Many people say their momma is their best friend, but I bet no one’s momma is quite like my momma.
You see, and I know this is dumb, but me and momma go way back. About three decades ago, momma met pop in high school. She had just moved to this here quiet little town of Whispering Pines. Born and raised thank you.
It’s one of those places where everyone knew everyone. You knew if Mr. Jones was going to have a rough summer because his feed store was in low supply. You knew when Miss Thatcher would be late teaching Math at Whispering Pines High School. Heck, you even knew if the Alcock’s dog had chased off the Miller’s cat, all before you stepped off the bus. And this was before all these fancy smartphones you all love.
I don’t think momma’s momma was her best friend. I never remember meeting grandma or grandpa, but I know momma was a bit miffed when she was taken out of her senior year of high school, to move halfway across the country. But that didn’t stop my momma.
The County Fair was going on when momma moved into town, and pop being the varsity quarterback for the Whispering Pine Wolves was on stage in some kind of celebration for their team. I don’t do sports so great, just like momma. She didn’t even remember what it was about because as she told me, all she remembered was looking into pop’s eyes, him looking back, and they fell in love, and after 20 years of blissful marriage they had a wonderful little child, me!
Yeah. That’s not what happened. Momma and pop did fall in love for a short bit after that longing gaze. That night they really thought they could be starting something special. Turns out momma didn’t know the strength of grain alcohol, which this town makes a mean batch of. The very same day that momma came to town, in the bleachers of my own high school, well, they had some fun. I don’t want to think about that. That same night, pop, in the same… spirits… managed to wreck his truck into the side of a tractor, gone in an instant. Luckily momma had already been caught drinking by grandma and got a whoopin’ that same night. Silver linings, I guess. If this whole situation for momma wasn’t bad enough, sure enough nine months later I popped out. 10,494 days ago. That’s how long momma and I have really known each other.
I also don’t think momma’s momma liked me either. Turns out in a small town like this, a single mom put out on the street with nothing but the baby in her belly doesn’t have a lot of chances in life, but that’s what momma’s momma decided was best for her apparently. Momma never let it break her, no matter what was thrown at her. By the time I was born, momma was already living in this same run-down trailer. She had to pick up a job at “OneStop QuickShop”, the local market, just to pay rent, while enduring ridicule for being a knocked-up senior trying to get her high school degree, all while dealing with a growing human inside her. My. Hero.
And through all of this she somehow didn’t end up resenting my very existence. Somehow, no matter what, I was her entire world. She always put me first, even though we’ve always had close to nothing. But something always felt like it would pull us out of bliss. Anytime something good would happen there’d be a thorn that needed to be pricked out. But momma always held her head high and made the best of a good situation gone bad.
Like when the school finally found an old beat up instrument for me to play in Band, a giant cello, and hours before my first recital the car breaks down. She helped me drag that cello to and from, 3 miles each way, in a wheelbarrow.
There was that time when during our first vacation in years that we could finally afford, an hour drive to a local motel that has a pool, it started raining, and didn’t stop. She made the biggest pillow fort you’ve ever seen.
Or when I was young, she would eat all the broccoli before my chicken nuggets even hit the plate because she knew I hated the smell. Some nights all she would eat was that broccoli, and she always ate it out of the room. She’s made even more sacrifices than I’ve realized…
My first memory of us together was learning how to ride a bike without training wheels. Momma found a bike in the dumpster behind the market one night. My birthday was coming up, and having just finished kindergarten, she needed something special for me. She fixed it up, made it shiny. Put a big bow on it that she had sewn by hand. It looked brand new, at least to me then, and the memory is what counts right? It was way too big, and I was going to have to learn how to ride without training wheels to begin with.
I should have suspected something when momma told me to just hop on and kick like I’m swimming, something neither of us had ever done. Turns out she didn’t know how to ride a bike; doesn’t matter here, but she also doesn’t know how to swim. We spent the rest of that summer covered in scrapes and bruises.
There were so many tears on both sides. We’d both try some new way to ride this scrape machine. One of us would fall, the other would run and help the other up. After a while, the cries of pain turned into cries of laughter.
Momma has one of those laughs you never forget. Not the laugh itself, but how she’d START laughing. She’d be down on the ground after another wipeout, looking stern like the world had let her down yet again, then out of nowhere POP. Sudden and abrupt, akin to a champaign cork just bursting, her mouth would pop. Every time she laughed, POP followed by laughter, it’s the best.
The laugh that followed was always the same too; a silent whisper compared to the pop that would have just happened, but a giddy little giggle. 8,288 days ago, that was when we finally got up on that bike and road down the street and back without getting all banged up. She threw her fist in the air, and I remember the yellow sundress she had on reminding me of a huge trophy. She had figured it out, and sure enough, with a little actual guidance from someone who now knew how to ride a bike, I got up in no time! It was a victory for unathletic kids everywhere!
That’s how I like to remember momma. Her never give up attitude. Strong and always willing to get back up again. Nothing would ever take her down. Well, almost nothing. It started early that year with the headaches. She always said it felt like something was just below the surface, nagging at her. We could never afford to have any kind of consistent health care. Momma was managing the Market by this point, and I even took up a job there a while back and manned the registers. We had enough to get by, but retail and insurance… It’s hard. She fought through till summer. It seemed to be getting better for a while.
Summer had just started; Momma and I were sitting out in front of the trailer. We had some of those good POP laughs remembering stupid little nothings, just a ride down memory lane. We never throw anything out, so I pointed to this bike, that holds my first memory, something that means so much in my heart. One day I hope my own child may learn on this bike. I figured momma was just messing with me, but no matter what, she was insistent this never happened. It did though.
This finally got Momma to head into the city to just get checked out, it was going to cost an arm and a leg just go get looked at, but at this point, the headaches wouldn’t go away, and well, I was worried. It took a while, but finally she agreed to go.
While she was gone, I went over learning to ride a bike so many times, everything. It happened. We cried and laughed an entire summer away. There was no way it didn’t happen. Something was wrong with one of us.
A week later was my birthday. Momma got the call on my birthday. Glioblastoma. This cancer had been eating away at her, silently destroying two lives. That same week we were in a cold white room, with the doctor essentially talking to a blank wall, we were just so beaten down by this point.
Surgery was an option, but with no way to afford it, it was impossible. And even with the surgery, she may have 2 to 3 years, without, possibly a year or two. We drove home in silence. About a mile from home, she suddenly stopped the car and pulled off to the side of the road. I’d never seen momma’s knuckles so white from how tightly she was gripping the wheel.
POP. Her laughter just filled the space. Abrupt just like momma. I was on the verge of tears, momma was going to be gone and there was nothing we could do about it, but here we were, laughing our heads off. Momma told me this is just what happens. Such a simple view on something so horrible, but until the very last day, I was always by momma’s side.
Until the end, we just talked about everything. It’s how I learned the real story of how momma and pop met; why we never saw grandma before she passed away; exactly how I was conceived. Maybe she told me too much. But I cherished every single word, every laugh, every pop.
10,000 days. Exactly. That’s how long Momma and I were together. We really thought she was going to make it to Christmas that year, but as momma said, this is just what happens. We spend time together, make the best of it, and hold on to every memory as tight as we can and hope for the best, because in the end, sometimes all we’re left with is memories.
Momma’s been gone for 494 days. I miss momma. It still hurts how abruptly she was taken from me.
I haven’t seen momma for 494 days.
After she died, I built a big mural around a mirror in our trailer. Momma and I got ready by the mirror for over 10 years, it held good memories. I lined the wall with photos of her and add to it every now and then. It gives me peace, and a good smile every day.
But 7 days ago, I was checking someone out at the market. After wishing this young man a good day, I heard the distinct sound of a champaign bottle being popped off. This startled me, it could be a gun for all I knew. But then laughter filled the room. Momma’s laugh. It was impossible. I felt my heart flutter as I turned around fast enough to get my apron caught on the register and almost knocked it to the ground. Stuck to it, I frantically looked around the room, trying to find, well, the impossible.
A glimpse is all I needed. 20 feet in front of me, walked a woman with her back to me, out of the store. That yellow sundress was unmistakable. It was her laugh. I cried out, trying to get her to come back. Ignoring me, she walked out the front door. Being stuck to a cash register, screaming out, well, people are starting to crowd around me.
As they should have, I’ve seen the camera footage, and I was certainly having an episode to anyone watching. The woman was never in a good shot on the camera, but she was one hundred percent there, in the yellow dress. Just before she was out of my own view, she turned back to look at all the commotion. What I saw I still don’t understand. I didn’t see momma.
What looked back at me was blank. I don’t mean a blank stare, I mean faceless. Like a mannequin. I stopped yelling for her then. I don’t know what it is, but it’s not momma, and I think I’d do my best to avoid it at all costs. But if it’s not momma, it sure is persistent like she was.
Everywhere I go, it feels like she’s just out of reach. I’ll hear her POP and laugh, and I really try not to look, and now I go the other way, but it’s getting closer. Sometimes I feel the hairs on the back of my neck rise just before a pop.
It’s been 3 hours since I last heard from momma.
She woke me up early this morning. I didn’t see it lurking around this time, but I don’t always see it now, usually I just hear her directly behind me and just keep moving. It’s been tough, I managed to go back to sleep. Every time I hear that pop, that laugh, I have a moment of hope. Maybe this time it’s actually her. Maybe momma will come up behind me and give me the biggest hug and tell me this has all been a bad dream.
But then I snap back to reality and remember this is just how it is now. She’s gone, and it’s not her. I’m a wreck, but up until this morning I was managing.
This morning, I was getting ready, a little off schedule but i think that’s understandable given the week I’ve had. I had just taken my shower and sat down to get ready for the day in front of the mom mirror. Light filled the room as I flipped on the light, but as I adjusted and I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, I recoiled in horror.
The mirror showed me staring back at me… but it wasn’t me.
I had no face. And sitting behind me on the edge of the bed was the faceless momma, reaching out toward me. I shot my head behind me, ignoring all the fear from the last week, but there was nothing there. And looking back in the mirror was me, and no faceless anything.
But I think it’s in the room with me right now.
Pop.
Pop.
Pop.
It’s constant behind me. This laughter that’s filled me with so much joy and happiness is destroying me from within. But I’m not moving this time, standing firm like momma would do. I don’t know what else to do, so I’m trying to remember the good times with momma, but it feels like it’s getting harder to remember. I guess that’s just the way it is sometimes.