THE NIGHT BEFORE MY DOUBLE MASTECTOMY |
Kim Horner

Inherited genetic mutation.

Deleterious. High risk. BRCA2. 

Tumor suppressors,

faulty brakes. Don’t eat after midnight.

I set my alarm for 4 a.m. Stare 

at the TV. Breast cancer killed

my grandmother at 43.

Great-grandmother, great

uncle. My mom, diagnosed last year.

She will take me to the hospital.

The surgeon will cut 

under each breast, scoop tissue,

reduce my risk.

She drew a diagram that looks like

two smiles across my chest.

The plastic surgeon

will slide in a silicone bag the size

of a flattened hamburger bun. Fill the blob

with small amounts of liquid each week

to stretch the skin for the implants.

The testimonials promise

perfect, perky boobs. I pack the pajamas

toothbrush, toothpaste.

I find my little baby blue

photo album with pictures of my son.

Me holding him in the hospital

when he was born

nine years ago. Him with a messy mouth. 

Him in a pumpkin Halloween costume.

Him with his arms around me,

me never wanting to let him go.

The hospital doesn’t allow kids 

his age to visit. I put the album 

in the front pocket of my bag.

Kim Horner is author of the memoir Probably Someday Cancer, winner of a Foreword INDIE Gold award, and her work has appeared in Lana Turner, So It Goes and the Texas Observer. Horner, a former newspaper reporter, earned an MFA in creative nonfiction from the University of Arkansas at Monticello and is a PhD in literature candidate at the University of Texas at Dallas.

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