Free I'm Not Her by Janet Gurtler

change into her clothes and then we’re to wait in Dr. Turner’s office. Room 2. The nurse showed me where to go.”
    Dad and I stand awkwardly in the hallway. I pull my sketchbook from my backpack to see if I can get down some ideas or make a couple of rough thumbnails. If I’m going to get my entry in on time, I have to start getting inspired, but my brain won’t allow me to work. Dad doesn’t ask what I’m doing or even pretend to be interested. I still haven’t mentioned the Oswald Drawing Prize to him.
    Instead of working, I dream of taking Kristina with me to San Francisco. We’d attend the awards ceremony together and then she could go shopping or do something else she likes. Man, I need to get my piece going if that’s going to happen.
    Eventually, Kristina and Mom emerge from the changing room and I hurriedly put away my pad. Mom leads the way to the doctor’s office. We follow, quiet and slow, like kids being shuffled off to the principal’s office for doing something wrong.
    The doctor’s room is stark. White walls, no examining table. There’s a big desk with a computer and monitor on top and a leather office chair pulled up to it. There are two cheap steel chairs opposite it. Kristina sits right away, her head bent. I lean against the wall close to the door and gnaw on my lip. Dad leans on the opposite wall, staring into space. Mom heads straight for the doctor’s desk and opens a thick medical book sitting on top of it. She starts flipping pages. I think she’s searching for something to tell that her daughter will be okay.
    Minutes go by, painfully long quiet minutes. Finally the doctor walks in the room and all of us snap to attention. She looks young. She’s pretty, with wavy brown hair. She’s wearing makeup and jewelry and a blue dress under an open white lab coat. I think how unfair it is that she seems to have been dealt an overabundance of good genes. Brains. Beauty. She got it all.
    She touches Kristina’s shoulder as she passes. I have an urge to yell at the doctor, to demand she tell us it’s all been a big mistake.
    I glare at her, wanting her to fix my sister with her slender, pretty hands. Make the nightmare go away. Mom closes the book she’s been snooping in and moves back, sitting in the chair beside Kristina. Dad doesn’t budge, but follows the doctor with his eyes. The doctor walks around her desk, clicks a key on the keyboard, and checks the screen for a second before turning her attention to Kristina. My sister stares at her and her eyes fill with tears. When I look at Dr. Turner’s face, I know immediately. The news isn’t good. I feel sick to my stomach.
    I blink rapidly, trying to keep my tears inside.
    “Kristina,” Dr. Turner says, and shifts her hip against the desk, not sitting yet. She nods at my parents. They’ve already met, formal introductions have been made. She smiles at me. “You must be Tess,” she says, but doesn’t seem to expect an answer, which is good because my throat is so tight, nothing, no sound is capable of coming out.
    We all stare at her, holding our breath as a family. Waiting.
    She sits in her chair, and leans back. “The tumor is directly above the knee. As expected with this type of cancer, we’re looking at a Stage 2B. The mass is larger than I would like, but despite that, we’re going to do what we can to help you keep your leg, Kristina. Many osteo patients can have limb-saving treatment and that’s what we’ll hope for you.”
    Bile boils around my stomach. I swallow a bitter taste, watching the doctor as if she’s insane. Help her keep her leg?
    “Stage 2B means it’s a high-grade cancer, very aggressive,” she says as if one of us asked the question.
    No one says anything. The doctor waits. Tears stream down my mom’s face. My dad’s face is stony, blank. Kristina stares at her hands, twisting them around and around in her lap.
    “I assume you and your family have talked about the possibility of amputation,”