I Promised My Son Forever—Then Cancer Made Me Count the Months

to breathe near.

“You okay?” he finally asks, like the question itself might break me.

“I’m okay,” I say, because I’m a mother and that’s what we do.

We turn the word okay into a shield and hope it holds.

I rinse, spit, wipe my mouth. My hands shake. Mike notices. Of course he does.

He takes a step toward me, then stops, like he’s afraid the act of helping continue reading …