A Final Dance

Act I

People ask me about the day she died. But I don't like that story. That's a bad story. I don't want to tell you that one. That one hurts. I don't know how to describe, but it feels like my heart was ripped from my chest and laid on the table, and all I could do was sit there and watch the beating die down to stillness.

But that's a bad story, and I don't want to tell it.

Let me tell you about the days she lived. Or perhaps the day she brought me to life.

Which one? There were so many!

The day we met?

Alright, I can tell you that.

Well first, a little context. If I just walked you into the moment she took my breath away, you might not understand why it was so stupid funny things turned out the way they did.

It all started, I suppose, the day my mom took me to the ballet. I didn't want to go.

That's an understatement.

I begged her not to take me. I threw a temper-tantrum. I threatened to walk out, whatever that meant. I appealed to my dad. I thought he was going to support me until my mom looked at him and he just hung his head in silence.

I was even willing to forfeit my phone until I graduated college. Until my grandchildren were born. I was ready to go on a hunger strike; I was NOT going to the ballet.

Then that treasonous sot who claimed to be my father sunk to the lowest low that anyone could go. "You know, son, owning a car is one of those privileges that comes with maturity."

Asshole.

So I rode with my mom into the city where she complained about the cost of parking downtown, and we sat down for the show.

I tried to close my eyes and let her know how much I was going to hate being there. I looked around at all the snooty old people and prayed there wasn't anyone from my school there to see me. This was going to be the most boring and miserable twenty-five years to life I'd ever have to sit through.

"Here, try this," my mom handed me one of those tall glasses, you know one of the really skinny ones, with some yellow, bubbly drink in it with a strong head of foam at the top, and she reserved one for herself as well.

"What is it?" It smelled like alcohol.

"The good stuff. Try it." She grinned at me. I wasn't sure how I was supposed to take that.

"Mom, does this have alcohol in it?"

"Did you just ask me if I would give my sixteen-year-old son alcoholic wine? What kind of mother do you think I am?"

"Well, it's..."

"Just drink it."

And so I sipped the thing. Right away, an octillion tiny ping-pong balls shot throughout my mouth bursting with sweetness every time they slammed against my tongue. I took another sip; the bubbles saturated my senses as though each one carried a different flavor of sweet and it was only the symphony of them all happening at once that made any sense.

I took another sip as my mom eyed me with a smug grin.

At some point, I felt strange. Not quite dizzy, but something was definitely off. I would turn my head, and the room would follow a moment later. And when I spoke, I felt detached from my voice as though muffled somehow. It was weird. I looked at the glass, which had another inch and a half of The Good Stuff and then turned to my mom.