Some Kind of Normal

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Published by NorLightsPress at Smashwords

Copyright (C) 2009 by Heidi Willis

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To Todd

I love you more today than yesterday...

~~~~

I ain't one to bash being healthy, but it sure takes
the fun out of living. My motivation to be the perfect mom starts
about six a.m. when I swing my legs over the bed and ends fifteen
minutes later when I stumble into the kitchen to make coffee and
figure out what I can cook for breakfast that won't kill no
one.

It wasn't always like this. I followed my own mama's
footsteps for years, laying out a spread that included all four
types of meat, and grits with cream and brown sugar if Travis was
lucky. But during Travis's mid-life physical, his doctor told him
my daily ham with sausage gravy on biscuits was driving him to an
early grave. He slid the lab results across his desk at me,
claiming Travis's LDL numbers were higher than a crackhead's. I
said if a crackhead had my sausage gravy he'd give up the crack and
rather die of plugged arteries. He didn't laugh. We switched to
eggs and toast.

Then when Logan was young enough to run around
bare-tushed, he developed hives and a tendency to up-chuck. His
pediatrician pointed to the milk we poured on his Cocoa Crispies
each morning.
Who
the Sam Hill is allergic to milk
, I asked. We switched to
Pop Tarts and apple juice anyway.

But now Travis's doctor don't want him having the fat
in the pop tarts, and all Logan wants is Coke and Twizzlers, and
Ashley can't make it downstairs in time to eat anything. So every
morning I stare bleary eyed at the pantry wondering what to feed my
family that won't kill them, and all I come up with is bagels and
orange juice.

'Course, they're white bagels, not those whole wheat
ones with all those grains in them, and I slather them in butter
and honey 'cause they ain't got no taste otherwise. And the orange
juice is really Sunny D, which I know is mostly water and corn
syrup, but it's got all that vitamin c in it so it must be some
kind of healthy.

"Ashley," I yell, walking down the hall tossing a Pop
Tart package on Logan's bed as I pass. "Time to get up." I knock on
her door. No answer. I know she's not in the bathroom because I can
hear Logan drumming on the sink in there with his hairbrush and
comb. I knock again, but there's no answer. I do the thing no mom
of teenagers should do: I open the door without invitation.

She's dead asleep, a bottle of water and a stuffed
armadillo she got at the state fair last year tucked under her
covers. "Jiminy, Ash, the bus is going to come in less than half an
hour." I pull the covers off her but she don't move. I got no time
for laziness this morning. I shake her hard. "Get up."

She moans and rolls over. I'm not sure why God saw
fit to give morning people like me and Travis a child who can't
function like a human being until past ten. I grab her ankles and
pull them over the side of the bed. "This is ridiculous. You were
better when you were a baby."

"That's 'cause I slept twenty hours a day," she
mutters, and I know she's awake.

"Get dressed. You can eat breakfast on the bus."

"I'm not hungry. I think I'm still sick."

"You're over the flu two days ago. The doctor said.
Time to get back into the swing of things," I say over my shoulder
as I leave.

When I check on Ashley twenty minutes later, she's
dressed and sitting in front of her mirror brushing out her long
hair very slowly. Her eyes are barely open. "I got you a bagel
ready," I say. "And some Sunny D. You want it now?"

"Just water," she answers, holding out her empty
bottle. I hesitate. "You need something more than that, Ash. You're
shriveling up into almost nothing." She gives me a look that
withers. I hold up my hands in surrender. "Okay. Water now. Bagel
and juice for the bus." Who the Sam Hill drinks water for
breakfast?

She turns back to the mirror and goes back to the
brushing, her arm weighted like the brush is too heavy to hold
easily. I try to see her for a minute like the little girl I knew
so well, but she's not there anymore. This girl has sprouted up
faster than a chain link cactus, the tallest twelve-year-old in her
class, and I hate puberty for causing my baby to become this young
woman I don't know. I go back to the kitchen and spread butter and
honey on the bagel, sun starting to filter in through the front
window.

Travis pops his head in the doorway. "I'll take Logan
on to school," he says, clipping up his overalls over his flannel
shirt. "I gotta get to the construction site early." I nod over my
coffee and hear the back door slam shut. The truck growls loudly
and I can see them pull out of the driveway, Logan happily munching
on a Twizzler. I finish off the coffee and go back to check on
Ashley.

She's trying to get her hair in a ponytail and acting
like her arms weigh a hundred pounds. I take the brush and finish
for her. She don't complain about me doing it, which strikes me as
odd. "You that tired?" I ask.

She shrugs. It's her new favorite communication.

I sigh. That's mine. "Okay. Tonight it's earlier to
bed. Let's go or you'll miss the bus."

She almost makes it out the door on time except she
runs back to go pee. "You're gonna be late," I say through the
door. "You wouldn't have to pee so much if you didn't drink thirty
gallons of water every morning." She gives me a look as she opens
the door and pushes past me. I don't think I've gotten ten words
out of her this morning.

I hear the bus honking at the end of the drive as
she's shoving her algebra book in her bag and flinging it over her
shoulder. She tries to drain the rest of her water on the way out
the door, but I grab it from her and hand her the bagel and Sunny
D. "It's healthier," I say.

"I'm not hungry," she protests.

"I ain't sending no child of mine off to school
without something in her belly." I press it into her hand and she
takes it, but not happy.

She scowls at me and half-jogs down our long driveway
where the bus is honking again. I yell at her to remember her flute
lessons after school, but she's already too far to hear. I see her
slow down before she gets to the bus, the jog becoming a walk, the
walk becoming a stop as she leans over panting. And then she
topples over. Just like that.

~~~~

By the time I huff and puff my way down the driveway,
the bus driver has already called 911 and is alternately kneeling
by Ashley like he might CPR her and trying to keep the other kids
from getting off the bus. Some pull the windows down and lean out,
their faces mostly pinched up and worried, although some look just
curious.

I kneel down and pat her face. It's purplish and pale
at the same time. "Ashley, darling. Wake up. It's Mama, now. If
you're that tired you can stay home." I know this is stupid. It
isn't as if she just decided to lie down and take a nap in the
dirt.

"I don't know what happened, Mrs. Babcock. She was
fine, then she fell over."

"I know. I saw."

"The ambulance is coming." He looks awkward, glancing
back and forth between Ashley and all her friends, trying not to
look at his watch; I know he's worried he'll be late to school. I
want to tell him to go on, get the other kids out of here, but
Travis is already at work and Logan left for school a half hour
earlier, and I don't know what to do. I silently curse Travis for
talking me out of that nice suburban house and into this
ranch-in-a-hay-field.

I slip the straps of her backpack off her shoulders
and push it aside. The Sunny D and the bagel are tucked under her
body, and I roll her on her back away from them. "Can you get the
water bottle I dropped by the porch?" He nods and scoots off to
find it.

When Gus the driver gets back from the house, I'm
sitting in the dirt with Ashley's head on my lap, stroking her long
hair out of her face and wondering if maybe God is punishing me for
the cigarettes I hide in my sock drawer. He hands me the water, and
I wiggle her head a bit trying to get her to open her eyes.

"Ashley, now, wake up." I dribble the water over her
lips a little and watch it run down her chin. I think I see her
eyes flutter as a Buick pulls up behind the bus.

A lady I recognize from the beauty parlor gets out,
looking like she's going off to a high-society social. A surly girl
slithers out after her.

"Thank goodness. I thought we'd missed the bus this
morning. I was afraid I'd have to take Chelsea in myself, and I
just don't have time for that today. Are we having mechanical
problems?" She comes around enough to see me sitting on the ground
with my baby in my arms, and she stops suddenly, throwing out her
arm and blocking her daughter from getting closer, too, as if we
have some disease.

"What's wrong with her? Is she having a fit?"

"Of course not!" I have no idea what's wrong with
Ashley, but I'm sure it isn't whatever this lady would like to
think she has. I focus on Ashley and hold her tighter. "Come on
Baby, take a little drink." I dribble more water, hoping I'm not
drowning her. Her eyelids flutter and beneath them, I see her eyes
rolled back.

"Go," I say to everyone. "The medics will be here.
You ain't doing nothing anyway. Just get on to school so the kids
don't miss nothing, and you tell them Ashley'll be on in
later."

I don't see the expressions passed between them, but
I know they're there. They're weighing moral obligation with the
strong desire to leave. Their selfish side wins out. The surly kid
climbs on the bus, and they all drive away. In the back window of
the bus I see a couple kids with their noses pressed against the
glass, unable to take their eyes off us.

I hear the ambulance, the siren wailing like my heart
feels. I hear it far away and then getting closer until I see the
lights red on the horizon. Ashley hears it too. Her eyes flutter
open again, and this time she strains to focus on me, the pupils
floating in and out, smaller and bigger, until she gives up and
closes them again. She sighs a shallow breath, then again.

She begins to shake, small shivers turning into
bigger ones, 'til I can barely hold her. Then, quick as they come,
they leave, and she's still again. A tiny sigh again.

Three men are suddenly beside me, a stretcher on the
ground and a heavy metal box I assume is the equivalent of the
doctor's little black bag. I seen stuff like this in movies, where
paramedics do all sorts of operations and life-saving stuff with
the tools in the box. One man is kneeling, offering to take
Ashley's head from me, but I hold on tighter.

"What happened, ma'am?" Ma'am is one of the most
common words in the Texas language, a reflection of a good southern
upbringing; but when he says it, it sounds condescending.

"She fell over on her way to catch the bus." I see
them look around for the nonexistent bus. "It was here, but I told
them to go on to school."

"Did she hit her head when she fell?" He has his
fingers on her neck, feeling for the same pulse I first heard
twelve years ago in the OB's office, all static-y and beautiful,
beating loud through a microphone the doctor moved over my
belly.

"No. I don't think so. She kinda fell on her knees
first. I suppose she musta hit her head, though, 'cause I didn't
see her break her fall with her hands. But it wasn't hard or
anything. Almost like she was just lying down."

"Did she trip?"

"No. She just fell over." I see them checking for
broken bones, but I know the problem isn't her falling down; it's
why she fell down. "She's been tired lately. She had the flu a
while back, and since then she's been hardly even eating. Drinking
a lot, but not eating hardly a thing, so maybe she's needing
nourishment." I see the two pass looks. "She seized too," I add,
though I don't want to. "Just now."

"You know it was a seizure?"

I nod. "My cousin has epilepsy. I seen them before."
My heart suddenly skips a beat. "You don't think she has that, do
you?"
Oh God,
I pray,
don't let
her have that.