The dog was barking and there was a slight breeze in the air. I walked through the back door, into the house, where my son, Chris and my husband, Mike stood before me. I opened my mouth, not knowing where my words were heading. I revealed the truth, “I can’t do this anymore, I’m sorry”. With those same words, I was gone in a week. Left in the house on the corner of 45th street, was the rest of the Conners, just Chris and Mike, left without a mother and emotionally alone.
It was snowing so much this week, so much snow that it made every other week seem like summer. Chris called and begged to visit. It happened that it was the third time I saw my son in the last year. We made plans for me to meet him at the nearby McDonalds. He, standing there, so innocent, bundled up in his coat made me think about how wrong of me to leave my family, but deep inside it was my only choice.
He was shivering, as each snowflake that touched him, seemed to make him a slight colder. He looked weaker. I walked up to him slowly and said, "You shouldn't come see me anymore," and stuff like how, I moved on and he should too.
He said, “Mom”, paused, took a deep breath, and continued his sentence. “I miss you”.
I answered coldly, without a second thought, "Let’s go, now, I'll take you home."

Unwillingly, he stubbornly walked a couple steps behind me towards the car. Keeping it together, he broke the silence with an excuse. He had mentioned that he hadn't ate and asked if I could take him out for dinner.
Quickly, without hesitation, I answered.”No”, as if my heart was nothing but a stone.
Disappointed, he turned red, and asked me to take him to the bus stop; he said he didn’t want to waste my time, so he decided he should take the bus, back home.
Maybe, the snow was the reason why all the bus stops were surrounded by bitter, cold people that were eager to arrive to their houses, not caring about no one else’s excuse to take the bus. We had waited and waited, he looked at me innocently, trying to explain to me with his big blue eyes, that I, as his mother needed to understand how he must feel when he came all this way to visit me, and I treated him like crap. That meant, I could repay him by letting him sleep the night at my house. But, my reality woke me up and I said to Chris, "Let's go try the train station."
Before, I left, my husband, my son and I got along well. We would always do family activities together, watch movies, play sports and sometimes go on family road trips. My husband and I were more than family, he was my best friend and it wasn’t too much longer that we had both, fallen in love with our child.
I suddenly snapped out of my old treasured happiness. Chris and I were walking along the side the walkway of the bridge, glancing at the streaming water. He was in front of me, walking a little faster but weaker. He had almost got hit by the cars passing by. I wanted to just reach out to my child, hold him in my arms and never let my baby go, but with the love I had for my child and with the regular pain in my heart, I did nothing.
On the way, we passed by the local park where Mike and I took him as a kid.
He begged and pleaded, "Can we go in the park, I promise I'll go home right after this."
I still put up an annoyed face but followed with the plan and walked into the park. Sitting on the benches, wanting to leave, I watched as Chris examined the big oak tree. I knew Chris was looking for the writing I had showed him what Mike and I had carved into the tree, while we were just dating.
I remembered it, perfectly, as Chris read it out loud, "Mike and Maria waz H3re w/ forever love”.

I felt so twisted inside, the pain was back, but all I did was pretend I didn't care, and said, "Can we go now?"
He simply stood there, hoping that there was any chance, to not leave.

We didn’t say anything to each other; we just walked towards the train station.
The truth was I had found out two years ago that I had cancer. Nothing big, I was told it was still curable. Without any thought, I started to live a normal life forgetting about the cancer and the doctors.
Until almost a year ago, I was sick for almost 2 weeks, but continued to ignore it until I just couldn’t anymore. After, x-rays, talking to a series of doctors, and just listening to the truth, I realized the truth was real; my cancer was back and worse. I was done and to me, at the time, to avoid the pain, I decided to commit suicide. I soon came to my senses and realized I couldn't let people find out about my intentions, especially Mike or my son, Chris. I didn’t want the two people, I loved the most, to know, and they still don’t know.
So, I lied to them. Yes, it was the wrong thing to, I made them both feel they were the reasons I didn’t want to stay and it was their faults but it was the fastest way for them to forget about me. I needed to act quickly because eventually I would begin to loose my hair and my secret would be revealed, but now I'm close to succeeding. This drama will be gone and that was all I had in mind.
I had called him a taxi, knowing that trains no longer were available at this time. We were just standing there, waiting, and wasting our last moments in silence. I saw the taxi arriving from down the street.

I held my tears and said my last words to my son, "Take care of yourself and take good care of your father."
He didn't talk but nodded and then I opened the door and closed the door for him and he got in. I had then realized I had closed the door that would separate me from him forever. I stood in the same spot as the car drove off and my son was out of my life. Finally, my lies couldn’t destroy lives anymore. I waved as I started to chased after the taxi, because I knew this would be the last time I would see him. He was my son, he was a part of me and I wanted to tell him I still love him. The taxi had already turned onto another street, as I begged for my son to stay. My tears flowed down my face, freezing, from the coldness of the snow and the coldness in my heart.
He left and I never received another phone call from him, again. He never saw my tears, and I’m sure that he didn’t know how I really felt that day, because I'm not Maria, I'm her son, Chris, using my memory and my mom’s diary, that I found after she left, writing down these last words.