Prom arrived several weeks later.
Tony stood in front of the mirror wearing the midnight-blue suit he had dreamed about for months.
It fit him perfectly.
The shoulders rested exactly where they should.
The trousers had been tailored to the correct length.
Against the white shirt, the color looked almost black until the light revealed the blue.
Viki had already started chemotherapy.
She looked tired, but when she entered the room and saw him, her face immediately brightened.
For one brief second, she lifted her hand as though she were about to tuck her hair behind her ear.
Then she remembered it was gone.
Tony noticed.
Without speaking, he crossed the room and embraced her.
“You look handsome,” she whispered.
“Because of you.”
“No,” Viki replied. “Because you worked for this.”
He stepped back.
“I’ll be home before midnight.”
“You had better not be,” she said. “You waited too long for this night.”
He laughed and kissed her cheek.
When Tony walked through the front door, his shoulders were held high.
He no longer looked like the boy who had sat alone on the porch wondering whether he belonged.
He looked proud.
The midnight-blue suit had become more than an outfit for prom.
It carried Tony’s hard work.
Viki’s courage.
And the promise that our family would face whatever came next together.
She attended treatment surrounded by people who loved her.
Evan drove her to appointments.
I prepared meals she could tolerate when the medication made her sick.
Tony delivered the terrible hospital coffee he had promised.
Some days were frightening.
Some were painful.
There were mornings when Viki was too exhausted to speak and evenings when she laughed so loudly that the nurses asked us to quiet down.
She never became only a diagnosis.
We did not allow cancer to erase the woman she had been before it arrived.
She was still the aunt who remembered every birthday.
The sister who teased Evan about his terrible cooking.
The woman who complained that hospital blankets were designed by people who hated comfort.
And the person who had turned something she was about to lose into dignity for someone she loved.
