I ran to my back deck on the cold November night. I did not care that it was below 50 degrees, I just needed to get away for a second, or a whole lifetime, to process what I had just been told. The moon was the only thing I could see in the pitch black, it seemed to be the only light in my life at the time. The only thing I could focus on were the tears that streamed down my face and hit the table like little bombs. A cold breeze sent chills down my spine but not like the bone shattering chills I had just received not two minutes before. I felt as if my whole world was cracking straight down the middle and the fragments were coming down and stabbing me everywhere in my body.  My sister and father came outside to sit with me and tell me everything was going to be okay, despite the fact that we all knew it wasn’t. Although we were living the same nightmare, I felt as if I was alone. I knew that I was going to have let her go, but all I could think was  “I don’t need this ring to survive, I need her.”

Their bedroom was where we spent most of our time because we didn’t want her to have to move often.  We bought her a big tan Lazy Boy chair to make her as comfortable as possible.  I would walk through the door and get hit with a wall of mist from the humidifier that was constantly running.  The portable furnace was right beside the bed and we had to be cautious while crawling under the covers so we wouldn’t hit it. Most days their bedroom was my favorite place. It was a place to laugh, tell stories, and watch tv. But on this particular day there was no laughter, no story time, and no tv.

She had called us all in her room late at night. She was sitting in the lazy boy. I knew something was different, you couldn’t see it in her face because she had always stayed strong for us, but the air just felt thicker. She asked for something that I never recalled her wanting before, she wanted a picture together. A little taken back, I crouched down next to her and put my cheek up to hers, and could feel her love radiating off of her warm cheek. I quickly snapped the picture and stood up straight and smiled at her. In the back of my mind I knew exactly why she wanted it; We both knew it would be our last.

As my other siblings were taking their photos, I studied mine. I ran my eyes across the screen. She was beautiful. The kind of beautiful that makes you want to be a better person just to impress her. She had this sort of glow about her.  Her strawberry blonde hair was like her aura shining through. Her eyes, her smile, even her pale motionless face; it was all so stunning. Even when her hair was gone and she wouldn’t leave the house without her wig, I would live for the moments when she was natural. She is the definition of pure beauty. 
Before I had even looked up from my phone I was hit with a ton of bricks. “The cancer has spread rapidly throughout my body and has traveled to my brain. We don’t know how long I have, it could be months, or a couple weeks.” The words felt like bullets entering my ears and lighting my insides on fire. I wasn’t even the one who was sick, but I felt as if I was dying. “I have a few things to give you guys.” My dad walked in and placed something in my mom’s hand. “For Kayla, I have my wedding and engagement ring. For zach, I have a bullet key chain with a bible verse written upon it. For Maddy, I have my class ring. And for Belle, I have a ring my grandmother gave to me, she had always told me it was a real gem.” With the ring in hand, I could feel my eyes start to burn. I did not want to cry because everyone had told me that I needed to stay strong. My siblings had left the room, but I stayed for a while. My mom  told me to open the closet door. As I turned the doorknob, she started to speak, “I know it’s kind of morbid, but I want you to wear that dress to my funeral”. I heard every word, but I could not understand them. All I could think was, “What is she talking about, miracles happen, she is going to survive”. I quickly shut the door, turned around, and looked at her with sad but excepting eyes and said “Of course.” The dress was never touched after that conversation.

  In any bystander’s eyes, my ring is lifeless and dull. Some might say it looks like a ring you get out of a gum ball machine. But to me it is absolutely alluring. It possesses an incredible amount of beauty in one unpolished gem. On the surface it is my favorite accessory to any outfit,  but deep down in the sea of emerald green, it contains a type of power that can be deadly. Jealousy. Envy. Bitterness. It has no sympathy to anyone's problems because they are not as bad as mine. It is comprised of loneliness because I feel as if I am the only one who has ever had this happen to them. It holds envy of other people my age because they didn’t have to grow up as fast as I did.  It is composed of resentment from people who ask me about my parents, but then correct themselves and say “dad”. It is filled with the regrets of unworn dresses. When I look at it I see hospital rooms, panic attacks, and headstones.

Although the ring reminds me of all that I have lost, it also makes me think about all the great things that I had. I had a wonderful mother for thirteen years. I had an amazing family that stuck together through a miserable time. And now, I have a ring, that sometimes is so heavy I can’t even get out of bed, but other times it is a pair of angel wings that carries me throughout the day. I carry my mother’s ring not as reminder of her death, but as a reminder of who I want to be when I grow up. It is my inspiration to be a better person, to be like my mom.