Living With Animals

Chapter 5

Claire P.O.V

Time: 8:17 PM

Acute Myeloid Leukemia.

The words play over in my head, like a record stuck on repeat as the boys bang in the door. I haven't come out of my room and Isabelle promised not to tell them anything so no one knows.

The fact that I had this when I was younger makes this all harder, because it scares me that if I do survive, it will come back later in life.

I sit in my bed, legs under the comforter, and stare at the wall, while Alexa and Katie plays in the background.

Alexa had Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia and survived. But that's just a TV show and it's a different type of cancer than mine. And even if I do survive, which I hopefully will, this has still ruined my life. I already had even before this, when I had it when I was 13. It hardly crossed my mind when we were in the doctor's office, and they hadn't brought it up. They were able to treat it quickly. Chemo and then the surgery. Just like they are going to now.

"Claire Ellorie Johnson, open this door please. We want to know what's going on," I hear my brother was from outside.

I sigh and get up, walking up to the door and getting hit with a wave of dizziness, causing me to stumble and hit a couple of things off the desk. I pick up the pencil and the bottle of pills that feel off the floor.

The pills are to help until the real treatment begins. The chemo. Also known as hell.

"What do you want?" I ask as I open the door.

"What's going on Claire. You haven't even said more than 5 words to us."

"I went to the doctor like Drew suggested." Everyone looks at him and he shrugs. "It wasn't a blood clot." He perks up.

"So it's not as bad as I thought?" he asks. He has no clue.

"Nope." Everyone smiles. My hands get shaky and my breathing accelerates. "100 times worse." Everyone's smiles drop, and i'm crying. Mason gives me a hug.

"What is it?" Connor asks.

"Acute Myeloid Leukemia."

"Cancer?" Everyone asks besides Drew and Mason. They know that it is Cancer but they also know that it's much worse than they think.

"It's not super bad is it? I mean what's the survival rate? And can't you just get chemotherapy?" Mason asks. So clueless.

"Mase, the survival rate is- 67%. And I have to get chemo. You know this. You've seen it all before." He's crying. I can add this to the list of time i've seen him cry.

"What's going on?" someone asks, happily. It's Jacob. He sees us and then frowns. "Oh. What's going on? Who's life did I ruin this time?"

"You didn't ruin anyone's life. My life was ruined and it wasn't by you," I inform him.

"Surprisingly," Drew mutters.

"Then who ruined it?" he asks.

"Leukemia," I answer, barely loud enough to for him to hear but he did.

"Oh, Claire. I'm so sorry." Before I know what's going on, his arms are wrapped around me, giving me a huge hug. I hug him back, after calming myself down when I flinch.

"It's fine. There is nothing you can do about it. So can I go feel sorry for myself for once in my life?" they nod and I notice Mason's biting his lip. "Mason. What are you hiding?"

"So you remember everything from 5 years ago?"

"Everything. To think that I actually forgot it for a moment, because I don't want to think about it 24/7. I should have known what it was when I started getting these symptoms. I should have remembered. Now because I didn't, it's much worse than it was when I was 11." He sighs and holds his face in his hand.