuring out moms can be really cool people if we just take the time to notice it. It was a lot of fun, and to my surprise, an hour flew by before R and his father returned.
“Hey Mom,” R called, opening the door. “I'm home – oh, Shane! You're here! Sorry I was late.”
We headed up to his room.
“How long have you been waiting?” He asked.
“Um, about an hour, I guess.”
“Oh, sorry, man! We totally lost track of the time. You know how I am with fishing,” he grinned. “What did you do? Just sit and be bored?”
“Nope. I talked to your mom. She's really cool, you know.”
R looked at me in what must have been amazement. “Wait, you talked to my mom for a whole hour? Serious?”
I laughed at him and nodded my head. He laughed a little too. As he was moving his wrist I thought I saw something. “R, is that a scar or a scratch? What, did one of the fish bite you?”
He quickly pulled his sweatshirt sleeve down to cover it. “Blackberry vine,” he explained.
I didn't pay any more attention to it. After all, scratches come all the time, especially to the accident-prone. But maybe I should have thought about it a little more.