And then I realize.

“You bastard,” I mutter, picking up the rubber bug and slipping it into my pocket before anyone else sees it and thinks it’s real. When I look up, Bill-Bob and his buddy are staring at me. “False alarm,” I say with a wave of my hand. And when I turn to look at Alessandro, he’s got a smug smile plastered to his face.

I glare and spin to wipe up Bill-Bob’s mess, and when I come back, Alessandro is gone, his half-full beer still on the bar.

I’m pissed, but I didn’t really want him to leave.

I pick his mug up off the bar, but just before I dump it I notice his jacket still draped over the barstool. I set the mug back down as he comes out from the hall to the restrooms.

“I thought you left,” I say.

He tips his head at me as he slides back onto his stool. “I thought you’d want me to.”

“I do. Sort of.”

“Hmm . . . sort of,” he purrs through his accent, his eyes gliding over me again. “That’s tricky. Because the thing here is, if I stay, you’ll wish I’d left, but if I leave . . .” He trails off, leaving the thought dangling.

When I finish the sentence in my head, it comes out something like: I’d be really bummed. “You can stay, but I’m confiscating all your cockroaches,” I say, holding out my hand.

He slips his hand into the front pocket of his jeans and comes out with the other one. I take it and tuck it into my pocket.

He sips his beer. “Tell me about your audition.”

I spend the next hour, when I’m not pestered by customers, telling Alessandro about the part. And then I can’t stop talking. I catch myself telling him things I’ve never told anyone, dreams I’ve barely dared to think, let alone say out loud. “I’m good, you know? I know I can prove that if I can just get my foot in the door. I know someone will see me and I’ll get my break,” I say, wiping down the bar between Alessandro and me for the twentieth time.

As I say it, the last of that frustrated tension slips out of my shoulders. I look up at him and his gaze is deep and steady, as if he’s looking into my soul, and nothing he sees there surprises him. I’m suddenly transported back to the group home. He’s on top of me in my bed, his sixteen-year-old eyes looking down at me just like that.

I shake the memory out of my head. That was a lifetime ago. This is now.

“It’s just hard waiting,” I say, tearing my eyes away from his.

“Keep the faith, Hilary.” His voice is low and sure and somehow he makes me believe it will happen—like maybe because he was almost a priest, he has more pull upstairs.

Because, let’s face it, I need all the help I can get.

“HILARY MCINTYRE HERE to see Roseanne McIntyre,” I tell the guard at the counter, a long slender woman with a horse’s face who has her dark hair all tucked up under her guard’s cap.

“Sign in.”

I do.

“ID,” she says, holding out her hand.

I jump through all the usual hoops and sit in a chair while I wait for them to “announce” me. It’s ten minutes later that the guard calls over the desk, “The doctor says she’s not well enough for visitors.”

I push out of my seat and stare at her. “What?”

“He says she’s weak from the chemo and you should come back later in the week.”

“Chemo . . . ?”

She squints at me. “You knew, right? That your mom has cancer?”

I shake my head.

“Oh . . . sorry.”

“Is she . . . ?” My dry throat clicks as I swallow. “Is she dying?”

“She’s receiving the best care there is, courtesy of the State of New York. That’s all I can tell you. You’ll have to talk to your mother if you want any more information.”

“What kind of cancer?” I ask, slowly getting my mind around what she’s saying.

She shakes her head once. “I’m sorry. I can’t share any information without your mother’s consent.”

I just stand here a minute longer, trying to think. “If I leave a message, could she call me back?”

“Yes. She’s allowed phone calls.”

I step up to the desk. “Do you have something I can write on?”

She pulls a scrap of paper and a pen from the drawer and slides them over the counter.

“Thanks.” I pull them toward me and just stare at the paper for a long time. What am I supposed to say?

Mom,

Why didn’t you tell me you were sick? I came for our visit today, but they said you’re weak from the chemo. Please call me as soon as you can.

Hilary

I slide it back to the guard. “Can I get into the visitors’ room? I just need something from the vending machine.”

She holds out her hand. “What do you need?”

I fish in my pocket and hand her a dollar. “An Oh Henry!”

She nods and brings the bill to the door, where she hands it through to the guard inside and mutters something that I can’t hear. A minute later, the guard is back with an Oh Henry!, passing it through the door. The guard at the desk hands it to me and I wrap my note around it.

“Can you make sure she gets this?” I ask.

She nods. “I’ll have someone bring it right in for her.”

“Thanks,” I say, turning for the lockers.

“She’s really proud of you, you know.”

I look back at her. “What?”

“She talks about you all the time . . . says you’re going to be a big Broadway actress. She’s even petitioned for a furlough for your opening night.”

I just stare at her. She’s got to have Mom confused with some other inmate. “My mom is Roseanne McIntyre.”

She squint-smiles, like she thinks she’s said too much. “I know.” She holds up the Oh Henry! wrapped in my note. “I’ll make sure she gets this.”

I collect all my stuff and turn for the door in a daze. Mom has cancer. I knew she looked bad over the last few months, older every time I saw her, but cancer? My insides pull into a hard knot.

Mom has cancer . . . and she’s proud of me.

I walk back to the train station thinking about my audition on Tuesday. If I get this part . . . if they give Mom the furlough, will she be around to come to my opening night?

I have to get this part.

“You want me. I know you do,” I say, deciding to rehearse my lines again.

I pause where my male counterpart will respond that, yes, he wants me, and mime unbuttoning the top button of my blouse.

“Then take me,” I say with an air of desperation.

Mime unbuttoning another button as he responds that it’s not right for us to give in to our desire. There are other people we need to consider.

A tear in my eye. “Who cares what’s right. We need each other like oxygen. I can’t live another day without you.”

Unbutton. We must exercise restraint, he responds.

“No! I can’t! I can’t wait for you another day. Tomorrow will swallow us whole if we let it.”

Unbutton.

“We can either live life scared,”

unbutton,

“or live life.”

Unbutton.

“There are no other choices.”

Slide shirt off shoulders.

Mom has cancer.

I hang my head and blow out a long white breath that trails behind me in the cold December air. Last time I was here she said something about if I loved her I’d have brought her cigarettes. I remember thinking that I didn’t. I was wrong. Pretending I didn’t really care—that I was just visiting out of some family obligation—felt safer, I guess. But the truth is, regardless of everything, she’s my mother and I love her. I feel the threat of tears and swallow them.

When I make the train station, I have a half hour till the next train back to the city. I go over my lines again, but I can’t focus.

Dev blasts out of my bag and I grab my phone, thinking it must be Mom, but when I look at the screen, it’s Jess. I press the call button, and even before I say anything Jess is already screeching in my ear, “Igotthepart Igotthepart Igotthepart!”

“Wow, Jess! That’s fabulous.” And I really am happy for her. Really. “Tell me the whole deal.”