Page 21 of Mourner for Hire
Panic rises, and I immediately want to draw back my agreement.
“I don’t think this is a good idea. I don’t know my clients. That’s how this works without it hurting anyone,” I say, rising from the couch.
She stands to meet my gaze. “Please.”
“I can’t. I’m sorry, but this just got personal, and I don’t do personal. I don’t remember my mother—I barely have any recollection of my childhood, and now a woman claiming to have known her, and who I have never even heard of, wants me to crash her funeral and renovate her beach cottage. This is absolute lunacy.” I turn to walk away, mentally berating myself for the outburst.
“Fifty grand.”
I freeze, rotating slowly so I face her. I’m an honest person,yes. And this goes against what I’d typically agree to, but fifty grand is fifty grand. I’m motivated by my morals, but money is a close second.
I meet her smiling gaze.
“You are so much like your mother.”
The blood rushes through my ears with the strength of the ocean’s current. “Yeah?”
She nods. “Yeah. Heart of gold. Tongue like a sword. And the honesty of a child.”
I don’t ask for details because I don’t really want them. I don’t want to know my mother through anyone’s eyes but my own. And sadly, that’s just not in the cards for me.
My next words tumble out with a bundle of regret swirling in my gut. “One thing I should offer considering… everything. Do you want me to do six-month or yearly check-ins? Just to make sure everything is still scheduled like we discussed. I can add a clause in our contract if you change your mind.”
I hold my breath, not sure if I’m giving the out for me or her.
“No need. I have melanoma that has already metastasized to my brain,” she says. “I’m dying in nine months.”
FIVE
DOMINIC
NINE MONTHS LATER
“How are you today?”I ask Mom as I slip a bouquet of roses next to her bedside table and a fresh bag of butterscotch candies—a habit we picked up from my dad. He never wanted to finish a meal with a mint but something sweet. It’s a weird quirk of the Dunne family that only makes sense to those within it. Everyone around us just thinks we’re addicted to sugar.
“Fine,” she answers with a slip of a smile that does nothing to hide her exhausted expression.
Fine. It’s always fine. Even when hospice was called in: fine. Even when they upped her morphine: fine. Even when they told her she had six months left to live: fine.
That was six months ago, and the dreaded hourglass of life has finally run out of sand. Granule after granule of life tumbling through delicate glass until there’s nothing left. Except there is. She’s still here.
I sit next to her bed and hold her hand, trying to ignore how much they’ve changed. She’s practically skin and bone, but still sarcasm and attitude. My dad used to tease her that her stubbornness will either keep her alive or kill her in the end. It turns out it’s done both.
She was stubborn about her skin checks and never went until that spot on her shoulder seeped its ugly cancerous talons into her bloodstream and attacked her brain.
Now, her stubbornness is pushing her past her life expectancy.
“You know you can tell me how you really feel?”
Her smile widens, but the expression in her eyes remains broken. “I can, but I won’t.”
“Why?” My chest twists.
“Because I don’t want to go out complaining about how shitty cancer makes you feel. I don’t want to go out telling everyone how I feel like I’ve become a shell of a human. Like some goddamn skeleton while my soul floats above me, trying to find any semblance of something normal.” She squeezes my hand tightly, but even that reminds me how weak she is. “I’m not going to go out like that. I’m going out with a battle cry screaming fuck cancer. Because I have loved my life. Every single bit of it.”
“But it’s okay to tell me you’re not fine, Mom.”
“Iamfine. I’ve made peace with it,” she says. “But you know what I haven’t made peace with? The fact that you are alone.”
