Fall 2000 Charles River Review: Wonder Woman

Tighten your belt," I whisper to Gina as the T pulls into the Central Square stop. "There's no telling what evil lurks outside."

The doors of the subway slide open, and Gina and I pop our heads out. We look in both directions before we step onto the platform.

"See anything?" Gina says, pulling her knapsack straps over her shoulders. A superhero must, at all times, have her hands free.

"Coast is clear, Wonder Girl," I say, motioning her to follow me through the turnstile. School has just let out and it is still early. Too early, I guess, for arch enemies to be outside, in public. Still, I know it's dangerous to let your guard down so I climb the stairs on my tiptoes, slowly. At the top, just before we come above ground, I put my finger to my mouth, signaling Wonder Girl to stay quiet. We lock hands, clink our magic rings together, and take the final step.

"Who's that?" Gina says once we're on Mass. Ave., pointing to a guy in a Hendrix T-shirt, waving to us in front of Skippy White Records.

"Joe," I say and let go of her hand, which is still sticky with glue from art class. "The drummer."

I scan the sidewalk. There are a couple of women wearing gaucho pants and peasant skirts waiting for the bus with babies hoisted on their backs and a few older kids roller-skating down the side of the road, their orange wheels a blur of color. A group of Hare Krishnas is gathered in a circle outside the food co-op. Their bare feet stick out from under their long, sand-colored dresses; they hum and pass out flyers to the shoppers. Mom is nowhere in sight. Something inside my throat begins to rise, and I look back at Joe, who starts to walk toward us, his boots scuffing the pavement. His long gray and brown hair, pulled into a ponytail, looks like the tail of a palomino horse.

"Where is she?" I say, kind of loud, twisting the ring around my finger.

Joe takes a few seconds to dig into the brown paper bag he's holding. "I was in the area anyway," he says, pulling out an album, trying to smile. "New Zeppelin."

The lump in my throat feels like it's traveled up to my eyes, which are getting wet, so I grab Gina's hand again and start walking toward Prospect, her street.

"What's going on?" Gina says, jabbing her elbow into my side. My golden belt of power deflects the jab and I feel nothing. "Where's your Mom? Should I call my Mom?"

"Don't worry about it," I say, walking faster, the hum of the Krishnas getting fainter.

"Joni," Joe says, catching up to us and grabbing my backpack. "Hold up."

I stop and blow out a deep breath.

"Mass. General," he says quietly, from behind me. "But she's fine. She was just feeling a little dizzy, so your Dad wanted to be safe. I was at the house, trying out a new tune. I said I'd come get you."

A month earlier, Joe had been the one who came to Ms. Washburn's class at the King School to get me out early when Mom was rushed to the hospital the first time. Initially, she thought she had just gained weight. Her jeans were getting tight and she had to poke a new hole in her belt with the Swiss Army knife. Dad jokingly gave her a hard time, saying if she didn't cut out the ice cream they'd have to switch from rock to blues and rename the band Big Kate and the Jumbleweeds. Mom would flick guitar picks at him and say, "Very funny," her favorite expression, but she always walked away smiling.

Eventually she began skipping breakfast and took walks before dinner, after her last guitar student left. When she also started feeling wiped out earlier and earlier in the day and had to pee a lot, she and Dad actually looked happy.

"What do you think of Simon for a boy?" she said one Saturday in August, sitting on a barstool in the band room, her Martin slung over her shoulder. "If it's a girl, you can pick the name." She was working on a new song, flatpicking A minor to E major and then back to A minor, moving her fingers up the fret board as she went along. I picked up the Gibson Hummingbird, Mom's first guitar, which she bought in high school just before I was born. Even though it was big, she had given it to me the year before, on my ninth birthday, when I officially started learning.

"I like it," I said, watching her long, thin fingers move quickly and with ease. My own fingers felt clumsy and slow.

That next day--the day Joe came to get me--while Ms. Washburn was telling us about the 300 runaway slaves that Harriet Tubman led to safety on the Underground Railroad, Mom passed out. That's when they found out she wasn't pregnant: she was sick. Lots of tests and whispered phone calls followed. The band put rehearsal on hold until they could learn more, and Dad rescheduled all of Mom's guitar students, despite her protests.

Two days later it was confirmed--ovarian cancer. Mom went out and bought herself a big bottle of wine and junk food she had stopped eating back when she thought she was just getting fat: Fritos, crinkle-cut French fries, and Hershey kisses. While I was sent off to stay at Grandma May's apartment in Somerville, Mom and Dad polished everything off. That next morning, I walked into a quiet house. Usually on Saturdays, Joe was tapping new song ideas on the coffee table with his drumsticks or the whole band was listening to records, deciding what songs to cover for their weekly Sunday gig at Passim's in Harvard Square. Instead, I found Dad in the kitchen making tea and Mom sitting alone in the living room, holding a bag of frozen corn against her temple with one hand. In the other, she was tossing balled up chocolate wrappers toward the empty wine bottle, missing the opening every time.

"I'm a bad shot," she said, tilting her head back and moving the bag of corn over both eyes, which had dark mascara streaks underneath.

"Do you want me to put something on?" I asked, looking at the record player. "Hank Williams? Miles?"

Mom just slowly shook her head back and forth on the back of the couch and readjusted the bag of corn. The house was so quiet I could hear Dad smoking in the kitchen, exhaling and tapping the cigarette against the ashtray.

Before I went to Grandma's, they told me a little about Mom's illness but said it was too soon to explain much. Still, I wanted to know what "cancer" really meant and what we needed to get Mom better. I wanted to know if Dad was going to get sick too. But I didn't ask. I was afraid of the answers, afraid I'd make it worse for her. So instead, I sat on the rug and picked up silver and pink foil balls and dropped them into the bottle, each making a soft clink when it hit the bottom.

That first week, after the diagnosis, when I was supposed to be asleep in bed, I would sneak down a few stairs and try to make out what Mom was saying during phone calls to Grandma and her friends, but other than phrases like "caught early" and "stage one," I could never make out much. As I sat on the dark step listening to Mom whisper and Dinah Washington sing about blue gardenias and what a difference a day makes, I tried to imagine what Wonder Woman would do if Queen Hyppolite, her Mom, were sick. Eventually I'd wander back to my room, sleepy and uncertain.

When we reach Gina's house, a big blue Victorian with her dad's VW bus parked in the front yard, she and I clink rings once again and say goodbye. Joe and I continue down Prospect, then left onto Hampshire, walking the six blocks to my house in silence. Inside, everything looks the same as it did when I left for school: dirty cereal bowls are in the sink, and the daisies Dad picked for Mom are in a jelly jar on the kitchen table. But I shiver, feeling colder than I did in the morning.

"Your dad said he'd call at 3," Joe says, looking at the clock above the sink. "Keep me company until then?"

We pull chairs up to the table and Joe grabs a handful of Hershey Kisses from the bowl on the counter. With his teeth, he peels back the wrappers, letting them fall on the table.

"You still saving these?" he says, pointing to the foil pieces, colored rusty orange for Halloween. I nod and ball up each piece, then add them to the wine bottle, which is on the windowsill next to a row of prescription bottles and now labeled "Joni's shaker" in black magic marker. Joe moves the flowers aside, careful not to knock them over, and pulls a pack of papers and a baggie out of his jeans. He dumps the small green clumps onto the table and crushes them with his thumb, pushing the seeds into a pile off to the side. Pinching the dried, green leaves, he sprinkles some onto the paper in a straight line, much fatter than Dad's, then puts a thumb at each end and begins rolling inward, careful that none of the leaves falls out. When it looks like a white stick, he licks the end and seals it.

The sound of the phone ringing cuts into the air, making Joe and me both jump. I race out to grab it after the first ring. Joe lights the joint and takes a deep drag. The room smells both sweet and skunky.

"Hello?" I say, shaky, afraid to hear my own voice. My heart feels like it's going to explode. Dad explains that the hospital wants to keep Mom for a few days just to give her more medicine, but that I shouldn't worry. He asks if Joe is still there and says we can take the T to the hospital. He says to pack the Martin.

"We can go," I say to Joe as I hang up.

"I'm already there," he says, pinching out the joint with his finger and putting it into his pocket.

I put the Martin into the velvet-lined case as Mom always does, careful not to bang the neck as I lower it. Before I close the lid, I squat down and look into the hole in the middle of the body, a perfect circle. The inside is hollow, filled with nothing but darkness.

"That's mighty big for such a little girl to carry," says this old guy wearing shoes with thick, black soles, sitting next to me and Joe in the hallway, outside the nurses' station. He smells like Vicks and chicken soup, and I clutch the handle of the guitar case tighter with both hands and ignore him. Nurses are pushing patients around in wheelchairs and showing charts to each other, and every five seconds the intercom crackles and calls out someone's name. A boy wearing a short white bathrobe and paper slippers walks by, making crinkling noises with each step.

"Sweetie," Dad says, tapping my shoulder, a Styrofoam cup of coffee in one hand. He leans down and kisses my forehead. His eyes look pink around the edges. "Go in and see her. I know she can't wait."

I hesitate, feeling like a big weight is keeping me stuck to the plastic seat. The boy in the bathrobe disappears into the elevator, holding a nurse's hand.

"Go on," Dad says, pushing my bangs aside with his fingers, which are warm from the coffee cup. He slides the guitar case over to Joe and sits on the edge of a seat, resting his elbows on his knees. "Just like last time. Same kinda room. First side."

I walk across the hall to Mom's room and quietly slide the door open. She is lying on her back in the bed and smiles when I step in. The room is sectioned off with what looks like a white bed sheet hanging like a shower curtain. From the other side of the curtain, I can hear someone snoring and a machine making a beeping sound, like trucks do when they back up, only softer.

"There's my girl," she says, tapping the snow-white bed for me to sit on. I stay standing in the doorway, sucking the end of my ponytail, which is wet and prickly from where I had been chewing it during the subway ride from our house to the hospital.

"Out," Mom says, pointing to my mouth, before I can answer. She pulls the rubber band out of her own ponytail and her long black hair fans out on the pillow like it does when she swims underwater and doesn't use the cap. It looks shiny against the stiff white pillow, and I wonder when it will start to fall out. She said that when it did, she would never wear a wig. After her first chemotherapy session, we had stopped at the army-navy store and bought half a dozen bandannas, including one with unicorns and rainbows that I picked out.

"Come on, sit next to me," she said, smiling and tapping the bed again. I spit my ponytail out and walk over, avoiding the lines of the linoleum tiles, which are streaked with black smudges and seem worn in some spots.

"How was school?" she says, pulling me against her shoulder. I'm afraid to lean too hard, so I put my arm underneath my side, shouldering most of my weight.

"Okay," I say, looking across her at the lights on the machines hooked up by her side. I try to imagine that Mom and I are on a big white spaceship, heading back home to Paradise Island, where Mom is the strong, healthy ruler and I am next in line to the throne. But all I see are flickering dots of yellow and red, and the room smells like bathroom cleaner.

"Just okay? Come on, you can do better than that," she says. A clear, see-through cord runs from her arm to a plastic bag marked "Taxol," her medicine. The bag is hanging from a metal stand that can be wheeled around when she has to use the bathroom. She is leashed to the room.

"Can't you come home?" I say, looking away from the bag and up at her face, which is pale. Her brown eyes look bigger than usual, like they're pushed too far back in her head.

"Well, Dr. Showers is suppose to be the best in Boston. A specialist in this kind of thing," she says, running her fingers through my ponytail. "I'll be in and out in no time, you'll see."

"When?" I say, suddenly wanting a day, a time.

She takes a deep breath and is quiet, her fingers hitting a snarl in my hair.

"When your shaker is full," she says.

I don't know whether to believe her but I want to, so I lie with my head on her shoulder and stay quiet, thinking about Dr. Showers and her specialty. Mom stays quiet too and after about 10 minutes, her breathing slows, and I can tell she has fallen asleep. Carefully, I slip my hand into one of hers, which is palm-side down, half open on the light-yellow blanket. Her fingers are soft on the outside, but inside, they are bumpy and callused from thick guitar strings. Symbols of love, she calls them. I touch the bumps and watch her chest move up and down with each breath.

"Wake up, Joni," Dad says, shaking my arm. Joe is standing by the other side of the bed, passing the joint to Mom, saying she might need it to fall asleep again. The curtain is pulled all around us, and I feel as if I'm inside a big white tent. Dad is waving a newspaper up and down, fanning the room.

"We have to leave in a few minutes," he says to me. "You can come back tomorrow after school."

"Sleep tight, okay, Baby?" Mom says, my hand still in hers. "Have Daddy take you out for dinner. You probably haven't eaten yet, have you? You're looking like a beanpole."

I shake my head and look at Dad, who is peeking around the curtain at the other patient.

"Still snoring away," he says.

Joe and I take turns giving Mom hugs and kisses and then move toward the door. Dad puts the guitar case on the bed and leans over it, holding Mom tight for what seems like an hour. When the nurse pops her head in to say visiting hours are over, Dad lets go and blows kisses to Mom as he walks to the door. I blow one too, and notice that her cheeks are wet. She grabs the kisses and clutches them in her hand, telling us she'll take one out every hour until we come back tomorrow.

Outside the door, Dad lets out a big breath and tells us to wait by the elevator. He wants to ask Mom's doctor a few questions before we leave. I throw my golden lasso, which makes people tell the truth, in the direction of the nurses' station so that it will get there before he does. I tell him we need to pick up more Hershey Kisses at the store on the way home.

As Joe and I stand by the elevator, I see Dad talking to a nurse, who picks up an intercom and in a muffled voice asks Dr. Showers to check into nurse station number four on the B wing.

After a few minutes, a tall woman wearing a white jacket and white clogs walks up to Dad and shakes his hand. From a distance, she looks like Lynda Carter, the real Wonder Woman. She smiles at Dad while they talk and even pats his shoulder. For the first time in a month, I feel lighter, like the heaviness that has filled my insides is melting away.

All our hopes are pinned on you, I sing in my head, as Dad and Dr. Showers walk toward us. The magic that you do. You're a wonder, Wonder Woman!

And then, as she shakes my hand and introduces herself, the heaviness returns. Her fingertips are soft and I realize she isn't at all like Wonder Woman. Her hair is long and shiny, but much lighter--the color of the paper bags I bring my lunch to school in every day. And what looked like a golden tiara from across the hallway is actually a pair of plastic glasses that she has pushed on top of her head--the kind that Grandma pulls out of her purse at grocery stores when she wants to read the ingredients on the back of boxes.

I let go of her hand and twist the magic ring around my finger and try to retrieve the golden lasso from the nurses' station, but nothing happens. Stop a bullet cold and make the axis fold, change their minds and change the world, I continue singing, trying to make the words mean something. But in that moment, I realize that Dr. Showers is an ordinary woman. Not the kind that is going to save my mother.