First Place - Form Four Writing Competition

My Greatest Joy

          I am a cancer survivor. It has been five years since I recovered. It was terrible to have thyroid mets in my lungs. How did I recover from my illness? It was a traumatic night that had reversed my fate.

          That night, I stayed up pretty late reading the sequel of Mara Dyer when I heard the front door pounding. I knew I had to sleep early but knowing that I was dying, I did not give any damn in the world and read on. I kept getting distracted by the door; I wondered why Dad did not answer the door. My head was spinning. So I had to stagger out of my room to open the door. 

          Filthy vomits splashed across the door and onto my Linkin Park merchandise tee. It was my drunken Mom. She was dressed in an ill-fitting dress and a pair of boots that looked like a carnivorous beast swallowing her legs. Her hair was dishevelled and she looked like a multi-million trash. I burst into a sob. I never knew why she acted this way. It was not the first time she had done this. I felt as though I did not have a mother. There was not the slightest hint that she was aware of my existence. But I had this vague sense that Mom was staring at me. Suddenly it really felt like we were back in that uncreated third space - the time Mom carried me in her womb. I missed her warmth and could feel the connection. The inexplicability of the mood was beyond my understanding. My thoughts were discarded when out in the blue, Dad came and dragged Mom harshly into their room. I pressed my fingers into my temples, trying to rub away the idea that I reeked of vomits. I made a groan of protest and walked straight to the bathroom to clean myself.

          But then I heard sounds of glass breaking. I closely placed my ear against the door to hear their conversation. Dad was screaming in rage and Mom broke down into a dam and all hell broke loose. Dad was talking about some woman and about leaving. Leaving? Sweat coursed down my back in little rivulets beneath my smelly tee. I drew in a sharp breath. Dad had another woman...

         I felt betrayed. Mom was addicted to alcohol because of him. He was all nice to me because deep down he knew I was going to die sooner or later, probably in the month to come. Dad was greedy. He wanted to take over my rights and the wealth Mom had. He wanted everything. Just when I thought I had it all figured out, just when I had finally begun to feel secure and know which direction I was heading, the paths and the signs changed, the wind blew the other way, north was suddenly south, and east was west and I was lost. 

         I leaned against the brick wall, breathing deeply since my lungs began to itch. The back of my throat felt raspy and tight and I sobbed. I wanted to run, away from Mom and Dad. Away from everything. I ran towards the crossroads, blinded by the lights cast by the cars. My breathing began to hitch. I heard Mom screaming, begging me to stop. I ran across the road until she shouted with all her heart and confessed that she loved me very much.

         I stopped. I swore I heard those three words – crossed my heart. I turned around and she was there, in the middle of the road, looking tenderly at me straight in the eyes full of love.

         “I love you, Lena...” she said.

         In the blink of an eye, a car hit her. She flew across the road and crashed onto the road barrier. My pulse was all over the place. Supernovae were exploding inside my brain, an endless chain of intracranial firecrackers that made me think that I was once and for all going crazy. I had been poked and stabbed and poisoned for years but this euphoria of love was beyond all this. The three words Mom said made me smile. At that moment, I would have been very, very happy to die.

         I woke up in the ICU. I could tell because all I saw was blinding lights and beeping machines. Every fibre of my muscles hurt. Whereupon I started to feel pretty tired again, I asked for Mom. I really needed Mom. But I was too hungry and exhausted to express my thoughts. I wondered how long I had been fainted. But not long after I came around, my consciousness slowly fizzled out into nothingness again. 

         I felt a little better each day. Slowly all the bothering nose tubes and oxygen tank were removed. I was beginning to breathe by myself. Did the cancer run away? Regular Doctor Jeanne showed up, sniffed me around for a minute, and murmured the tumours were gone.

          “Gone?” I said under my breath.

         “You did not know? No one told you about it?” Doctor Jeanne said. I felt kind of sick, like I was going to throw up. I had gone for a lung transplant... And the donor was Mom...

        Before she breathed her last, she informed the nurses to give her healthy lungs to me. She wanted me to live. To feel having a normal pair of lungs. Her head hit the road barrier a little too hard and she sustained internal bleeding in her head. The doctors could not save her. Not anyone.

         I had only just realised that this was all a little too late. But I was incredibly lucky to have been her daughter, and the smartest thing I could do was to gather myself together and realise that I had the best mother in the world.

         Doctor Jeanne hugged me when I cried silently. She was a hugger. Slowly she pulled my hand and slipped a small paper and left. I thanked heavens that she understood my situation of wanting to be alone for a little while. I opened the little paper and immediately recognised the handwriting. I ran my fingers across the note, feeling the dents where she had pressed the pen hard to the paper. Mom had this really beautiful cursive handwriting.

         “You are my greatest joy,” the note said. And for once, I actually felt happy and content. I finally felt loved.