Jennette McCurdy - Im Glad My Mom Died

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For Marcus, Dustin, and Scottie

I TS STRANGE HOW WE ALWAYS give big news to loved ones in a coma, as if a coma is just a thing that happens from a lack of something to be excited about in your life.

Mom is in the ICU at the hospital. The doctor told us she has forty-eight hours to live. Grandma, Grandpa, and Dad are out in the waiting room calling relatives and eating vending machine snacks. Grandma says Nutter Butters soothe her anxiety.

Im standing around Moms tiny, comatose body with my three older brothersMarcus (the together one), Dustin (the smart one), and Scott (the sensitive one). I wipe the corners of her crusted-shut eyes with a rag and then it begins.

Mom, Together leans over and whispers into Moms ear, Im gonna move back to California soon.

We all perk up, excited to see if Mom might suddenly jolt awake. Nothing. Then Smart steps forward.

Mama. Uh, Mama, Kate and I are getting married.

Again, we all perk up. Still nothing.

Sensitive steps forward.

Mommy

Im not listening to what Sensitive says to try and get Mom to wake up because Im too busy working on my own wake-up material.

And now its my turn. I wait until everyone else goes down to grab some food so that I can be alone with her. I pull the squeaky chair close to her bed and sit down. I smile. Im about to bring the big guns. Forget weddings, forget moving home. Ive got something more important to offer. Something Im sure Mom cares about more than anything.

Mommy. I am so skinny right now. Im finally down to eighty-nine pounds.

Im in the ICU with my dying mother and the thing that Im sure will get her to wake up is the fact that in the days since Moms been hospitalized, my fear and sadness have morphed into the perfect anorexia-motivation cocktail and, finally, I have achieved Moms current goal weight for me. Eighty-nine pounds. Im so sure this fact will work that I lean all the way back in my chair and pompously cross my legs. I wait for her to come to. And wait. And wait.

But she never does. She never comes to. I cant make sense of it. If my weight isnt enough to get Mom to wake up, then nothing will be. And if nothing can wake her up, then that means shes really going to die. And if shes really going to die, what am I supposed to do with myself? My life purpose has always been to make Mom happy, to be who she wants me to be. So without Mom, who am I supposed to be now?

T HE PRESENT IN FRONT OF me is wrapped in Christmas paper even though its the end of June. We have so much paper left over from the holidays because Grandpa got the dozen-roll set from Sams Club even though Mom told him a million times that it wasnt even that good of a deal.

I peeldont ripoff the paper, because I know Mom likes to save a wrapping paper scrap from every present, and if I rip instead of peel, the paper wont be as intact as shed like it to be. Dustin says Moms a hoarder, but Mom says she just likes to preserve the memories of things. So I peel.

I look up at everyone watching. Grandmas there, with her poofy perm and her button nose and her intensity, the same intensity that always comes out when shes watching someone open a present. Shes so invested in where gifts come from, the price of them, whether they were on sale or not. She must know these things.

Grandpas watching too, and snapping pictures while he does. I hate having my picture taken, but Grandpa loves taking them. And theres no stopping a grandpa who loves something. Like how Mom tells him to stop eating his heaping bowl of Tillamook Vanilla Bean Ice Cream every night before bed because it wont do any good for his already failing heart, but he wont. He wont stop eating his Tillamook and he wont stop snapping his pictures. Id almost be mad if I didnt love him so much.

Dads there, half-asleep like always. Mom keeps nudging him and whispering to him that shes really not convinced his thyroid is normal, then Dad says my thyroids fine in an irritated way and goes back to being half-asleep five seconds later. This is their usual dynamic. Either this or an all-out scream-fight. I prefer this.

Marcus, Dustin, and Scottie are there too. I love all of them for different reasons. Marcus is so responsible, so reliable. I guess this makes sense since hes basically an adulthes fifteenbut even so, he seems to have a sturdiness to him that I havent seen in many other adults around me.

I love Dustin even though he seems a bit annoyed by me most of the time. I love that hes good at drawing and history and geography, three things Im terrible at. I try to compliment him a lot on the things hes good at, but he calls me a brownnoser. Im not sure what that is exactly, but I can tell its an insult by the way he says it. Even so, Im pretty sure he secretly appreciates the compliments.

I love Scottie because hes nostalgic. I learned that word in the Vocabulary Cartoons book Mom reads to us every day, because she homeschools us, and now I try to use it at least once a day so I dont forget it. It really does apply to Scottie. A sentimentality for the past. Thats definitely what he has, even though hes only nine so doesnt have much of a past. Scottie cries at the end of Christmas and the end of birthdays and the end of Halloween and sometimes at the end of a regular day. He cries because hes sad that its over, and even though it barely is over, hes already yearning for it. Yearning is another word I learned in Vocabulary Cartoons.

Moms watching too. Oh, Mom. Shes so beautiful. She doesnt think she is, which is probably why she spends an hour doing her hair and makeup every day, even if shes just going to the grocery store. It doesnt make sense to me. I swear she looks better without that stuff. More natural. You can see her skin. Her eyes. Her. Instead she covers it all up. She spreads liquid tan stuff on her face and scrapes pencils along her tear ducts and smears lots of creams on her cheeks and dusts lots of powders on top. She does her hair up all big. She wears shoes with heels so she can be five foot two, because she says four foot elevenher actual heightjust doesnt cut it. Its so much that she doesnt need, that I wish she wouldnt use, but I can see her underneath it. And its who she is underneath it that is beautiful.

Moms watching me and Im watching her and thats how it always is. Were always connected. Intertwined. One. She smiles at me in a pick-up-the-pace kind of way, so I do. I pick up the pace and finish peeling the paper off my gift.

Im immediately disappointed, if not horrified, when I see what Ive received as my present for my sixth birthday. Sure, I like Rugrats, but this two-piece outfita T-shirt and shortsfeatures Angelica (my least favorite character) surrounded by daisies (I hate flowers on clothes). And there are ruffles around the sleeves and leg holes. If there is one thing I could pinpoint as being directly in opposition to my soul, its ruffles.

I love it! I shout excitedly. Its my favorite gift ever!

I throw on my best fake smile. Mom doesnt notice the smile is fake. She thinks I genuinely love the gift. She tells me to put the outfit on for my party while she already starts taking off my pajamas. As shes removing my clothes, it feels more like a rip than a peel.