Page 14 of Being Julia

“It’s almost dinner time. Do you want me to bring you something up?” he asked.

“No. I’m not hungry, but thanks,” I said as I hugged him.

“I’m really sorry this happened, Julia.”

“I know you are, baby brother. I think I’m going to take ashower. Could you please do me a favor and text London and tell her what happened?”

“Sure, I’ll do that right now.”

I got up from the bed and decided to take a bath instead. I started the water and poured a capful of bubbles under the stream. I climbed in and lay back, letting the hot water soothe my body. I closed my eyes as the tears fell down my face once again. I was thinking about everything that had happened when I heard the bathroom door open, and my mom whispered my name.

“Get out. I don’t want to talk to you,” I cried.

“I’m sorry, but I’m not leaving. I’m your mom, and you’re going to talk to me whether you want to or not,” she said as she sat down on the floor next to the tub.

“Please just go away and leave me alone,” I whispered.

My mom took my hand, turned it over, and softly rubbed my wrist.

“The tattoos on my wrists cover the scars of my attempted suicide when I was your age.”

I opened my eyes and looked at her, horrified by what she had just told me.

“Mom.”

“I guess it’s time you knew about my past. You already know that my mom died when I was a little girl, and I’ve told you how hard it was on your grandfather. I was diagnosed with cancer on my sixteenth birthday.”

My heart felt like it stopped beating when my mom said that. I had no idea that she’d been sick or attempted suicide.

“Mom,” I said, putting my hand on her cheek.

She took my hand and pressed my palm against her lips as she softly smiled.

“I couldn’t let your grandfather go through that again, so I thought it was best that I spared him the pain. I figured itwould be easier for him to get over my death than to see me so sick and die.”

“How could you think that?” I asked as tears swelled in my eyes.

“Because I was sixteen years old. He became an alcoholic because of what happened to my mother. Anyway, he came home one night, found me, and called an ambulance. The doctors saved me, and I went through a year of chemo and went into remission.”

The tears in my eyes fell quickly as I stared into my mother’s eyes. They were full of sadness and despair as she told her heart-wrenching story. She handed me a towel and said that if I stayed any longer in the bath, I’d turn into a prune. She walked out of the bathroom and told me she’d wait for me to get dressed. As I stepped out of the tub, I wrapped the towel around me and looked at myself in the mirror. I started to believe that there was more to my mom and her past that I didn’t know about. I put on my robe, walked into my bedroom, and sat on the bed next to her. I grabbed her hand and turned it over, staring at the tattoo of my father’s name on her wrist.

“Your dad got kicked out of a club for being so drunk that he was causing a scene. I had already noticed him that night, and when I walked outside to get some fresh air, he was sitting up against the brick wall. I hailed a cab, helped him into it, and took him home.”

“Mom, that’s dangerous. Even I know better than that.”

She smiled at me and kissed the side of my head. “You sound like your father. He got sick all over his clothes when I brought him here to the penthouse, and I couldn’t let him sit in his own vomit all night, so I undressed him and made sure he was safe in his bed. When I checked on him one last time before I left, he was on his back, so I rolled him on his sideand sat next to him all night to ensure he didn’t throw up again. That’s how your grandfather died. He choked to death on his own vomit. I fell asleep, and it was morning when I woke up.”

I lay down on my back, and my mom lay beside me.

“What did Dad say when he woke up and found you lying next to him?”

“I wanted to get out of the penthouse before he woke up, so I went down to the kitchen, made a pot of coffee, and my famous hangover cocktail. I was going to leave a note with the drink when he came into the kitchen and scared the shit of me.”

“What did he say to you?” I asked.

She looked over at me and smiled. “Your father had a list of rules and thought I had broken one of them.”

“That’s weird. What kind of rules did he have?”

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