Dad says “Mom didn’t go to work, I’ll pick you up from school”
That’s not a big deal
So I get into his old grey car and we drive away
Words fly from his mouth
“Hospital...”
“Mom...”
“Tests...”
“Mass in her lung...”
“Another in her brain...”
He says it all so fast like he’s been given a script
Then he has the audacity to say “But it’s going to be okay.”
We get to a sterile room with such a clean smell it burns my nose
See my mom laying there like nothing’s wrong
She makes jokes and asks me how my day was
I have no words to speak
Dad tries to hug me, I shake him off
Go and cling to my mom’s hand
The doctor arrives fast and I stay in the corner
Looking at the man, I want to punch him
As if punching him could make this all okay
Because he looks over my head and says the word
The word which I never thought would be uttered in my family
The word that haunts me when I’m trying to sleep at night
The word that kills me to even say
But he says it
“Cancer.”
He says it like he’s just saying the time or how the weather is
I can’t hear him explain what we’re going to do
All I can hear is the word
Cancer, cancer cancer cancer cancer
That’s all that is echoing through my brain as the tears break through the dams
Such a simple word with so much destruction
A word that crushes dreams and destroys hopes
A word that makes me look at my hero lying in that hospital bed nodding as the doctor won’t quit talking
Cancer, cancer cancer
A word that has invaded my hero’s brain and causing her so much pain
A word that is filling up her lungs
Cancer.
Cancer.
That is the worst word ever created.