Through sickness and in health

37

Thursday

"Bullshit!" Jason shouts walking into the living room. My head pops up whilst I exchange a confused glance with Katie who's on FaceTime to me.
"Babe what's-"
"The lock-in is tomorrow and I can't fucking go"Jason collapses onto the couch with a groan.
"Jay dude come on it's fine. We can do something else" Kai says patting his back.
"What! No! No! We can't!" Wills suddenly awake from his slumber, he has two blankets draped over him as he lies on the beanbag with messy hair.

Jason shoots him a glare looking up from the pillow he had buried his head in.
"Sorry man I love you but it's the lock-in we only get it once a year" will says sheepishly
"Nah it's fine just go, I'm just pissed this is what my life is now" Jason says masking on a smile. I can tell he's putting on an act for the sake of his friends, I think Kai can too judging by the way he's looking at me with sad eyes.

"C'mon let's go bowling" Jason pulls himself up from the couch.
"You still wanna go?" Will asks
"Obviously, I always beat your ass" Jason smiles cockily. Will and Kai exchange worried glances before looking at me then back to Jason.
"What aren't you telling me?" Jason says looking between them.

"Lockwood's going" Kai mumbles
"Fuck sake" Jason groans collapsing back onto the couch.
"Cmon dude don't be like that"
"Don't dude me" Jason grumbles with his face in the pillow.
"Dude" will mocks
"Dude"
"Dude!" Will says this time with a voice crack that sends Kai into a laughing fit as Will throws a pillow at him.
"About time your balls dropped" jason mumbles lifting his head from the pillow. I see the small smile pulling at the corners of his mouth which makes Will smiles proudly knowing he got jason to smile.

*~*

"Jessica's driving out with ivy on the 21st" Jason says. I'm currently laid on his bed with his head on my chest and his body in between my legs and I watch him while he plays video games. Thanks giving is coming up in two weeks meaning we have a week off school.
"No Luke?" Luke's work schedule is weird and it's usually hard for him to get time off. Travelling from Vancouver to Seattle isn't a long drive but with a toddler it's 10 times harder. It's about a 3 hour drive with good traffic, travelling with ivy makes it a 4 hour drive, keeping her occupied, fed, toilet breaks, nap breaks. It's a whole day in the space of 4 hours.

"He's driving out thanksgiving morning so he will get here midday if he leaves early enough" Jason shrugs
"Sorry I can't spend the whole day with you" I sigh running my hands through his hair. Ironically Jason is going to be on chemo during thanks giving meaning on Christmas week he will be too.
"It's chill" he says keeping his eyes locker on the screen still. Jason's being weird, not that I'm surprised. We've been trying to come up with ways for him to be able to go to lock-in but we've come up with nothing good.

"Jack invited me to the house on thanksgiving" Jason says after a minute. He says it so casually making me slightly shocked.
"I said I couldn't come. Mom would die if I spent thanksgiving with him, plus none of them still know about the whole cancer thing. I don't want to put that on Tyler, kids been texting me everyday" Jason says, I notice the small smile tugging on the corner of his lips.

Ever since Tyler showed up at the house and he got Jason's number he's been messaging Jason. It's cute to see him have a younger brother, they're exactly alike too which I'm not sure is a good thing. That doesn't change the shit Jack gave Melissa for 'having not control over her kid and not teaching him the common decency to call worried parents about their 14 year old son' Melissa being Melissa said she had no idea about it, which she didn't in her defence, but come on at least try to dented your kid. I hadn't realised until recently how much stuff Melissa missed because of her work.

"Are you sleeping over tonight?" He asks shooting me a quick glance before looking back to the game.
"I should really go home. I've been spending more time here than I have at my house recently" I sigh thinking of the lecture Mom gave me the other day. She said she liked that I was with my boyfriend and looking after him but he isn't dying. Which was definitely the wrong words because Jason could die. But she recovered that by saying her and dad missed me.

Jason just nods his head. I love watching him focus on something, his tongue peaks out the corner of his mouth, his eyebrows furrowed in concentration. Then he looks away, he looks like he's thinking.
"Are you braiding my hair?" He screeches sitting up and running to his mirror. I can't help but laugh seeing that he's finally noticed. His hair is long enough to put it into a French braid on the top of his head now. I've been wanting to do it for ages just to see how it looks.

"My forehead is huge!" He shouts starting to pull on his hair.
"Babe!" I laugh running over to help him take it out. He groans slapping my hands away and wraps his arms around my waist. He body slams me onto the bed knocking the wind out of me.
"I hate you" he murmurs kissing my stomach.
"I love you too" I smile, his head sticks up as he glares at me. Half a braid is still in his hair with the rest messy and in his face, I break out laughing as he buries his head back on my stomach.
"I missed this side of you" I smile when I find my hands going back to his hair to take the remaining part of the braid out. He doesn't say anything, just stays in the spot he is in but I know he's heard me.