My heart hammered in my chest, beating up toward my throat. I felt the tears begin to form in my eyes, blurring my eyesight.
“How are you feeling, Mom?” I finally asked her, the dreaded words that I so often tried to avoid, if I could. The words that so often had a horrible answer. “You had that doctor’s appointment the other day…”
“Oh, honey, I’m fine,” my mother said, trying to gloss over the fact of the tumor, of the diagnosis that had left us stricken for months.
At the back of the room, two students began to scuffle over a toy. I watched as one of them, Jamar, yanked at the plastic truck, falling back into the trash can. The other kid throttled forward, gripping the truck and trying to nab it back as Jamar began to kick his feet in the air.
I rushed forward, pointing my finger at them. I heard the strain in my voice, the fear from speaking with my mother.
“Hey! The two of you need to cut it out and learn to share,” I told them, my eyes gleaming with the kind of anger that only comes when it’s coupled with intense, internal emotion. “If you don’t, you’ll need to sit at your desks for the rest of free period. Do you want that?”
Slowly, they shook their heads and stumbled back onto their feet. They gave me wounded looks, and then began to vroom the trucks around the carpet. I took several steps back, lifting the phone back to my ear. I heard my mother’s chuckle on the other end.
“You’ve really put your foot down, haven’t you?” she asked, joking.
“I don’t know what else to do with them,” I laughed, rolling my eyes.
I stepped back toward the chalkboard, giving the class space once more. On the other end, my mother’s voice waned.
“How are you doing, baby?” she asked. “Have you tried dating anyone lately? Have you found some new friends?”
She was anxious about my recent move to a new location in Al-Jarra, knowing I’d left people behind. I’d only been in the new city for a few weeks, and, it was true, I felt the aching loneliness that comes with a new scene, a new start.
In the back of my mind, I reminded myself that this was necessary. That each day, I fought for a paycheck for my mother. That each day, the scholarship program provided me with room and board, keeping me alive, and always contributing.
I would be one of the reasons my mother remained alive. I had to be.
“I’m working on it,” I told her, trying to smile through the tears that glimmered down my cheeks. “But as far as dating, who on earth has time for that?”
“You should make time, honey,” my mother continued, her voice waning even more.
“Mom.” I felt my throat catch. I knew I was about to give into a wave of pain and horrible sadness. “I just wanted to let you know that I’m sending another check over to you at the end of this week. I get paid on Thursday night—”
“Oh, honey, stop it,” my mother whispered, rasping. “You need that money. You work hard for it. I don’t want you to—”
“Mom, don’t be silly,” I said, feeling exasperated. “It’s part of the reason I’m here. I can live off the scholarship and—”
“Tell me you’re there for reasons besides me, baby. Otherwise, I want you to come home,” my mother murmured, making my throat tighten.
My gaze wandered toward the window and I stared out at the gorgeous Middle Eastern landscape. The mountains in the distance, shimmering with sunlight. Beyond that, the ocean churned on in all its turquoise and white caps, a sight I’d grown accustomed to on weekend hikes. The people were warm, alive in ways that the people in my South Dakotan town were not. They simply couldn’t be; times were hard, and smiles were hard to come by.
“I do like it here, Momma. I just miss you.”
“I miss you, too.”
I swallowed sharply, closing my eyes. In the background, I could hear the grumbling voice of my father—deeper, darker, from years of cigarette smoking, a habit he’d promptly quit after my mother’s diagnosis.
“Can I talk to her?” I heard him say.
Soon, the phone was passed to him. I could visualize it clearly: my parents, Sarah and Joe Peretti, poised at the kitchen table, watching as the sun rose over the bright green grass in the front yard. I’d seen it countless times before.