Emma's Prayer

by Liz Zuercher


If I said the day my mother died is my worst teenage memory, I would be lying.

I would be ignoring the two years leading up to that October day just after I turned sixteen.  I would be putting those previous two years into the shadows and making them less than they were.

My mother’s death was a blessing.  For her it was the end of pain and suffering.  For me, it was the beginning of a more normal life where I no longer had to pretend not to hear the moans she tried to hide from us, or keep a false smile on my face for her.  It was the day that set me free of all that playacting, all that being strong for the family.  Finally, I could be a teenager and go out with my friends without feeling guilty that I wasn’t with my mother-who-was-dying.  My mom was dead.  I didn’t have to be there for her any more.

But, those thoughts made me feel guilty, selfish.

When she first got sick, I prayed for her to live.  In the last weeks of her life, I prayed for her to die. Then as soon as I’d think those words, I’d take them back.  No, no, don’t let her die, I’d say.  But that was fake.  That wasn’t how I really felt.  I loved her.  I should want her to live, I told myself.  But I don’t want her to live like this, I answered, like the devil and angel, one on each shoulder arguing.

The day before she died, she couldn’t raise her head off the pillow or move her hands from where they rested on the covers.  When I entered her room, her eyelids fluttered, opened and she looked hard at me.  There was a raw intensity in her eyes that I’d never seen before, that she’d never let me see before.  She’s pleading with me, I thought.  For what?  What could I do? It scared me, but I tried to smile for her, like always.  Answering my effort, my mother put her own mask back in place, her eyes softening.  The corners of her mouth tilted up in a slight smile, the most she could muster before she closed her eyes again and slept.

“It’s okay, Mom,” I told her as I stood beside her bed and stroked her hand.

That evening I sat in the porch swing waiting for James to come over, and I asked God to let my mother die.  Straight out. No pussy footing around this time.  “Enough,” I said right out loud to God.

Then James came and we went to the movies and laughed at a silly comedy.  For a few hours I didn’t think about my mother-who-was-dying.  When I got home, I went right to my room without even saying goodnight to her.

While we all slept, my mother died, tiptoeing away without bothering anyone, as if she knew we were almost as exhausted by her battle with cancer as she was and needed the rest.

I should have felt bad about that last prayer, but I didn’t. I felt guilty for spending the final night of my mother’s life eating popcorn, snuggling up to James and laughing at a movie.  I felt guilty about going to bed without saying goodnight to her.  But all I ever felt about my prayer and God’s swift answer was grateful.