BFF

Last night I spent hours in the ICU sitting with my mother, holding her hand and reminiscing about old times ~ the things we did just the two of us, the adventures we had in her little “Porsche”, the movies she took me to as a child (I remember she even sneaked me into ‘A Star Is Born’!), our tiffs over silly things.

She was on the ventilator, struggling to breathe yet my beautiful, sweet, strong and positive mother was chatting away and laughing at my stories.

As she always does.

Then out of the blue she said to me, “In-In, you are my BFF”, gripping my hand harder.

I wanted to break down and cry because this amazing superwoman now so weakened by cancer is truly my BFF and it kills me to see her this way.  Being her only daughter, we confided in each other, shared so many things like friends do… because she doesn’t have any sisters either.  We were each other’s confidante.  My friends would bump into Mummy and me around town and those who didn’t know what my mother looks like would ask,”who’s this friend of yours?” (It helped that Mum never looked her age, she could always easily pass for being 15 years younger than her true age.) I loved to see the look of surprise on their faces when I introduced her and told her that she’s my mother.

In wanting to bawl my eyes out, I had to suppress a giggle too.. at her use of the slang/hip term of “best friends forever”. She was always on the ball, my Ma, with the hip vernacular expressions of the day.

Yes, Ma… we are BFFs…forever and ever. No one else can ever come close.

When I was about to leave, she took my hand and put it against her cheek. “In-In, Mummy minta maaf for everything.”

I lost it. I managed to choke out a “No Ma.. In yang kena minta maaf for so many things” before I hurriedly left because I didn’t want her to see me bawl.

I sat in my car in the car park till I couldn’t cry anymore.