SS - Chapter 5

Chapter 5

The room felt like it was closing in on us and I suddenly found it hard to breathe. Once Bom and I have calmed down, we went out and hopped on my reliable 3 year old Vespa. I drove us to Turtle Beach - our beach. We claimed it as ours years ago.

There’s barely any light from the sun now and the twilight somehow perfectly suited our mood. We sit by our usual sand dune under three coconut trees. This was the place where we’d cried over unrequited loves, bad grades and parental injustices. It’s the place where we planned out our dreams after college and mapped out the places we’d travel around the world together. We even made a pact to marry a pair of twins, preferably French, so we can become legal sisters. We dreamt of conquering the world - with Bom, taking the music industry by storm and I, I will discover new ocean species. We dreamt of so much and planned for so much … we just never thought of making room for sickness, much less brain cancer.

A fresh wave of tears threatens to spill out of me so I took deep, measured breaths because I always get hiccups when I cry for too long. Bom has been silent as well and is absentmindedly running some sand between her fingers. We needed no words for we both know that there will be questions which we won’t have the answers for. Still, we couldn’t help but succumb to our tears until we couldn’t cry anymore.

After about half an hour or so, Bom broke the silence as she laughed over two seagulls fighting over a piece of seaweed. At the sound of her laughter, I realized that deep inside, I was furious. “Why didn’t you tell me?” I demanded. “You knew! You knew something was wrong, Bom, that’s why you went to America. You knew didn’t you?” I accuse her. “You must have thought I’m stupid! I was thinking you went there to have fun when you were … you were …” I was babbling, tears are blurring my vision. “How could you keep it from me? I thought I’m your best friend!?”

Bom reach for me and envelops me in a hug. “I’m sorry. I just didn’t want you to worry. I’m sorry if I didn’t tell you sooner …”

I felt like a jerk. “No. I’m sorry” I say. I know that she was just trying to protect me. She has always been the strong one, the ever reliable one. And me? I’m an idiot who only thinks of my feelings. I return her hug and then we let go. 

“I’m sorry” I say again. “I just wished that I could have been there for you, you know. I could have held your hand as you went through different tests.”

She softly laughs. “What? And have you fainting on me? I know you don’t like hospitals, Tokki.”

It’s true. I don’t like human hospitals but one for animals, I have no problem with.

“So all those trips in Seoul months ago before summer, did you already know then?”

“No” she answers. “The first doctor said that it could be stress and it’s affecting my eyes. I was already told that by the local doctor here so we asked for a second opinion. This time, they did some EEG and MRI and other tests that I couldn’t keep track of. Somehow, with all those tests after another, I had a feeling that something was wrong …” She looks at me sadly. “And then, right after the semester ended, my parents decided to go on a family trip. They didn’t tell me at first and they only told me about the main reason why we were there a day before they admitted me to Cedar-Sinai.”

“Oh, Bom” I say, squeezing her hand.

“They did another round of multiple tests until they finally decided to drill a hole in my skull for a brain sample for biopsy.” She wipes a tear and looks at me. “I hated it, Dara. I hated all the needles, all the tests, all the prodding like I was a lab rat. I wanted to go home but I had to do it for my parents. I had to be strong for them.”

“You are strong, Bom. You’re the bravest, most amazing girl I know. You’re Bominator!” I try to cheer her up, despite my tears and we laugh. “So what did the doctors say?”

Her face turns serious and looks into the now, dark ocean, with traces of the pale half moon. “Maybe 6 months to a year, if I’m lucky.”

“Okay” nodding my head, “6 months until you’re all better.”

She shakes her head slowly.

“Until you’re in remission then” I say, desperately hoping for it to be true, dreading the truth.

“Until I’m worm food” Bom says, trying to make a joke out of it.

My eyes sting anew. “Shut up. You don’t mean that.”

“You know what I’ll miss?” she looks at me, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “I’m sad to think that I won’t get to see the turtles next year.”

The beach is known as Turtle Beach because turtles come here to lay their eggs. The two of us always make sure that we’re there when the eggs hatch and watch as the baby turtles shoot up from the sand and race their way into the ocean. The sight never fails to captivate us. It’s an endless wonder of nature how they instinctively know where to go upon hatching.

“Of course you’ll see them” I countered. “What are you talking about? We’ll be here when that time comes.”

I see Bom’s expression and frankly, it terrifies me. I have never seen her looking so hopeless and looking like she has given up the fight.

“Tell you what? Why don’t we change our plans after graduation? Let’s skip a year in college and just fulfil our dream to travel the world. Who knows? Maybe we’ll even meet our twins in Paris” I smile at her.

She looks at me blankly. I hold both of her hands and squeeze them.

“Bom … please … don’t give up hope. You can overcome everything. WE can overcome everything. Don’t give up, please. Please?”

“The doctors say that there’s a slim chance for …”

“Fuck the doctors!” I interrupt. “Doctors don’t know everything … You shouldn’t believe in any statistic Bommie. This is your life we’re talking about. You will go to Berkelee College of Music and launch a singing career and when you get your Grammy’s, you’re going to thank your bestfriend  for sticking up with you all through the body pains and bullying I’ve endured for the sake of friendship.”

“You’re crazy” she says, hints of a smile showing on her face.

“You bet I am. So let’s stop this pity party and think of our future, neh?”

She seems to be having an internal debate but she finally looks at me and smiles. “Okay.” She says. “I’ll be here to see the turtles.”

“The turtles and the twins” I interjected. 

After a while, I mused. “Don’t you wish there’s a backspace button in our lives? I would backspace the time from now, back in summer and we’ll start all over.”

“I would backspace more than that” Bom says. “I would backspace this tumor in my brain to non-existence.”

I agreed.

Suddenly, a pair of deep set eyes flashed in my head. I almost forgot about Seunghyun. That would mean he would be part of what I want to erase. I met him in summer after all. I try to remember the day that we spent together and the giddiness that I was feeling before Bom’s news but I couldn’t. All I can remember is the sensation of flying on his motorcycle and how stupid it was of me to think that during the ride, I let go of my fear of death, thinking that just because we were young, we were immortals.

That night, I came home at quarter past eleven, after I sent Bom home. I saw my Mom waiting for me at the front porch and I can tell from her expression that she’s angry. I forgot to tell her that I was going out and even forgot to bring my phone.

“You better have a good reason, young lady” she greeted me.

My tear ducts seem to have an infinite supply of tears because I burst out crying and I wrapped my arms around her waist, bawling my eyes out. 

“What happened?” she asked in panic.

“OMMA!” I wailed.

“What is it? Sandara ...”

I started telling her about Bom in between hiccups. I tell her how I’m so scared of the thought of losing my bestfriend. In the end, both I and my Mom were crying. She, too, loves Bom and treats her like a daughter. That night, she tucked me into bed just like she’s done from years ago and kissed my forehead.

After she closed my bedroom door, I sat up and wrote in my Diary.

Dear Diary,

I take it back. This is the worst day ever....

*****************************

A/N:

Honestly, it took me 2 days just to write this short chapter. I had to take breaks because I always end up crying. Sniff. Sniff.

I almost gave up because I found it very painful to write the dramatic scenes as they play out in my mind like sequences from a movie. I had to restrain myself from going overboard and go overly dramatic. 

*bisous*

~mzbookworm4life