Chapter 50
At the sound of
his voice, Jane Carter shifted in her chair and opened her eyes. “Nicky,” she whispered, smiling tiredly. Rising slowly, she dragged the chair over to
his bed and sat down again. “How are you
feeling?”
“What are you
doing here?” he asked her, ignoring her question.
“What do you
mean, what am I doing here? I came to
see you, of course,” she replied matter-of-factly.
“Well, yeah, I
figured that, but… why? I mean… how did
you know I was here?”
“Brian
called. He said… uh… he said you weren’t
doing too well…” She studied her
manicured fingernails, purposely avoiding his eyes as her voice tapered off.
Nick rolled his
eyes, muttering crossly, “Brian overreacts.”
“Not by the looks
of things.”
Nick’s eyes
narrowed. “What the hell is that
supposed to mean?”
Jane glanced up
quickly, then looked away as soon as their eyes met. “I just mean that you don’t… well… you… you
don’t look good.”
Nick sighed in
disgust. “Is that the only thing you
care about? What I fucking look like? Yeah, I look like shit, okay, I know! I can’t help it – it’s the damn chemo.”
“No, I didn’t
mean it like that, I just meant-“
“Well, I lost
weight, I’m sure you’ll be happy to hear that.
Look, you see!” He tore off the
covers, exposing his body, which had thinned considerably since the last time
she had seen him. “At least now you
can’t badger me about my weight anymore.”
A hurt look
crossed his mother’s eyes, and part of him felt guilty. But secretly, another part was glad. Half of him wanted to hurt her, wanted
to make her feel bad. She had done it to
him so many times before… she deserved it, as far as he was concerned.
“Nicky-“
“Don’t call me that;
I’m not five anymore. I don’t need to be
babied, and you don’t have to come all the way to Florida, pretending to be my
mother, just because I’m sick.”
He knew he should
stop saying things like that; he was going too far, he was crossing the line. But at the moment, he didn’t care. Caught up in the moment, wanting to release
the months of pent-up anger at her, he kept firing his mouth off, not thinking,
not taking her feelings into consideration at all.
She was crying
now, silent, her head down, forehead resting against the heel of her hand. He stopped.
“Mom?” he asked, his tone softening.
She did not respond. “Mom?” he
said again. “I’m sorry. I…” He
started to go on, to apologize, to tell her he hadn’t meant most of the things
he had said, but the intense emotions seemed to have caught up with him, and he
suddenly felt extremely nauseous. Not
again, not now, he thought miserably, diving for the emesis basin. He retrieved it just in time and slanted over
it, heaving.
He could not see
much while he was doubled over, choking and retching, but all of a sudden, he
felt a hand lightly touch his back. Too
weak to pull away, he continued to throw up, allowing her to gently rub his
back. When he was done, she said softly,
“Here, let me take that” and placed the basin on the bedside table. Then she eased him back down into bed and
whispered, “Hang on just a minute.” She
left his side and went into the bathroom, where he heard water running. Then she returned, carrying a warm, damp
cloth, which she handed to him to wipe his mouth with.
“Thanks,” he
mumbled, too drained to be angry with her anymore.
She only sat back
down, and silence filled the room. It
was broken by her quiet inquiry, “How often do you throw up like that?”
“I dunno… a lot,”
he answered tiredly. “It’s no biggie;
I’m pretty much used to it by now.”
This, of course, was far from true, but he couldn’t let her know
that. He was a grown man; he couldn’t be
bitching and whining about throwing up.
That would only make her worry more, if indeed she really was concerned
about him. He kind of figured she had to
be though, to come all the way from California.
Either that or this was all some publicity stunt. He tried to push that possibility far from
his mind and be optimistic.
“Oh, baby…” Jane
whispered, her voice filled with sorrow.
Gingerly, she reached out and touched his bare left shin. Running her fingers lightly over his skin,
she said, “So this is where it all started, huh?”
“Yup.”
“How does your
leg feel? Does it hurt?”
“Yeah. It still hurts to walk on it, and it throbs
sometimes, you know. I got pain meds for
that though, and they help.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah.”
The small talk
diminished, and Jane sat back in her chair, nervously biting her lip, not
knowing what to say. Racking his brain,
Nick asked casually, “So, how’s the rest of the family? They’re all still in Cali, right?”
“Yeah, they
stayed behind this time,” replied Jane.
“I thought it would be better if maybe I just came to see you at
first. But if you want them to come-“
“No, not now,”
Nick interrupted quickly. “They don’t
need to see me like this… ‘specially the kids, you know. Aaron and Angel. It’ll probably freak ‘em out.”
Jane nodded. “I think your brother’s plenty freaked out
already.”
“Is he?” Nick felt bad, wishing he’d called Aaron,
talked to him about this. The last time
he had heard from his brother was before the TRL appearance, before the whole
world found out about his cancer.
“Yeah… he doesn’t
really talk about it though. You know
boys – never want to share their emotions.”
Nick smiled. Well, that was definitely true. “I’ll call him sometime, when I’m feeling a
little better,” Nick promised.
“And when will
that be? When will you get out of here?”
Jane wondered.
“Probably tomorrow
morning. I’m just in here so they can
test the new chemo.”
“Yes, that’s what
Brian told me. Well, that’s good.”
“Yeah.”
Again, they
drifted off into silence. For the past
few years, Nick’s relationship with his mother had been strained at best, so
this conversation was really not much different from the usual ones. Small talk or arguing – that’s usually what
their conversations consisted of. At
least the cancer hadn’t changed that.
Nick only hoped that maybe, somehow, his being sick would help bring
them back together, repair their broken relationship.
Their broken
relationship… it seemed everything in his life was broken these days… even his
life itself. Nothing was going right
anymore. There was a time, just a few
months ago, when he had been on top of the world. Now his love life was nonexistent, his family
ties were frayed, he felt suffocated by his bandmates and separated from his
other friends… not to mention, he was suffering from a life-threatening
illness. His whole world was crashing
down, falling apart. Breaking.
Could it ever be
fixed?
***