Crying is Forbidden
Toby Tucker Hecht
The summer before I entered high school, everything went out of my head, except the desperation of finding a way to change the trajectory of my life. I would no longer tolerate being one of those invisible kids: not spoken to unless absolutely necessary and then only in sarcastic, bullying tones; never picked for teams or sat with at lunch period; and consigned day after day to walking home alone to do homework at the kitchen table while other kids grouped up to hang out at the mall. Of course, teachers spoke with me, but that didn’t count. And I could have had friends, kids who were just like me—plain, gawky, and ignored—but I didn’t want to be in a losers’ club, to feel like a lesser human being by reflection. I wanted to be a focal point, a person who mattered.
If you’ve ever been in my situation, marginalized and therefore insignificant, you know that adults are completely useless at giving advice. My own mother, who if she were my age would fit perfectly into my uneasy world, had said on more than one occasion, “They’re just jealous because you’re so smart.” I knew this wasn’t true because I attended a magnet school where everyone was smart. And: “Try being more outgoing.” My mother probably forgot the cold stares, or worse, the caustic lobs, that greet unwelcome comments eagerly served into closed teen circles. That fall, as I was about to begin again in a new school, I wanted to crack open those circles and wedge myself inside.
The entry, I figured, was through Lily Aoki, a girl who had been in my class for as long as I could remember. We lived in the same apartment building and our mothers were on a first name basis, but until that summer Lily and I had barely acknowledged each other’s presence. She was, in so many ways, the center of our school’s universe. She would be my ticket.
The previous semester had ended in the midst of a heat wave so lengthy and draining that air-conditioner units failed in many of the classrooms. The county posted a “code red” air quality alert, and students stayed home, playing computer games and catching up on sleep. Final exams were cancelled. By that time, Lily had already missed four weeks of school. At first, the buzz was that she had a flu-like virus, and then that she had mononucleosis. Everyone in homeroom class made her get-well cards, most with pictures of ballerinas, since Lily was a dancer, who at nearly fifteen already had an impressive resume of appearances with regional dance companies and was waiting to hear about a spot in a prestigious New York ballet school.
I asked my mother, who was a doctor, what was going on with Lily, and she told me that Lily had cancer, that she was getting treatments, and would probably do well—most children with her disease recovered. But it was a long, arduous process. I waited for her to say more, but she didn’t, and I didn’t know then what questions to ask.
I didn’t have plans to leave town over the summer. It was just me and my mother, who couldn’t get away from the clinic where she worked as a gynecologist for indigent women. It was my first summer without a babysitter and with a key of my own, which I wore on a lanyard around my neck. I’d been looking forward to the freedom of it. We didn’t have cable or video games, but our apartment house did have a swimming pool with a lifeguard, and was walking distance to a library and an ice cream parlor, so the only thing that could have been better was having a friend with whom to while away the time.
I knew for my idea to work, I needed to enlist my mother’s help. I waited until an evening when she wasn’t overly tired from her packed schedule of clinic patients. We sat on the sofa, her swollen feet propped up on the coffee table, each of us drinking sweetened iced tea. An exhaust fan, set into the window, droned and created a breeze. My mother was in a good mood. One of her cases had resolved well and she went on that evening about the nobility of the medical profession, a theme that ran like an electric current throughout our lives together, mostly because her work was the only life my mother apparently had, but also because I believed she was gearing me up for such a life, too.
“Do you think Lily would like visitors?” I asked. My voice sounded strange, rehearsed. My mother turned and stared at me for a moment before responding.
“Yes, I imagine she would. It must be lonely being sick and not in the hubbub of the life she was used to.” I nodded. I suspected my mother knew about my own loneliness and lack of hubbub, but since she was helpless to do anything about it, she kept silent. She smiled and said. “I’m proud of you, Dana. I’ll ask Lily’s mother.”
Lily lived two flights above me, but in a larger unit. We were the only two students I knew at school who lived in an apartment; everyone else lived in single-family homes or townhouses. We had something else in common, too. We both lived with one parent. My father died of heart failure when I was four. I had no memory of him at all. He was twenty-five years older than my mother—her surgery professor in medical school. Lily’s father was alive, but never home. According to my mother, he lived in Japan where he was a wealthy businessman. He visited when he could get away, which wasn’t very often. Lily’s mother was an actress, and like my mother, had an erratic schedule. Because of her dinner theater performances, rehearsals, auditions, and commercial shoots in New York, an unrelated woman, Mrs. Dorsey, a nanny of sorts, lived with Lily Aoki and her glamorous mother, known by the stage name of Kate Kensington.
I stood outside her apartment door trying to decide if I should knock or ring the bell. My mother had first talked with Lily’s mother and then set up a time with Mrs. Dorsey, so I knew I was expected. I tapped lightly. The woman who opened the door smiled and led me into a living room not unlike my own, except that there was hardly a spot on the walls or a surface that wasn’t jammed with photographs of Lily in a dance recital or her mother in one of her performances. It reminded me of the lobby of a restaurant my mother took me to once when we were in the New York theater district. At first, I didn’t see Lily. Despite the warmth of the day, she was on the sofa under a fleece throw. Her head was wrapped in a pink and violet batik scarf. Her lovely long dark hair was gone, her face milky pale. A graceful, but thin arm lay on top of the covers. She looked like a heroine in the last act of an opera—beautiful, but sickly. The room had a stale smell, as though the air had not circulated through it in a long time. And there was something else besides the mustiness—a vague odor, both sweet and metallic and just beyond what I could name.
“Hi,” I said. I didn’t think I needed to introduce myself, but it was an uncomfortable moment as the only words we’d ever exchanged were in the elevator when it was even more awkward not to speak. She stared at me for a long time in silence, as though my being there, in her apartment, despite my mother having made the arrangements, was a mystery.
I handed her the book of crossword puzzles my mother bought for her, but that now seemed inappropriate and geeky.
She looked at the gift, then at me, and both of us burst out laughing. “Mom,” I said.
“Yes,” she said. “They really can be clueless. Kate is just as bad.” I tried not to show surprise at her using her mother’s first name. This, to me, was the height of sophistication. I could not imagine calling my mother Irene, or even Doc.
“Are you feeling better?”
“Some days. But I don’t want to talk about it.”
She didn’t ask me to sit, but I pulled up a chair next to the sofa and did.
“Tell me something—something I’d be happy to hear.”
I had no news about her crowd and anything about myself would be too boring to discuss, so I said, “The lifeguard this summer is seriously cute.”
“Really? Interesting! Tell me more.”
So, I did: how his butt looked in his bathing suit and what kind of music he played while he sat in the chair by the pool. “And besides that, he seems nice,” I said. “He gives the little kids swimming lessons on the weekends for free.”
Lily listened for a while and then looked at the clock on the mantelpiece and said, “I need you to go now.”
I assumed her cool friends would be arriving and she didn’t want me around, so I stood up to leave.
“I get tired very easily,” Lily said. “But it’s nice having company. Come back again.”
During the week, I tried to do some research about Lily’s illness on my computer and then at the library, but I had no real information to start with and my mother was mum, saying only, “She’s in good medical hands. You just be a pal.” That was what I intended to become. My first year in high school—my life from now on, in fact—would be vastly different with Lily as a friend.
At first, we didn’t talk about anything significant when I stopped by Lily’s apartment. In fact, Lily said very little. Once I brought a board game, but she seemed too distracted to play, so we went into her bedroom and looked through a picture album of her mother’s and then one of hers from when she danced the role of Clara in The Nutcracker in Washington, DC. From time to time, I glanced at her computer on which a screensaver floated the words, CRYING IS FORBIDDEN, back and forth, in neon-colored capital letters. Seeing this made me want to cry, but I took deep breaths and continued commenting on the photographs.
During these visits, I didn’t run into any of the in-crowd who’d swarmed around her when she was bursting with health and beauty. The phone did ring, occasionally, but it was her mother, and the conversations were short inquiries about how Lily was feeling and what she was doing. Mrs. Dorsey was kind and brought cookies and lemonade, but Lily had no appetite, and once or twice she threw up while I was there.
“Strange,” she said. “I’m not embarrassed getting sick in front of you. I wonder why.”
“I guess because my mom’s a doctor,” I said. But it was equally probable that whatever I thought didn’t matter.
“Do you think you’ll be a doctor, too?” she said. It was the first time she asked anything directly about me.
“I might.”
“Maybe you’ll be an oncologist,” she said. “Then you could find a cure for rhabdomyosarcoma.” She pronounced the word as fluidly as though she’d been saying it every day her entire life.
“Maybe I will,” I said. “Is there anything you feel like eating?”
“Not really. Everything tastes funny. But this is wild—I have dreams about peach ice cream. I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to eat it, though.”
For a week or so, I wasn’t able to visit because of Lily’s treatments, which were starting up again after a rest period. I hung out at the pool, stretched out on a lawn chair reading the books on my reading list for the fall semester. But mostly, I watched the lifeguard, Brent. He was a boy of about nineteen, maybe a college student, who sat in his designated chair staring into space, listening to music, and looking hot and bored. He had almost nothing to do. Most adults from the apartment complex were at work. Those who braved the heat were mostly senior citizens who sat at the edge of the water, dangling their legs, and a few mothers with toddlers, who splashed in the kiddie-pool before having to go upstairs to take naps. It would have been natural to strike up a conversation with him, but he was muscular and tan, like a surfer boy, with his blond hair flopping over his eyes and his swim trucks slipping down to reveal paler skin on his hips, and I didn’t have the nerve. Besides, what would I say, “Read any James Baldwin lately?” Even the young mothers looked him up and down and whispered among themselves. That night in bed, I touched myself all over and imagined stroking Brent, especially the fair, soft hair on his chest and thighs. I felt a pulsating ache between my legs and then finally a release. I wondered if any boy would ever find something in me to like.
When Lily felt better, I brought her a pint of peach ice cream from the store down the block.
“Thought this might cheer you up,” I said. She looked much worse. The treatments had taken a toll. Her eyes looked sunken and there were scabs around her mouth.
Lily smiled and said, “Mrs. Dorsey, will you please bring a dish and a spoon for Dana?”
“Please Lily, it’s for you. Try to eat some of it.”
“I can’t.”
“It’s not from my mother. It’s from my allowance.”
And then she did eat it. Slowly at first, taking tiny careful spoonfuls. When she had enough, she said, “You know, you’re awfully nice.”
“Not really.”
“Why are you so nice? You hardly know me.”
“Because if I were sick, I would want someone to be nice to me, too.”
The next time I visited Lily, I found her in bed. Her eyes were closed and she clutched a pair of toe shoes, winding the pink ribbons around her fist. There were post-it stickers all over her room—at least a dozen—that said CRYING IS FORBIDDEN. I said her name and she sat up.
“Here,” she said, handing me a letter. “Read it.” I unfolded the paper and read the unconditional acceptance to the New York ballet school that Lily had her heart set on.
“That’s wonderful,” I said. “I’m sure they’ll hold your place until you’re well, even if you have to put off going until next year.” She looked at me, as though I had said I could defy gravity.
“It doesn’t work like that. The school is incredibly competitive. There are hundreds of girls vying to get in. My spot will be grabbed up as soon as I say I can’t come now. Besides, look at me.” She extended her legs for me to see. They looked limp and bruised. “I have no energy to do a simple arabesque or a jeté. And I certainly couldn’t go en pointe. My life in ballet is over. My life is over.”
“No, it’s not. Your life’s just beginning. You’re Lily Aoki. Every girl in our school wants to be you. You’ll beat this cancer. And your life will be perfect, again.”
“That’s a lovely speech, Dana. My life, so far, has been built on hard work and lies. Nothing perfect about it.”
I understood about the hard work. Lily trained for hours at the dance studio and often when she landed parts in ballets she had tutors to keep her up to date with school assignments, but I had no idea what she meant by lies.
“I know I can trust you,” she said. “I knew it from the moment you first visited, out of the blue, that you were a true person who wouldn’t betray me. I’ve never told another living soul, but I must tell you something now. Come closer so I don’t have to raise my voice. Mrs. Dorsey has supersonic hearing.”
My mother had told me not to get too close to Lily because she was more susceptible to germs than most people. But I got onto the bed with her anyway.
“To start with—my name, Aoki, that’s a lie. It’s a fairly common name in Japan and that’s why my mother chose it so no one could trace my supposed roots.”
I waited; the room was still.
“When Kate was twenty-three, and still known to her family and friends as Bonnie Bernstein, she had a part as a hooker in an off-Broadway show. A Japanese dignitary, visiting New York, was in the audience and was smitten with her, so much so, that after the show he summoned her to his room at the Plaza where he made her call the theater to say she was sick, and stay with him night and day for an entire week, until he left for home and his family.”
“Did he leave his wife for her?”
“Of course not. He didn’t love her. He just wanted a good time with a ripe young body,” she said. “He did give her an emerald bracelet with an unsigned note that said: A token of my esteem. He also left her pregnant with me.”
“But he’s your father and he comes to see you. Right?”
“I’ve never seen or heard from him. My mother tracked him down through the embassy and they had a talk. He wires her child support every month. Hush money, I think it’s called. It comes as long as there’s no more contact or accusations.”
“Shouldn’t he know about your illness?”
“I don’t exist for him. If I tried to find him the money would stop. It pays for all of this,” she waved her hand in a sweeping gesture, “and, of course, in part for my treatments. Kate’s health insurance is pitiful.”
“And you’ve never told anyone?”
“Just you. Because you’re a real friend and because you’re growing up without a father, too.”
I stood up, crossed the room, and pulled one of the sticky notes from the closet door. “You’re very brave. I cry all the time. I’m terribly lonely.”
“I feel like crying, too. But I don’t. It never helps.”
Lily’s cordless phone rang.
“Hi Sofia,” she said. I held my breath. Sofia was one of the girls I avoided. She was the worst of the worst. Once she pushed me into a glass door and said, “Too bad it didn’t break. Then you could have had plastic surgery on your ugly nose.”
“Hey, what’s up? You better yet? You’re missing out on all the fun,” Sofia said. Her voice was loud and I could hear everything through the phone receiver.
“Just chilling here,” Lily said.
“I should be going,” I said. I stuck the sticky note back on the closet.
“Someone with you?” Sofia asked.
“Dana,” Lily said.
“Dana?” Sofia said. “You mean that dork who lives in your apartment house? What’s she doing there? Bummer! Get rid of her. I got tons of dirt to share.”
“Love to hear it, but listen, something’s just come up—you know, about dance—and I have to go,” Lily said. “I’ll call you back later.”
“Whatever. Just make sure that creep isn’t around.” Then she hung up.
I had no idea if Lily knew I’d heard the entire conversation. I waited to hear what she would say. It was a long wait. I watched her put away her dance shoes and return the acceptance letter to the envelope it came in. Then she sat down again on the bed. She looked more than tired; she looked defeated. I started to leave.
But then she said, “I’m sorry. She’s awful.”
“Awful? I thought she was your best friend,” I said.
She smiled, but her eyes were sad. “You and I have a lot in common,” she said.
“I would never be friendly with such a mean person.”
“You might. We all cozy up to people for a reason, don’t we?” Lily would not release her stare.
I didn’t want to hear more. I needed to escape. Lily had laid my secret out in the open where my selfish motives could be dissected and analyzed. And yet, I was confused. I couldn’t imagine in what way Lily was using Sofia. Lily was the one with star power. Sofia was a nothing. A rich nothing with a lot of family connections, but still, very ordinary.
“I’m going,” I said, getting up. “I hope you feel better.”
I thought about Lily and her friends for the next few days. What was it that Lily needed from them? And how could these cruel but popular girls give it to her? I had learned the word symbiosis in my biology class and wondered if this was a case of each person giving and getting something crucial from the other. Although I was horribly embarrassed and considered staying away, by the end of the week, curiosity won out. I was greeted at the door by Mrs. Dorsey. She told me that Lily was not feeling well, but it was all right to come in if I stayed for only a few minutes.
Lily was in bed. Her skin looked chalky and her brown eyes were dull.
“I’m glad you came back. I have something I need to tell you. Something important. Come close.”
I sat down on Lily’s bed. She took my hand. Her arm had bluish blotches.
“Now listen carefully and don’t say a thing until I’m done.”
I was sure she was about to finish the conversation we had started saying that she would never have had her status at school if it weren’t for those so-called friends. Of course, she was wrong, but I would let her go on and then I would explain the truth to her. That would cement our friendship.
“Dana, I’m dying. Probably within weeks it will all be over.” she said. “Right from the beginning, I knew I was in a high-risk group. The treatments aren’t working anymore and there’s nothing left to try. Kate knows it, and that’s why she’s taking a leave from work in New York to be with me. She’ll be here by the end of the week. But she doesn’t know that I know the worst. She told me she was bored and needed a break. She’s conniving with Mrs. Dorsey, who also knows, and is already looking for another job. I overheard a phone call. All this deception is stressful and unfair.”
I thought of Lily’s notes: Crying is forbidden, and so I didn’t. But I trembled so fiercely that my eyes couldn’t focus. I swallowed hard and could feel thick tears sliding down the back of my throat.
“I’m not being dramatic, if that’s what you’re thinking. The oncologist told me a few days ago. I asked him a direct question and got an answer. I was relieved that finally someone told me the truth. No more treatments.”
I was stunned. Why didn’t my mother tell me that this might happen? She was so optimistic. But she should have known. Why were adults such liars? I reached out and took Lily in my arms. “I’ll be here for you” I said. “Anything you want. Just say. We haven’t been friends for long, but my heart is breaking as if we were sisters.” And I meant every word. I loved Lily. I saw that now. I wanted her to live, but no longer for my sake.
“I’ve been lucky in some ways, getting to do things that most people never do in a regular lifetime,” Lily said. “But, I never had a father, or any man in my life, and my mother—well, I never expected much from Kate. Her career always came first. And I wonder, if I hadn’t gotten cancer, whether I would have turned out like her. You know, until you came around, I never had friends who really cared about me and made me feel like a normal girl. And you do, and that makes me happy.”
“Being your friend has made me happy, too,” I said. “Lily, please don’t give up. There must be other things to try. My mother always talks about clinical trials for her patients. Couldn’t you get into one?”
“Oh, Dana! If only.” She got out of her bed and limped around the room, deep in thought. I could see she was in pain. Then she said, “I wish I’d had a boyfriend—to know what it’s like. I’ve been thinking about that. To be close enough to smell him and maybe even to be kissed. A lot of girls our age have already had that, but I never did.”
“Me neither,” I said. “I sometimes wonder if any boy will ever like me.”
“Believe me, someone will—a smart, successful man who thinks you’re wonderful. You have so much time for that.” She got back into bed and pulled the covers over her shoulders. “Do you think you might sleep over here one night soon, maybe when my mother gets here? There’s a pull-out bed beneath this one. I don’t think Kate will mind. I don’t want to be alone with just the adults.”
“I’ll ask my mother,” I said. “I don’t want you to be alone, either.”
Later that week, my mother was called back to the clinic in the late afternoon for a difficult case.
“There’s cold chicken in the fridge and some potato salad. I probably won’t be home until nine,” she said.
I changed into a bathing suit and robe and went out to the pool with a book and some fruit. Brent was sitting on a lounge chair, not in his usual lifeguard spot, since no one was in the pool. It was a perfect opportunity, but I was scared.
“Hi, I’m Dana,” I said. “Want a cold peach?” I held it out for him to see that it was not bruised.
“Nah, but thanks. I hate the fuzz. Got a nectarine?” he asked. I did, and gave it to him, sitting down on the lounge next to his. I watched him eat it slowly, closing his eyes for a moment after each bite—as though relishing the taste. He wiped the juice dripping down his chin with his forearm.
“I’ve seen you around—always with a book,” he said.
“Too young for a summer job. Maybe next year. Are you in college?”
He grinned. “Not yet. High school senior, next month. Only seventeen, but I’ve been told I look older.”
“You do.”
“Been looking at colleges—for engineering.”
“Engineering! Wow! That’s a hard major, isn’t it?”
“For some, but I’m good in math and science. And I really like it. I even tutor a bunch of seventh graders as part of the student service requirement for graduation.”
“I forgot about needing to volunteer. I guess I’d better start thinking about what I want to do,” I said.
“Whatever it is, do something that really helps people,” he said. “Too many kids wimp out and do the easy thing.”
I watched the float line bob up and down on the surface of the pool. I took a deep breath.
“Do you have a girlfriend?” I asked.
He stared at me, puzzled, and then laughed. “Are you offering, Dana?”
“No.” I said, feeling my face grow hot. “I guess that sounded pretty bold. But I’d like you to meet my friend, Lily.” I pulled out a picture of Lily I’d swiped from one of her photo albums. She was in a ballet costume, full theatrical makeup, and in the middle of executing an almost unimaginable leap.
“Whoa, she’s a knock out.” Brent stared at the picture for a long time. “You say she’s your friend?”
“The best friend I ever had,” I said. “And she deserves to meet someone as nice as you.”
“She looks like a girl who could have a million boyfriends.”
“It’s hard for her to meet boys. She’s a ballerina and has little time for social stuff.”
“But she has time for you. As you said, she’s your best friend. And she goes to school. Right? So, what’s the deal?”
I weighed the pros and cons of telling the truth and, in the end, didn’t want to join the pack of liars surrounding Lily.
“She’s sick now,” I said. “She might not make it.” My voice cracked. “Well… it’s likely she won’t. She’s dying.” Brent’s eyes darted around the pool as though he was searching for a drowning child. “She’s never been with a boy before and that’s her wish.”
“What do you mean by never been with a boy? Does she want to have sex?”
“No, no, no!” I said. “I would never ask that. But just to meet her, hang out, and maybe hold her hand.”
“And you’re asking me because I’m around and handy?” he said.
I was mortified and wanted to erase the entire conversation. Brent was angry and I didn’t blame him. It was a stupid request. I gathered up my things and stood to leave. But he said, “Look, I see you want to do something special for your sick friend, but you’re not her fairy godmother—granting wishes. Besides, I don’t know Lily and I hardly know you.”
“I know,” I said. “Thanks for listening.”
In the apartment elevator, I was about to push the button for my floor, but changed my mind and pressed six. It had been a few days since I saw Lily and it might be a good time to sleep over. I could use her mobile phone to call the clinic and let my mother know. The hallway was empty, but I could hear noise coming from behind the door of Lily’s apartment. I knocked and when no one answered, I knocked harder. Finally, a woman who looked vaguely familiar opened the door. She was about forty and was wearing jeans and a black tee shirt. I guessed this was Kate Kensington, although she was without makeup and didn’t have an actress’s aura. She looked like a mother, and with a flash of annoyance, she asked what I wanted—as though I were selling Girl Scout cookies.
“I’m Lily’s friend, Dana.” And then I added, “Irene’s daughter.”
She looked perplexed, perhaps because I was still in a swim suit and a cover-up, and said, “Lily’s very sick. She can’t see anyone.” Beyond the open door, a nurse came out of the kitchen wheeling an IV pole.
“Is she going to the hospital?” I asked.
“No, she wants to be at home. We have some help, now. Hospice. I’m sorry, but I have to ask you to leave.” She shut the door.
I slumped down onto the hallway carpet, my forehead against my bent knees. I didn’t want to go home. If I couldn’t crawl into bed with Lily, I wanted to stay right there, in front of her door, and think about the weeks we’d spent together. I imagined what the future would have looked like—attending her debut at the New York City Ballet and her presence at my medical school graduation—all the things we would have done together if she hadn’t gotten cancer. But then I remembered—if she hadn’t gotten sick I wouldn’t have known her.
It was likely I would never see Lily again. I hoped I could learn from her resolute courage, something that would give me peace in the days ahead.
The elevator door opened and Brent walked out. He slipped on a shirt from his backpack and sat down next to me along the wall.
“I followed you. I watched the number on the elevator so I knew where you got off” he said. “I had a feeling you were the one who needed someone. I thought I could help.” He slid his hand over mine and it was warm. We sat that way for a while, talking and not talking, until he handed me a tissue and I determined that crying was no longer forbidden.
If you’ve ever been in my situation, marginalized and therefore insignificant, you know that adults are completely useless at giving advice. My own mother, who if she were my age would fit perfectly into my uneasy world, had said on more than one occasion, “They’re just jealous because you’re so smart.” I knew this wasn’t true because I attended a magnet school where everyone was smart. And: “Try being more outgoing.” My mother probably forgot the cold stares, or worse, the caustic lobs, that greet unwelcome comments eagerly served into closed teen circles. That fall, as I was about to begin again in a new school, I wanted to crack open those circles and wedge myself inside.
The entry, I figured, was through Lily Aoki, a girl who had been in my class for as long as I could remember. We lived in the same apartment building and our mothers were on a first name basis, but until that summer Lily and I had barely acknowledged each other’s presence. She was, in so many ways, the center of our school’s universe. She would be my ticket.
The previous semester had ended in the midst of a heat wave so lengthy and draining that air-conditioner units failed in many of the classrooms. The county posted a “code red” air quality alert, and students stayed home, playing computer games and catching up on sleep. Final exams were cancelled. By that time, Lily had already missed four weeks of school. At first, the buzz was that she had a flu-like virus, and then that she had mononucleosis. Everyone in homeroom class made her get-well cards, most with pictures of ballerinas, since Lily was a dancer, who at nearly fifteen already had an impressive resume of appearances with regional dance companies and was waiting to hear about a spot in a prestigious New York ballet school.
I asked my mother, who was a doctor, what was going on with Lily, and she told me that Lily had cancer, that she was getting treatments, and would probably do well—most children with her disease recovered. But it was a long, arduous process. I waited for her to say more, but she didn’t, and I didn’t know then what questions to ask.
I didn’t have plans to leave town over the summer. It was just me and my mother, who couldn’t get away from the clinic where she worked as a gynecologist for indigent women. It was my first summer without a babysitter and with a key of my own, which I wore on a lanyard around my neck. I’d been looking forward to the freedom of it. We didn’t have cable or video games, but our apartment house did have a swimming pool with a lifeguard, and was walking distance to a library and an ice cream parlor, so the only thing that could have been better was having a friend with whom to while away the time.
I knew for my idea to work, I needed to enlist my mother’s help. I waited until an evening when she wasn’t overly tired from her packed schedule of clinic patients. We sat on the sofa, her swollen feet propped up on the coffee table, each of us drinking sweetened iced tea. An exhaust fan, set into the window, droned and created a breeze. My mother was in a good mood. One of her cases had resolved well and she went on that evening about the nobility of the medical profession, a theme that ran like an electric current throughout our lives together, mostly because her work was the only life my mother apparently had, but also because I believed she was gearing me up for such a life, too.
“Do you think Lily would like visitors?” I asked. My voice sounded strange, rehearsed. My mother turned and stared at me for a moment before responding.
“Yes, I imagine she would. It must be lonely being sick and not in the hubbub of the life she was used to.” I nodded. I suspected my mother knew about my own loneliness and lack of hubbub, but since she was helpless to do anything about it, she kept silent. She smiled and said. “I’m proud of you, Dana. I’ll ask Lily’s mother.”
Lily lived two flights above me, but in a larger unit. We were the only two students I knew at school who lived in an apartment; everyone else lived in single-family homes or townhouses. We had something else in common, too. We both lived with one parent. My father died of heart failure when I was four. I had no memory of him at all. He was twenty-five years older than my mother—her surgery professor in medical school. Lily’s father was alive, but never home. According to my mother, he lived in Japan where he was a wealthy businessman. He visited when he could get away, which wasn’t very often. Lily’s mother was an actress, and like my mother, had an erratic schedule. Because of her dinner theater performances, rehearsals, auditions, and commercial shoots in New York, an unrelated woman, Mrs. Dorsey, a nanny of sorts, lived with Lily Aoki and her glamorous mother, known by the stage name of Kate Kensington.
I stood outside her apartment door trying to decide if I should knock or ring the bell. My mother had first talked with Lily’s mother and then set up a time with Mrs. Dorsey, so I knew I was expected. I tapped lightly. The woman who opened the door smiled and led me into a living room not unlike my own, except that there was hardly a spot on the walls or a surface that wasn’t jammed with photographs of Lily in a dance recital or her mother in one of her performances. It reminded me of the lobby of a restaurant my mother took me to once when we were in the New York theater district. At first, I didn’t see Lily. Despite the warmth of the day, she was on the sofa under a fleece throw. Her head was wrapped in a pink and violet batik scarf. Her lovely long dark hair was gone, her face milky pale. A graceful, but thin arm lay on top of the covers. She looked like a heroine in the last act of an opera—beautiful, but sickly. The room had a stale smell, as though the air had not circulated through it in a long time. And there was something else besides the mustiness—a vague odor, both sweet and metallic and just beyond what I could name.
“Hi,” I said. I didn’t think I needed to introduce myself, but it was an uncomfortable moment as the only words we’d ever exchanged were in the elevator when it was even more awkward not to speak. She stared at me for a long time in silence, as though my being there, in her apartment, despite my mother having made the arrangements, was a mystery.
I handed her the book of crossword puzzles my mother bought for her, but that now seemed inappropriate and geeky.
She looked at the gift, then at me, and both of us burst out laughing. “Mom,” I said.
“Yes,” she said. “They really can be clueless. Kate is just as bad.” I tried not to show surprise at her using her mother’s first name. This, to me, was the height of sophistication. I could not imagine calling my mother Irene, or even Doc.
“Are you feeling better?”
“Some days. But I don’t want to talk about it.”
She didn’t ask me to sit, but I pulled up a chair next to the sofa and did.
“Tell me something—something I’d be happy to hear.”
I had no news about her crowd and anything about myself would be too boring to discuss, so I said, “The lifeguard this summer is seriously cute.”
“Really? Interesting! Tell me more.”
So, I did: how his butt looked in his bathing suit and what kind of music he played while he sat in the chair by the pool. “And besides that, he seems nice,” I said. “He gives the little kids swimming lessons on the weekends for free.”
Lily listened for a while and then looked at the clock on the mantelpiece and said, “I need you to go now.”
I assumed her cool friends would be arriving and she didn’t want me around, so I stood up to leave.
“I get tired very easily,” Lily said. “But it’s nice having company. Come back again.”
During the week, I tried to do some research about Lily’s illness on my computer and then at the library, but I had no real information to start with and my mother was mum, saying only, “She’s in good medical hands. You just be a pal.” That was what I intended to become. My first year in high school—my life from now on, in fact—would be vastly different with Lily as a friend.
At first, we didn’t talk about anything significant when I stopped by Lily’s apartment. In fact, Lily said very little. Once I brought a board game, but she seemed too distracted to play, so we went into her bedroom and looked through a picture album of her mother’s and then one of hers from when she danced the role of Clara in The Nutcracker in Washington, DC. From time to time, I glanced at her computer on which a screensaver floated the words, CRYING IS FORBIDDEN, back and forth, in neon-colored capital letters. Seeing this made me want to cry, but I took deep breaths and continued commenting on the photographs.
During these visits, I didn’t run into any of the in-crowd who’d swarmed around her when she was bursting with health and beauty. The phone did ring, occasionally, but it was her mother, and the conversations were short inquiries about how Lily was feeling and what she was doing. Mrs. Dorsey was kind and brought cookies and lemonade, but Lily had no appetite, and once or twice she threw up while I was there.
“Strange,” she said. “I’m not embarrassed getting sick in front of you. I wonder why.”
“I guess because my mom’s a doctor,” I said. But it was equally probable that whatever I thought didn’t matter.
“Do you think you’ll be a doctor, too?” she said. It was the first time she asked anything directly about me.
“I might.”
“Maybe you’ll be an oncologist,” she said. “Then you could find a cure for rhabdomyosarcoma.” She pronounced the word as fluidly as though she’d been saying it every day her entire life.
“Maybe I will,” I said. “Is there anything you feel like eating?”
“Not really. Everything tastes funny. But this is wild—I have dreams about peach ice cream. I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to eat it, though.”
For a week or so, I wasn’t able to visit because of Lily’s treatments, which were starting up again after a rest period. I hung out at the pool, stretched out on a lawn chair reading the books on my reading list for the fall semester. But mostly, I watched the lifeguard, Brent. He was a boy of about nineteen, maybe a college student, who sat in his designated chair staring into space, listening to music, and looking hot and bored. He had almost nothing to do. Most adults from the apartment complex were at work. Those who braved the heat were mostly senior citizens who sat at the edge of the water, dangling their legs, and a few mothers with toddlers, who splashed in the kiddie-pool before having to go upstairs to take naps. It would have been natural to strike up a conversation with him, but he was muscular and tan, like a surfer boy, with his blond hair flopping over his eyes and his swim trucks slipping down to reveal paler skin on his hips, and I didn’t have the nerve. Besides, what would I say, “Read any James Baldwin lately?” Even the young mothers looked him up and down and whispered among themselves. That night in bed, I touched myself all over and imagined stroking Brent, especially the fair, soft hair on his chest and thighs. I felt a pulsating ache between my legs and then finally a release. I wondered if any boy would ever find something in me to like.
When Lily felt better, I brought her a pint of peach ice cream from the store down the block.
“Thought this might cheer you up,” I said. She looked much worse. The treatments had taken a toll. Her eyes looked sunken and there were scabs around her mouth.
Lily smiled and said, “Mrs. Dorsey, will you please bring a dish and a spoon for Dana?”
“Please Lily, it’s for you. Try to eat some of it.”
“I can’t.”
“It’s not from my mother. It’s from my allowance.”
And then she did eat it. Slowly at first, taking tiny careful spoonfuls. When she had enough, she said, “You know, you’re awfully nice.”
“Not really.”
“Why are you so nice? You hardly know me.”
“Because if I were sick, I would want someone to be nice to me, too.”
The next time I visited Lily, I found her in bed. Her eyes were closed and she clutched a pair of toe shoes, winding the pink ribbons around her fist. There were post-it stickers all over her room—at least a dozen—that said CRYING IS FORBIDDEN. I said her name and she sat up.
“Here,” she said, handing me a letter. “Read it.” I unfolded the paper and read the unconditional acceptance to the New York ballet school that Lily had her heart set on.
“That’s wonderful,” I said. “I’m sure they’ll hold your place until you’re well, even if you have to put off going until next year.” She looked at me, as though I had said I could defy gravity.
“It doesn’t work like that. The school is incredibly competitive. There are hundreds of girls vying to get in. My spot will be grabbed up as soon as I say I can’t come now. Besides, look at me.” She extended her legs for me to see. They looked limp and bruised. “I have no energy to do a simple arabesque or a jeté. And I certainly couldn’t go en pointe. My life in ballet is over. My life is over.”
“No, it’s not. Your life’s just beginning. You’re Lily Aoki. Every girl in our school wants to be you. You’ll beat this cancer. And your life will be perfect, again.”
“That’s a lovely speech, Dana. My life, so far, has been built on hard work and lies. Nothing perfect about it.”
I understood about the hard work. Lily trained for hours at the dance studio and often when she landed parts in ballets she had tutors to keep her up to date with school assignments, but I had no idea what she meant by lies.
“I know I can trust you,” she said. “I knew it from the moment you first visited, out of the blue, that you were a true person who wouldn’t betray me. I’ve never told another living soul, but I must tell you something now. Come closer so I don’t have to raise my voice. Mrs. Dorsey has supersonic hearing.”
My mother had told me not to get too close to Lily because she was more susceptible to germs than most people. But I got onto the bed with her anyway.
“To start with—my name, Aoki, that’s a lie. It’s a fairly common name in Japan and that’s why my mother chose it so no one could trace my supposed roots.”
I waited; the room was still.
“When Kate was twenty-three, and still known to her family and friends as Bonnie Bernstein, she had a part as a hooker in an off-Broadway show. A Japanese dignitary, visiting New York, was in the audience and was smitten with her, so much so, that after the show he summoned her to his room at the Plaza where he made her call the theater to say she was sick, and stay with him night and day for an entire week, until he left for home and his family.”
“Did he leave his wife for her?”
“Of course not. He didn’t love her. He just wanted a good time with a ripe young body,” she said. “He did give her an emerald bracelet with an unsigned note that said: A token of my esteem. He also left her pregnant with me.”
“But he’s your father and he comes to see you. Right?”
“I’ve never seen or heard from him. My mother tracked him down through the embassy and they had a talk. He wires her child support every month. Hush money, I think it’s called. It comes as long as there’s no more contact or accusations.”
“Shouldn’t he know about your illness?”
“I don’t exist for him. If I tried to find him the money would stop. It pays for all of this,” she waved her hand in a sweeping gesture, “and, of course, in part for my treatments. Kate’s health insurance is pitiful.”
“And you’ve never told anyone?”
“Just you. Because you’re a real friend and because you’re growing up without a father, too.”
I stood up, crossed the room, and pulled one of the sticky notes from the closet door. “You’re very brave. I cry all the time. I’m terribly lonely.”
“I feel like crying, too. But I don’t. It never helps.”
Lily’s cordless phone rang.
“Hi Sofia,” she said. I held my breath. Sofia was one of the girls I avoided. She was the worst of the worst. Once she pushed me into a glass door and said, “Too bad it didn’t break. Then you could have had plastic surgery on your ugly nose.”
“Hey, what’s up? You better yet? You’re missing out on all the fun,” Sofia said. Her voice was loud and I could hear everything through the phone receiver.
“Just chilling here,” Lily said.
“I should be going,” I said. I stuck the sticky note back on the closet.
“Someone with you?” Sofia asked.
“Dana,” Lily said.
“Dana?” Sofia said. “You mean that dork who lives in your apartment house? What’s she doing there? Bummer! Get rid of her. I got tons of dirt to share.”
“Love to hear it, but listen, something’s just come up—you know, about dance—and I have to go,” Lily said. “I’ll call you back later.”
“Whatever. Just make sure that creep isn’t around.” Then she hung up.
I had no idea if Lily knew I’d heard the entire conversation. I waited to hear what she would say. It was a long wait. I watched her put away her dance shoes and return the acceptance letter to the envelope it came in. Then she sat down again on the bed. She looked more than tired; she looked defeated. I started to leave.
But then she said, “I’m sorry. She’s awful.”
“Awful? I thought she was your best friend,” I said.
She smiled, but her eyes were sad. “You and I have a lot in common,” she said.
“I would never be friendly with such a mean person.”
“You might. We all cozy up to people for a reason, don’t we?” Lily would not release her stare.
I didn’t want to hear more. I needed to escape. Lily had laid my secret out in the open where my selfish motives could be dissected and analyzed. And yet, I was confused. I couldn’t imagine in what way Lily was using Sofia. Lily was the one with star power. Sofia was a nothing. A rich nothing with a lot of family connections, but still, very ordinary.
“I’m going,” I said, getting up. “I hope you feel better.”
I thought about Lily and her friends for the next few days. What was it that Lily needed from them? And how could these cruel but popular girls give it to her? I had learned the word symbiosis in my biology class and wondered if this was a case of each person giving and getting something crucial from the other. Although I was horribly embarrassed and considered staying away, by the end of the week, curiosity won out. I was greeted at the door by Mrs. Dorsey. She told me that Lily was not feeling well, but it was all right to come in if I stayed for only a few minutes.
Lily was in bed. Her skin looked chalky and her brown eyes were dull.
“I’m glad you came back. I have something I need to tell you. Something important. Come close.”
I sat down on Lily’s bed. She took my hand. Her arm had bluish blotches.
“Now listen carefully and don’t say a thing until I’m done.”
I was sure she was about to finish the conversation we had started saying that she would never have had her status at school if it weren’t for those so-called friends. Of course, she was wrong, but I would let her go on and then I would explain the truth to her. That would cement our friendship.
“Dana, I’m dying. Probably within weeks it will all be over.” she said. “Right from the beginning, I knew I was in a high-risk group. The treatments aren’t working anymore and there’s nothing left to try. Kate knows it, and that’s why she’s taking a leave from work in New York to be with me. She’ll be here by the end of the week. But she doesn’t know that I know the worst. She told me she was bored and needed a break. She’s conniving with Mrs. Dorsey, who also knows, and is already looking for another job. I overheard a phone call. All this deception is stressful and unfair.”
I thought of Lily’s notes: Crying is forbidden, and so I didn’t. But I trembled so fiercely that my eyes couldn’t focus. I swallowed hard and could feel thick tears sliding down the back of my throat.
“I’m not being dramatic, if that’s what you’re thinking. The oncologist told me a few days ago. I asked him a direct question and got an answer. I was relieved that finally someone told me the truth. No more treatments.”
I was stunned. Why didn’t my mother tell me that this might happen? She was so optimistic. But she should have known. Why were adults such liars? I reached out and took Lily in my arms. “I’ll be here for you” I said. “Anything you want. Just say. We haven’t been friends for long, but my heart is breaking as if we were sisters.” And I meant every word. I loved Lily. I saw that now. I wanted her to live, but no longer for my sake.
“I’ve been lucky in some ways, getting to do things that most people never do in a regular lifetime,” Lily said. “But, I never had a father, or any man in my life, and my mother—well, I never expected much from Kate. Her career always came first. And I wonder, if I hadn’t gotten cancer, whether I would have turned out like her. You know, until you came around, I never had friends who really cared about me and made me feel like a normal girl. And you do, and that makes me happy.”
“Being your friend has made me happy, too,” I said. “Lily, please don’t give up. There must be other things to try. My mother always talks about clinical trials for her patients. Couldn’t you get into one?”
“Oh, Dana! If only.” She got out of her bed and limped around the room, deep in thought. I could see she was in pain. Then she said, “I wish I’d had a boyfriend—to know what it’s like. I’ve been thinking about that. To be close enough to smell him and maybe even to be kissed. A lot of girls our age have already had that, but I never did.”
“Me neither,” I said. “I sometimes wonder if any boy will ever like me.”
“Believe me, someone will—a smart, successful man who thinks you’re wonderful. You have so much time for that.” She got back into bed and pulled the covers over her shoulders. “Do you think you might sleep over here one night soon, maybe when my mother gets here? There’s a pull-out bed beneath this one. I don’t think Kate will mind. I don’t want to be alone with just the adults.”
“I’ll ask my mother,” I said. “I don’t want you to be alone, either.”
Later that week, my mother was called back to the clinic in the late afternoon for a difficult case.
“There’s cold chicken in the fridge and some potato salad. I probably won’t be home until nine,” she said.
I changed into a bathing suit and robe and went out to the pool with a book and some fruit. Brent was sitting on a lounge chair, not in his usual lifeguard spot, since no one was in the pool. It was a perfect opportunity, but I was scared.
“Hi, I’m Dana,” I said. “Want a cold peach?” I held it out for him to see that it was not bruised.
“Nah, but thanks. I hate the fuzz. Got a nectarine?” he asked. I did, and gave it to him, sitting down on the lounge next to his. I watched him eat it slowly, closing his eyes for a moment after each bite—as though relishing the taste. He wiped the juice dripping down his chin with his forearm.
“I’ve seen you around—always with a book,” he said.
“Too young for a summer job. Maybe next year. Are you in college?”
He grinned. “Not yet. High school senior, next month. Only seventeen, but I’ve been told I look older.”
“You do.”
“Been looking at colleges—for engineering.”
“Engineering! Wow! That’s a hard major, isn’t it?”
“For some, but I’m good in math and science. And I really like it. I even tutor a bunch of seventh graders as part of the student service requirement for graduation.”
“I forgot about needing to volunteer. I guess I’d better start thinking about what I want to do,” I said.
“Whatever it is, do something that really helps people,” he said. “Too many kids wimp out and do the easy thing.”
I watched the float line bob up and down on the surface of the pool. I took a deep breath.
“Do you have a girlfriend?” I asked.
He stared at me, puzzled, and then laughed. “Are you offering, Dana?”
“No.” I said, feeling my face grow hot. “I guess that sounded pretty bold. But I’d like you to meet my friend, Lily.” I pulled out a picture of Lily I’d swiped from one of her photo albums. She was in a ballet costume, full theatrical makeup, and in the middle of executing an almost unimaginable leap.
“Whoa, she’s a knock out.” Brent stared at the picture for a long time. “You say she’s your friend?”
“The best friend I ever had,” I said. “And she deserves to meet someone as nice as you.”
“She looks like a girl who could have a million boyfriends.”
“It’s hard for her to meet boys. She’s a ballerina and has little time for social stuff.”
“But she has time for you. As you said, she’s your best friend. And she goes to school. Right? So, what’s the deal?”
I weighed the pros and cons of telling the truth and, in the end, didn’t want to join the pack of liars surrounding Lily.
“She’s sick now,” I said. “She might not make it.” My voice cracked. “Well… it’s likely she won’t. She’s dying.” Brent’s eyes darted around the pool as though he was searching for a drowning child. “She’s never been with a boy before and that’s her wish.”
“What do you mean by never been with a boy? Does she want to have sex?”
“No, no, no!” I said. “I would never ask that. But just to meet her, hang out, and maybe hold her hand.”
“And you’re asking me because I’m around and handy?” he said.
I was mortified and wanted to erase the entire conversation. Brent was angry and I didn’t blame him. It was a stupid request. I gathered up my things and stood to leave. But he said, “Look, I see you want to do something special for your sick friend, but you’re not her fairy godmother—granting wishes. Besides, I don’t know Lily and I hardly know you.”
“I know,” I said. “Thanks for listening.”
In the apartment elevator, I was about to push the button for my floor, but changed my mind and pressed six. It had been a few days since I saw Lily and it might be a good time to sleep over. I could use her mobile phone to call the clinic and let my mother know. The hallway was empty, but I could hear noise coming from behind the door of Lily’s apartment. I knocked and when no one answered, I knocked harder. Finally, a woman who looked vaguely familiar opened the door. She was about forty and was wearing jeans and a black tee shirt. I guessed this was Kate Kensington, although she was without makeup and didn’t have an actress’s aura. She looked like a mother, and with a flash of annoyance, she asked what I wanted—as though I were selling Girl Scout cookies.
“I’m Lily’s friend, Dana.” And then I added, “Irene’s daughter.”
She looked perplexed, perhaps because I was still in a swim suit and a cover-up, and said, “Lily’s very sick. She can’t see anyone.” Beyond the open door, a nurse came out of the kitchen wheeling an IV pole.
“Is she going to the hospital?” I asked.
“No, she wants to be at home. We have some help, now. Hospice. I’m sorry, but I have to ask you to leave.” She shut the door.
I slumped down onto the hallway carpet, my forehead against my bent knees. I didn’t want to go home. If I couldn’t crawl into bed with Lily, I wanted to stay right there, in front of her door, and think about the weeks we’d spent together. I imagined what the future would have looked like—attending her debut at the New York City Ballet and her presence at my medical school graduation—all the things we would have done together if she hadn’t gotten cancer. But then I remembered—if she hadn’t gotten sick I wouldn’t have known her.
It was likely I would never see Lily again. I hoped I could learn from her resolute courage, something that would give me peace in the days ahead.
The elevator door opened and Brent walked out. He slipped on a shirt from his backpack and sat down next to me along the wall.
“I followed you. I watched the number on the elevator so I knew where you got off” he said. “I had a feeling you were the one who needed someone. I thought I could help.” He slid his hand over mine and it was warm. We sat that way for a while, talking and not talking, until he handed me a tissue and I determined that crying was no longer forbidden.
