Annie Zapata called Bakersfield, California the seventh ring of hell. A town Annie hated from the first moment she set foot in it as a child. In July she could expect triple digit days with air so polluted that the meteorologists highly recommended that one stay indoors. Annie wondered why 250,000 people, including her parents, especially her parents, put up with poisonous air and water.

Annie flew out to California from Banner Elk, North Carolina (population 800) to be there for her mother Mae's rad. On her lap lay the sleeping head of her six-year-old son, Rainer. Even though they were flying on the red eye, Annie could not sleep. Her head was filled with memories of the last five weeks. She talked to her mother two minutes after she heard the news and received the full force of her mother's fear: before Mae entered her denial mode, and began saying “Everything's all right, it's in the early stages. Besides, I'm sixty years old, what do I need with breasts?” Her mother would feed these lines to Annie's younger brother Tommy and their older sister Olive. The thought of Tommy maddened Annie because, though he lived a mere two hours driving distance from their mother, he seldom went and visited her, or offered to take her to a doctor's appointment or in any other way be involved in her life. She looked at the sleeping softness of her boy and wondered if this would be her future too.

Tommy was a cuckold. He suffered the same fate Milton ascribed to Adam: uxoriousness. His wife had convinced him that all of their marital problems stemmed from his relationship to his mother. He was a functional alcoholic, like both of their grandfathers. He went to work everyday and drank every night save Sundays. Annie and Rainer would spend the night at Tommy's and then drive down the coast to her sister's house, where her mother was awaiting surgery.

* * *

Waiting on the concourse, Tommy looked at Annie and Rainer with a mixture of apprehension and relief. His sister looked beautiful in a purple paisley silk shirt and faded Levi's, with some impossibly bulky purple leather biker boots. Tommy smiled: she had style. Rainer, in his estimation, needed a haircut, but he couldn't help feeling a surge of pride looking at the wild waves of red curls, identical to his own at that age. Annie had always been the smart one in the family. He was proud of her: a university English professor, whose first book of poetry—that may as well have been written in Greek as far as he was concerned—won some big award, filled his heart because it reflected an intelligence in the genes. He had been held back in third grade when he was finally diagnosed with dyslexia, but by this time it was too late to undo the damage caused by teachers who had labeled him “learning disabled,” which every kid knew was code language for stupid. He had overcome odds and now ran his own dental prosthetics lab where he made dentures, crowns and bridges. Tommy hugged her and thought, I make three times as much money as Annie ever will, fancy degree and all.

Tommy, his wife and daughter lived in Pismo Beach, California: known primarily for it's beautiful coastline and Bakersfield transplants. Annie and Tommy's father, Pablo Zapata was born and raised in Bakersfield, but had met their mother, Mae Dixon in Virginia when transferred by the Navy to Norfolk, Virginia. Annie and her siblings were all born and raised in Virginia, but after their parents' divorce, each member trickled out to California over the years until they were all out west, all that is, except Annie.

Annie looked with disdain upon California with its attendant materialism and passive parenting. But every time she came out West, its rocky coastline and emerald-blue oceans seduced her. She always thought about Francis Ford Coppola's movie Rumblefish when Mickey Rourke says that California is a beautiful woman on heroin who doesn't know she's dying even if you show her the marks. When Annie woke up in the morning, it was the solidity of the mountains she wanted, not the irreverence of the Pacific.

Tommy and Marci had a huge house with a 180-degree view of the ocean. Wine flowed on the 1800 square foot deck of their house. Annie watched Rainer zip around on his uncle's Go-ped and counted the palm trees lining the Pismo Beach Pier. She soon realized it was too late for the lobster remoulade and rosemary-goat cheese mashed potatoes to compensate for the lack of ingested food that day and before she knew it, she was incredibly drunk. This was a typical Friday evening for her brother. Marci was a bleach blonde stay at home mom who drove a silver Mercedes. None of these posings erased the fact that she was a high school drop out from Bakersfield and a staggering “social” alcoholic. Annie's brother met her during a trip out to California to visit his father and fell in love. She soon became pregnant and they were married on a boat out of Morro Bay. All of this happened before Tommy turned twenty-one.

Annie liked Marci in spite of her neglect of her mother, Mae. After all, her mother could be a raving bitch. Mae had never liked Marci whom she referred to as “the slut who trapped my son into a premature marriage.” Now the daughter of that union was 17 years old and looked and dressed like Britney Spears. She had gorgeous blue eyes, a diamond belly ring and long hair that she had been bleaching since the eighth grade.

“What?” exclaimed Annie.

“Yeah, she didn't say a word to me and just took off for Bakersfield. When I talked to her she said, ‘I hope Rainer and Annie will come see me,'” Olive said in exasperation.

“Come see her, who the fuck does she think I came out here to see? No offense, but fuck. She's always got to pull something at the last minute.” Annie paused and said, “Maybe I should leave now and drive down there.”

“I'm really freaked out Annie,” Olive said and began to cry. Of the two, she was the weaker of the species, if weakness is gauged by one's willingness to cry often and for an extended period of time.

“I'm freaked out too, sis, and I know if I'm a stress queen then you must be really fucked up,” Annie said.

“Thanks,” Olive said and laughed, because they both knew it was true.

“I'll go down to the seventh ring of hell tomorrow and have a talk with her. I mean, we have to go to the Orange County fair—or I'd leave today,” Annie said.

The Orange County fair was a tradition of sorts with Forrest and Rainer who, though they lived three thousand miles apart, still saw each other at least twice a year at Christmas and during the summer months.

Mary and Shelby would be late to meet them at the entrance gate to the fair, because, as Olive put it, “Shelby is one Depends away from being June Allison.” After shedding money like so much dandruff, they had the boy's wrist banded and ready to ride. They rode a purple dragon with hands in the air—joy exuding from every pore in faces reflecting pink, orange and gold. Annie felt like a good mother. Olive looked on and with a wide smile said, “Five more rides and we'll head over to the wine garden, stuff the kids with baked potatoes and funnel cakes and have a glass.”

After a taxing day of facials and swimming pools, Annie was beginning to feel like an L.A. woman, sans augmentation and botox. Olive complimented Annie on her new haircut saying, “Hey, if you're not going to do botox, you need to have bangs.”

Annie loved her sister and embraced the shallowness that was a part of her having always wanted to live in Orange County.

“I wouldn't be so frustrated if mom would only communicate between her doctors. Now she wants to go see Dr. Patel,” Olive said.

Mae had been to see five different doctors in the past three months and had been diagnosed with Crohn's disease, irritable bowel syndrome and fibro-myalgia. She never told any of these doctors about her past diagnoses, and conveniently left out the fact that she had been addicted to laxatives for the last twenty years.

“Dr. Patel The Incompetent? The one who has consecutively misdiagnosed her for the past year?” Annie asked, indignant.

“Yes, and when we went to talk to the oncologist she left out all of this information and so I let her ramble on and when she was done I told him about the Crohn's disease,” Olive said.

“Maybe she didn't like the use of the word ‘crone'” Annie said and they laughed.

Annie knew she owed Olive for being there with their mother during every office visit with the oncologist, and asking the pertinent questions. And though Olive had always been able to live with their mother in ways Annie never could; Annie knew it was at a cost. They watched the boys on their first Ferris wheel ride holding hands with eyes like buckets full of stars. The magic in their faces made the idea of driving down to Bakersfield almost bearable.

Annie and Olive taught her to drink at disco bars that Mae visited like butterfly gardens, fluttering like a fritillary from milkweed to goldenrod to purple coneflowers. She'd sip frozen drinks like nectar-bearing flowers. All of the years Mae had taught dancing at Arthur Murray's finally paid off. People would actually leave the dance floor to watch her, like in the old time movies. She looked blissful and ethereal.

After the divorce, Pablo remained in his hometown of Bakersfield. He still loved Mae to the total exclusion of anyone or anything else in his life, including his children. He bought her a condo in Bakersfield back in the 80's for her infrequent trips out West. He had a plan and it worked because she eventually settled there.

Annie had been forced to spend several summers in Bakersfield as a child and had fond memories only of eating at Buck-O's drive in, the eponymous burger establishment owned by Buck Owens, patron saint of Bakersfield. Annie often said he didn't have the sense God gave a gnat, or he never would have settled in Bake-0.

Annie reached her mother's house after suffering through bumper to bumper traffic with brakelights screaming in Munch-ian redness past the L.A. airport, past the Getty and down, down the grapevine into Dante's inferno--flat and brown, it wavered oppressively like a mirage one never wants to actually exist—Bakersfield. There used to be a billboard that read— Sun, Fun, Stay, Play! But Annie guessed they had to take that down since it was now dangerous to “play” outside in the heat. She arrived at her mother's condominium complex and ran from her air-conditioned car to her mother's air-conditioned house.

Mae's house was a myriad of golds and pale greens. She really had a knack for decorating, Annie thought. Whereas Annie's house was always decorated in early American hodgepodge, Mae's was a mini Versailles. All of her china plates decorated the walls like eyes all around. She bought all of her furniture in North Carolina, home of the best-made furniture, but then had it stripped and repainted on an almost yearly basis as her moods changed from Tuscany to France. Her home was beautiful but uncomfortable. The only place anyone over eighty pounds could really sit without possibly breaking anything was on her couch. Mae was perched at the end of this couch like a brilliant butterfly. Annie always saw her mother as an exotic species of butterfly, a Phoebus with iridescent wings: fragile but also quite powerful in a graceful way.

Annie had dealt with the possibility of Mae's breast cancer and subsequent diagnosis by trying not to incite an argument with her mother and agreeing with anything she said. Once you disagreed with Mae (and of her children, Annie was the only one with enough courage to take her to the mat), you had to suffer her wrath: she would never, under any circumstances in the history of Annie's life, admit when she was wrong. Annie kept repeating to herself—she's sick, after all, which she hoped would be enough to nullify any and all petty frustrations, but within a matter of five minutes Annie's stomach was a boiling pit. After eating the grilled vegetables Mae had prepared on her new George Forman grillomatic, Annie launched into her argument, parsing out words and testing Mae's reaction to each before she went on.

“Did Dr. Snodgrass call you today?” Annie asked.

“I talked to Dr. Patel and he said that he couldn't figure out what's going on with my stomach. All he cares about is getting me into his office so he can get his office fee and then run tests that I don't need in order to get more money out of me. I tell you Annie, the whole thing's a racket.”

Annie knew what was coming—the whole diatribe about how the medical industry is a huge sieve designed to extract money from hapless patients who happily give it over because they are in a weakened state that the doctors exploit, blah, blah, blah. Annie had heard it a million times, and could not bear to hear it again, but she listened, because . . . her mother had breast cancer. Annie told herself that these delay tactics where merely her mother's way of saying she was scared to death and didn't want her breasts lobbed off like so much foreskin, didn't want major surgery, didn't want to get rid of the twins that had served her so well all these years. Mae never verbalized how she felt and Annie sensed she didn't admit these fears even to herself.

After her speech Annie let loose: “Mom, haven't we already established that Dr. Patel is incompetent? Didn't we come to this conclusion a year ago when he misdiagnosed your Crohn's disease as diverticulitis? If your stomach is torn up, you need to tell Dr. Snodgrass who can refer you to a gastroenterologist. You need to not be in this town where the act of breathing is risky business. I want to take you back to Olive's tomorrow. I'll talk to Dr. Snodgrass and get the ball rolling on your surgery. You can't stay here and act like everything's all right. We do not want the cancer to metastasize, we are all freaked out mother, do you understand?”

“Oh, I know,” said Mae. “Your brother called me last night and I told him, ‘I must be dying because all my children called me in one day.' Your brother's so sweet, he said he'd come down if I wanted him to.” Mae possessed that Southern tradition of privileging the male. Annie realized that if he came, he'd hook up with old drug friends, go out and party all night and come back to her house and pass out. She'd wake up, no matter how sick, and fix an elaborate breakfast and make his bed and he would accept all of her labors as his due and wouldn't realize there was anything wrong with working her in this way. The other unsaid point was that Annie's brother wouldn't have called if Olive hadn't called him up crying and saying, “Mom is going to die if she doesn't have the surgery!”

Annie said, “Mom, do you realize you have cancer? Of course we're all going to call, we love you, we don't want to lose you, but you have to face reality, you have to have the surgery.”

“You know, Annie, I really don't think there's a rush. I just wanted to come down here and water my plants and get my pink Dior robe to wear in the hospital. I intend on going back soon.”

“Tomorrow. We have to go tomorrow. I'm going to call Dr. Snodgrass now and make the appointment for the consultation with the plastic surgeon who'll do the reconstruction. Remember, this is the appointment you missed on Friday?”

“Really, Annie, I don't need to have reconstruction, I mean, I'm 60 years old, I don't need them anymore,” Mae said, as she looked down at her breasts and touched them unconsciously.

“I know you don't need them,” Annie said, “But they are a part of you, like your hands or feet. You don't just get rid of them and not expect repercussions. Honestly mom, I thought you'd made up your mind about all of this.”

In a tiny voice Mae said, “Well, I suppose I could be ready to go tomorrow. I really need to trim my plants back. You know your father is worthless when it comes to watering my plants when I'm away.”

“I know, Mom, I'll trim the plants today and help you pack, Annie insisted. “I'll get the neighbor woman to water them. They'll be fine. I'll go cut off all the dead leaves and old flowers so they can survive the inferno that is August in Bakersfield. They'll all be blooming in September when you get back,” she said, and hugged her mother and felt her ribs catch beneath the satin of her house dress.

Annie grabbed the silver trimming shears and went outside in the 104-degree heat. The faucet branded her hand as she turned on the water, careful not to let it touch the plants until it cooled down. She then left it running at her feet because she liked the sound of water. At home in the mountains, a creek ran through their property. It would swell up during the fall rains and threaten to overflow its banks, though it hadn't yet. Annie surveyed the garden to see what she could save and what had been left too long neglected. Mae had many plants more suited to the Eastern coastal region of the United States, rather than a desert landscape. Annie had encouraged her to plant a succulent garden but could only see one, a portulaca with tiny yellow and pink flowers. Annie cut dead leaves off of begonias and hydrangeas until all that was left was green. She frantically pruned dead or semi-dead black-eyed Susans, purple coneflowers, hyacinths, and an anorexic azalea until nothing remained except the blooms, alive and vibrant in palettes of yellow, purple and pink. Sweat pooled between her breasts and all the creases of her body began to drip and she cried.

The next day they drove back up the grapevine towards Los Angeles. The brown horizon shimmered like amber in her rearview mirror and grew smaller until nothing remained of it except the taste of dust in Annie's mouth. She thought, everything's all right now. She's going to be well. Annie believed she could see it off in the distance in a place no one would ever mistake for hell.