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Dr. Levine tilts his head with a tired expression coating his face. He sits across from us at his desk wearing a white lab coat. “Mrs. Blakely, this is the second time we ran the tests. They aren’t wrong.”

Mama stands up and plants a hand on his desk as if intimidating the man will help. “Do you see my baby over there?” She points to me. “She’s seventeen. She barely has all her teeth, for heaven’s sake. So yes, you’re completely and utterly wrong.”

He looks in my direction and then back at my mother, clearly not changing his mind. “I can understand why this is hard to hear, but the best thing to do now is to think about what you want to do moving forward.”

Mama steps back to pace the room, nodding. “Fine.” Mama pats the air. “You know what, if you’re so sure you’reright, we’ll just treat it like last time. She’ll do the chemo and radiation again. Easy.” She rubs her hands together as if she solved the problem.

I give Papa a look. Should we help? Should we save Dr. Levine from Mama going ballistic on him?

“As I mentioned before,” Dr. Levine continues, “that route might add a month or two to her remaining time, at best.”

Mama shakes her head. “No. I know there are clinical trials we can try. There are always trials, and we can do one of those.”

Dr. Levine takes off his glasses and pinches the bridge of his nose. This isn’t the first time he’s talked to Mama. “I’m sorry. I really am. I know this is hard to understand, but Margo’s cancer is terminal.”

Hearing the words leave his mouth feels foreign. It hasn’t sunken in yet. I figured I’d be more upset at this appointment, but I must be in shock. Either that, or my body knows I have to keep my composure to make up for Mama. We can’t both fall apart.

“No. I refuse to believe that.” She crosses her arms.

Memories start to resurface. Memories of pain and white hospital walls. Of more medicine than food. Of the nosebleeds and bruises. Of the sleepless nights. Of the looks on everyone’s faces.

I never argue with my mother. She almost always gets her way no matter what, but this is different. This choice should be mine. It’s my life after all.

“I don’t want the treatment.” My voice is low and quiet, scared to voice those words out loud.

Mama’s jaw drops, slowly meeting my eyes. “Yes, you do.”

I stay calm, trying not to escalate the situation any further. “If I get the surgery and start chemo, I’ll feel even worse thanI do now. I don’t want my friends feeling like they have to walk on eggshells every time they see me. I don’t want them to pity me every time I’m around them. And I especially don’t want Annie to do what she did last time. She put everything on hold, but this is her senior year of high school. I want her to have fun, not waste all her time worrying about me.”

“No.” Mama’s jaw clenches, and she looks away. “You have to try. They could be wrong.”

“I don’t want to be—”

“No, no. This isn’t right.” She shakes her head again. “It’s not as bad as it sounds. We just need to get another opinion.”

Papa reaches for her hand. “I agree with Margo. This should be her decision.”

Mama rips her hand away and stands up, eyes wide. “So you just want to let our daughter die?”

“I’m going to die either way,” I say.

That’s the final straw, the match hitting gasoline.

There’s a heavy silence that follows.

Mama’s lip quivers, and she stares at me like I just told her I want to jump off a bridge. Tears start to pool in the corners of her eyes.

I don’t mean to say it so straightforwardly... or maybe I do. Maybe if she hears it from me, she’ll believe it.

But I still hate crushing her.

She grabs her purse, fumbling as she tries to get the strap over her head. “I need to use the bathroom.” She gives up, stuffs her purse under her arm, and rushes out of the room.

It’s not every day you get the news your daughter is dying. I should be more upset than I am, but I always knew there was a possibility the cancer would come back. We all knew that. The difference is this time the cancer is much more aggressive. It’s stage four. It’s spread to too many placesalready. Maybe if we’d caught it sooner, there would be more we could do, but we can’t turn back the clock.

We wait a little while for Mama to return, but she doesn’t. We continue the rest of the appointment without her. Dr. Levine goes over different medications I can take to ease the pain and what I should do when my symptoms become worse. Then, we thank him for his time and leave.

My head feels like a balloon as I try to process it all. I don’t want it to be true, but I also know being upset won’t change anything.