Years pass

FRIENDSHIP

 

Sherry is a dancer, a dresser, a wingless angel. She and I grew up as pals way back to when we began kindergarten the same time. No matter our childhood squabbles, kicking, scratching, not talking to each other for, at most, from lunch to dinner, we made up. Our parents each have bloated scraps books, full of photos that have cracked and dried out. They are treasures of yesteryears that our walking separate paths now doesn't seem possible. Yet it is happening now as I relate it.

 

Sherry is trying out for a new ballet group that will open with Swan Lake at the T.T. Tennessee Auditorium come next April 10th, only four months from tomorrow. I know she is good, above average and have every confidence in her making the cut. Her Tuesday afternoon call squelches the tiniest fear I've allowed myself to harbor. She made it, isn't the Swan, but will be doing her first sem-starring pas de deux professionally.  On the phone, we laugh and cry together, jete' and say goodbye. Rehearsals begin in two days. We will not meet again for months.

 

My path, my talent, send me down a different road. I teach twelfth grade English at Randallstown  High five days a week. Anxiously I await weekends so I can write my heart out. My meals are made of alphabet soup that overflow the bowls. My thoughts mix together, collide while my computerized fingers fly over the keyboard with a single word, half a sentence. I don't think about my nagging hunger, my need to go to the supermarket. All I want is solitude, self-time. Mama Jessie tiptoes on the stairs, picks up the phone after only one ring. She is my backbone, my mentor.

 

It's April 12 and I am tied up, involved, can't seem to find the right word, a better way to express what my character, Haley, is experiencing. Crying, sobbing, weeping when she gets the call from her internist that her ovarian cancer has spread. And I pause as the door chime startles me, makes my mouth go dry. My Mama Jessie opens the door, signs for the Fed X  package addressed to me. She sees before I do, that Sherry has sent it to me. Opening the box, white feathers fly out, surprise us both. Under them are two DVDs of Swan Lake. I shut down my computer and ask Ma to join me watching the ballet. Carrying a tray of hot tea and half a dozen chocolate covered cookies, we sit together in the den, eyes glued on every dancer, searching all the time for Sherry. 'There she is,' I yell. 'That's not Sherry,' Mama says. We argue. I replay the pas de deux but we cannot agree until I make the decision that the ballerina near the end who has performed far more perfectly than any other dancer had to be Sherry.

 

My morning pleasure has removed my need to write about the sobbing, crying, weeping of a young woman who has ovarian cancer. I re-start my computer, open my Word Perfect document and delete half of it. Golden sunny thoughts change my outlook, my path. I send two dozen long stemmed roses to Sherry as I envision her meeting new people, maybe a 'fella'. Calls to her apartment and to her parents in Randallstown accept my messages but no replies come. My assumption is they are there in Tennessee with Sherry, enjoying every moment, gloating about their daughter, the ballerina.

 

At last, I feel the electricity in the phone. Without hesitating, I lift the receiver and blurt out, 'Hi, Sherry. What took you so long to call me?' There are no words, just sobs, loud crying spells. Taking  control, Sherry tells me that she has been in the hospital, learned only today, that she has breast cancer third stage. 'Dear, dear, Friend. I didn't want to tell you–but– but–I am going to beat this thing. Don't you dare worry. My folks are worrying enough for all of us.'

 

In a cracking voice she says, 'I love you,' and the call ends.