Page 17 of How to Walk Away

“We took two full skin grafts from just under your collarbones,” he pointed at the large dressing that was taped there, and I noticed it, really, for the first time. “You’ll keep that dressing on about five more days, and then we’ll just let it air dry. It’ll scab up and heal. It’ll leave a scar, ofcourse, but once the skin has grown back, there are ointments to help it fade. In ten years, you won’t even see it.”

Ten years! If I’d been drinking a beverage, I would have spit it right out.

He went on, unperturbed. “We used full skin on the front of the neck, and partial over the back trapezius area, so there will be more scarring there. Partial leaves a more mottled appearance. But you can cover some of that with hair.” He smiled. “No more ponytails.”

“Why is there no bandage on the graft?” I asked.

“Once it ‘takes’ we like to let it air, and just keep Silvadene ointment on it. It doesn’t need to be covered. But you will have to go sleeveless on that side for a good while. Just buy some cheap T-shirts and cut the neck and left sleeve off.” He chuckled. “Kind of Tarzan and Jane.”

My mother was not amused. “What about the face?”

My eyes widened.The face?I didn’t remember anything about ‘the face.’

The doctor looked over at my mom like he hadn’t noticed she was there. Then, to me: “Bet it’s nice to have your mom here.”

“Sort of,” I said.

She went on, in a stage whisper, “I can’t even look at her,” and now that she mentioned it, I noticed that was true.

“The face is all second-degree,” the doc said. “It’s going to blister and scab and itch like hell—but if she doesn’t scratch, there should be minimal scarring. Should heal up in about three weeks.”

My mom was a stickler for details. “Does ‘minimal scarring’ meannoscarring?”

But she was being too greedy. “I never make promises,” the doctor said, finishing up on the computer and rolling the cart away. “We’ll do our best, and we’ll hope that’s enough.”

After he left, it was dead quiet. This room had nothing of the mind-vibrating cacophony of the ICU. Just the white noise of the A/C vent, and the uncomfortable echoes of everything my mom had just said. Then, suddenly, the shuddery breaths of her crying.

I looked over. She had turned toward the window, arms clutched tight at her waist.

“Mom, stop it,” I said.

“You’re going to be just fine,” she told me, like the opposite.

“Pull it together, please, Mom.” I closed my eyes again. So tired.

“You wereperfect,” she said then. “No wonder Chip is too sick to come.”

My mom had a remarkable talent for making things worse. She could always find the downside. And she had no filter, so once she found it, everybody else had to find it, too.

“You know what?” I said then. “I’m pretty exhausted.”

But she wasn’t done. “You had your whole life ahead of you.”

So. The opposite of comforting, really.

“I’ve read the statistics,” she went on, “about what something like this does to a relationship.”

“Mom—”

“Guess what? Women don’t leave men, but men do leave women.”

“Chip is not going to leave me, Mom.” Ridiculous wasn’t even a big enough word for how ridiculous that was.

“No,” she said, turning to face me. “No, he’s not. Because we are going to fix you.”

I knew that look on her face far too well.

“God did not give me all this strength for nothing,” she went on. “You’ll recover, darling girl. We will put you back as good as new. I’ve already got a file folder as fat as a brick with articles on miraculous recoveries and people who’ve defied all their grim diagnoses.”

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