Page 15 of I Can't Even

Dragging my hands over my sides, I unfastened my pants, planning to shove them down my hips, but the head twirling had made me dizzy and I staggered, probably looking as graceful as the town drunk.

I stepped wide to steady myself and stubbed my toe on the desk. Ouch! I hopped back a step and my pants dropped, tangling my legs, causing me to windmill my arms in a desperate bid to regain my balance. I failed and did a loud face plant onto the floor taking the desk chair with me. I laid there for a moment, stunned, the breath knocked out of me, my butt in the air—not my best side.

“Jules, are you all right?” Em cried as she barged into the room.

“I’m okay,” I mumbled into the carpet beneath my cheek. And I was, you know, minus my dignity and all that pesky other stuff like self-esteem and pride.

“What are you doing on the floor?” My baby sister grabbed me beneath the arms and hauled me to my feet. I stood half dressed with stars moving around my head in a circular motion—oh wait, maybe only I could see those—slowly coming to the realization that I had probably just made a complete ass of myself.

I glanced at the window to verify. Yep. Liam was doubled over, his entire body shaking with laughter. He looked like he was having a seizure; every time he seemed to get it under control, he lost it again. I was really glad I couldn’t hear the guffaws that were coming out of his face hole.

He must have felt me staring because he straightened and caught my eye. He tried to iron out his smile, yeah, that didn’t work. First his shoulders started shaking, then his lips looked like they were wrestling with his cheeks to keep from turning up, and finally he had to wipe the tears that streamed out of his eyes with the heels of his hands. Yeah, Liam Mahony was having a good old laugh at my expense. Jerk!

Em glanced from him to me and back again. She studied me with consternation, taking in my half-dressed state and my hair gone wild.

“Oh, Jules, tell me you didn’t,” she said. “Tell me you did not let that man see you get undressed.”

I sighed, knowing there was really no point in fibbing.

“Well, he didn’t see me naked, because I didn’t finish my striptease,” I said. “I might’ve broken my toe.”

Em reached around me and snapped the window shade down, sending Liam a dirty look as she did so. She scowled at me as if I’d lost all sense of common decency...I couldn’t really blame her for that.

“What is wrong with you?” Em asked. “We have bigger stuff going on here than your old boyfriend living next door. God, Jules, get your shit together.”

With that she slammed out of my room as if I’d lit her backside on fire. I waited until I heard her bedroom door open and close and then I peeked beneath the shade to see if Liam was still there.

He was and he was working out—yay, me—but every now and then he would pause with his weights half raised and he would have to put them down so he could laugh. I had no doubt he was laughing at me and I was surprisingly okay with it. In the grand scheme of things, it seemed like he’d received a solid karmic payback. I could live with that.

I dropped the shade. Maybe now that I’d humiliated myself in front of him, he’d see his way to not glaring at me like he had before. Oh, I didn’t have any illusions that we’d ever be friends or lovers, but maybe we could be civil. You know, the sort of neighbors who saw each other, waved, and shouted out a “good morning,” but who never stopped to chat.

The picture wouldn’t form in my head, and I had the feeling it was because I could never envision a time where Liam would look at me with anything but anger. The thought made me sad.

Babs’s condition deteriorated more the next day. She had stopped eating and getting her to drink was a battle of wills. A hospice nurse named Ashley arrived and admitted our mother into their care. Tense meetings were held in the kitchen as her medications were all but suspended, everything but the pain meds.

Sophie and I understood what this meant. I feared that Em wasn’t really grasping it, but she surprised me when she asked Ashley, a sturdy woman built for giving hugs, “How long do you think we have? You see people like this all the time.”

Ashley didn’t flinch from the question, though her voice was soft when she answered, “A day or two at most is my best guess, but sometimes...”

Em nodded. She didn’t cry or wail or breakdown. She stiffened her spine. “I’ll be sitting with Mom from now on then.”

“Me, too,” Sophie said.

“And me,” I said.

The nurse gently admonished us to take care of ourselves and we agreed, but I knew we were all just giving her lip service so she’d go away and leave us alone with our mom. Ashley seemed to get that and left, telling us to call her any time for anything.

Babs woke up to find the three of us staring down at her, hovering as if we were trying to memorize everything about her, so that we would never forget this complicated woman who had given each of us life.

She held her hands out to us, and Sophie took one while Em took the other. We all sat down on the divan, with me by her feet. Her voice was just a soft rasp now, and we had to lean in to hear her.

Mom looked at Sophie. “You’ve given up so much of yourself to take care of others, don’t be afraid to go after what you want. I never did and I’ve always regretted it.”

“I will, Mom,” Sophie said. Her voice wavered a bit but, she kept her emotions in check. “I promise.”

Babs turned to Em, her baby. Her eyes softened. “Thank you for taking such good care of me. You’re free now. Live boldly, darling, you deserve it.”

“I will, Mom.” Em sobbed. “I promise I will.”

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