{"id":6199,"date":"2026-04-20T11:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/?p=6199"},"modified":"2026-04-19T21:41:35","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T04:41:35","slug":"ma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/","title":{"rendered":"Ma"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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Ma<\/h1>\n\n\n<\/div>\n \n \n By<\/span>Ruoer Su<\/strong>\n \n April 20, 2026<\/span>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n <\/div><\/div>\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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\n \n \n Share\n <\/span>\n \n \n <\/svg>\n <\/span>\n Copy Link<\/span>\n <\/a>\n \n \n <\/svg>\n <\/span>\n Facebook<\/span>\n <\/a>\n \n \n \n\n<\/svg>\n\n <\/span>\n X<\/span>\n <\/a>\n \n \n <\/svg>\n <\/span>\n LinkedIn<\/span>\n <\/a>\n \n \n \n \n <\/svg>\n <\/span>\n Bluesky<\/span>\n <\/a>\n \n \n <\/svg>\n <\/span>\n Email<\/span>\n <\/a>\n <\/span>\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div><\/div>\n \n\n\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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Here\u2019s a story I tell my wife on nights when I know I won\u2019t sleep right away. Ellis would loosen her robe a little as she scoots under the blanket. \u201cWell, Jordyn, I\u2019m listening,\u201d she would say, and I would tell her about how my mother died.<\/p>\n

\u2014<\/p>\n

It went like this: we were making our way down Temescal Canyon trail, trying our hardest not to fall on our asses with all the mud that was starting to condense under the heavy rains that came out of nowhere.<\/p>\n

This was 2019, the winter before she got too sick. The hiking was all Mom\u2019s idea. She had come into my room unannounced and said that she wanted to take me somewhere. She didn\u2019t tell me where at first. \u201cJust come,\u201d she said. Her doughy features were assembled into a kind of stubbornness, a fragile angry kind that forbade me from refusing. I followed her with a reluctance that never used to be there when I was a girl. When I was a girl, Mom was soft and laughing.<\/p>\n

A hardness had taken over her through the years, but it was not always this way. Even when she was first diagnosed with her sickness, she had put up with it as if it didn\u2019t bother her. Dinner was made, my sisters were driven to school, Dad avoided the topic. Life went on. I think her efforts for normalcy made it easier for me to go out of state for college. And I think I was glad for it too. When you know the truth it\u2019s even easier to pretend nothing\u2019s wrong because you know what you\u2019re avoiding. That winter, before she died, I was scared to admit I didn\u2019t know who she was anymore. That scared me more than actually losing her. And I didn\u2019t want to admit that, either.<\/p>\n

It was as if time had drained the light from her body and I could do nothing but watch as she got older and I got younger in the sense that I would always be young in comparison to her. In the sense that there has been and always will be this unnamed distance between us that I don\u2019t remember forming. In the sense that when she died, it was too late.<\/p>\n

On that day we were trudging through mud that reached mid-calf and pelting rain and bone-chilling wind. I wondered if she had intentionally chosen this remarkably awful day for hiking on purpose to make me resent her. The woman that was my mother walked ahead of me and didn\u2019t look back. I wanted this woman to notice my irritation, to ask what I was thinking, to answer for the unreasonable hike, to name the feeling in my chest when I saw her windbreaker cling to those thin shoulders.<\/p>\n

We got to the parking lot and climbed into the car, dragging mud and rainwater across the seats. Mom didn\u2019t start the car right away.<\/p>\n

“Let’s not do this again,\u201d she said after a while, glancing at me half-way.<\/p>\n

What were we trying to do again? I wanted to ask. Instead I replied, \u201cYeah. Christ, Mom, can you start the heater? I\u2019m freezing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two weeks after that, Mom collapsed in the hallway and had to stay in the hospital.<\/p>\n

On Monday in the first week of June, I tried holding her hand. It was warm, but had it always been this small? The breathing tube in her nose made a soft rattling sound every so often. Above her dark nostrils her black eyes blinked up to look at me as if she was waking up from a reverie each time and was surprised to see I was still there.<\/p>\n

\u201cHey,\u201d I said softly, \u201cremember that time when we got soaked on that hike? How crazy high the mud was? We never did it again. But I wish we did.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI love you, Mom. I wish I said it more often, but I\u2019m saying it now. I was just scared of losing you so bad that I was already preparing for when you wouldn\u2019t be there and I wouldn\u2019t be able to say these things to you.”<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t understand it. I didn\u2019t know how to talk to you about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe sickness scared me, but it never scared you, Ma.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBesides, you\u2019re more than just being sick, you\u2019re my mom. Nothing\u2019s changing that.\u201d<\/p>\n

And then she died.<\/p>\n

\u2014<\/p>\n

I remembered her coming into my room and saying, \u201cJust come.\u201d She must have known there was not much more time for her daughter to gather the words to talk to her like they did before. She must have seen me sprawled lazily on my bed and thought disapprovingly about how my stomach was out again. When she was gone, she thought, she would not be here to tell me to tuck my shirt in. She must have known all this, but had been pretending to not be troubled for so long and so she didn\u2019t say anything. Not a word to me, not even in her final moments.<\/p>\n

\u2014<\/p>\n

My wife, who must be tired of this night routine now, would reach out and touch my hand. \u201cShe heard your voice before she passed. Even if she didn\u2019t understand, what you said would have made her very happy,\u201d she said gently, then turned off the light and embraced me.<\/p>\n

It felt good to be told that and hugged so warmly. But although my body accepted Ellis\u2019 words and drifted off to a sound sleep, my heart knew it was too good to be the truth. Besides, when you know the truth it\u2019s even easier to pretend because you know what you\u2019re avoiding. And the truth was that Ma had spoken her last words to me on that Monday in June. She said \u201cyou made me sick.\u201d<\/p>\n

And then she died.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n <\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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Ruoer Su<\/strong> is a freshman studying English. When she is not doing school work, you can find her reading or drawing. Ruoer writes about things that have never happened to her, but she doesn’t believe it makes the stories any less real.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n <\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1048,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[52],"class_list":["post-6199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spring-2026","tag-prose"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nMa<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ma - Palaver Arts Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Palaver Arts Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/palaver.arts.magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-04-20T18:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/175\/2023\/06\/palaver-logo.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"710\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"198\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"lanstra\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"lanstra\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/live-usc-dornsife.pantheonsite.io\/palaver\/#\/schema\/person\/d2d59c4c584136b8b2e5209098cfc6b3\"},\"headline\":\"Ma\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-04-20T18:00:00+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/\"},\"wordCount\":1,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/live-usc-dornsife.pantheonsite.io\/palaver\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Prose\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Issue 19: Spring 2026\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/dornsife.usc.edu\/palaver\/spring-2026\/ma\/\",\"name\":\"Ma - 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