The Fault In Our Stars: Augustus Lives

Chapter sixteen

It was one week after the drunk incident. Gus and I were packing up some stuff from his basement to bring to the new house.

"God, I'm so excited!" He said, as he put some books in a box.

"About what? Not living in this crusty basement?" I replied, folding up a blanket and throwing it into a basket.

He smiled and walked over to me. He wrapped me in a big hug from behind. "Yeah that, and the fact that our house is bigger and we have more privacy." He said, his lips next to my ear. I smiled and turned around.

"That's good too. Well I can't wait either. I can barely breathe knowing I can't be there right now."

He made a face. "Oh really? Well I'M so excited to get there that I can't feel my legs." he said laughing.

I heard Isaac upstairs walking towards the basement door with his mom. "Yo, Gus man, I'm here."

"Come on down!" Gus shouted.

I waited a second until Isaac was walking down the stairs by himself, using the railing to do so. "Well I'M so excited," I said as he looked back over at me, "that I can't see straight." Gus laughed again, harder this time.

Isaac attempted to stare in our direction, but instead stared at the wall behind us. Gus and I tried to stifle out laughs, but pretty much failed. "What about this situation is so funny that you feel like you MUST make horrible puns about my disability? Maintenant que tout est grossier. Je suis tellement honte de vous. Honte honte honte." (Look it up on Google Translate. It's French for you  AMATEURS! Jk ily ppls)

"The shame you feel for us is nothing compared to our beautiful love story." I said, staring at Gus's eyes. They're so beautiful. They looked like stars. 

"Hey, being cheesy is my thing!" Gus said with a fake pout. "And I didn't know you spoke French you sassy French child."

I just looked at him. "What, you don't?"
We all started laughing and Gus fell on the floor. I started wheezing. Gus immediately got up off of the floor and came over to me to see if I was okay. I gave him a thumbs up.

"Don't die on me." He said with a sigh of relief. All of the humor from before was gone. I just looked at him until he realized what he said. He fumbled with his words.

"Isaac?" I said looking over at him.

"I'm going." He said getting up. I went over to help him but he, to my surprise, quickly made his way over to the stairs and half walked half ran up them without a problem. I turned to Gus who was looking at me guiltily. He had a scared look in his eyes.

"Hazel..." He began.

"No Gus. It's fine. We need to talk about this. We need to stop avoiding it."

He looked at me sadly. "Hazel we don't need to talk about this right now-"

"Yes, we do. Gus... I know you love me."

"Of course I do." He said immediately.

I felt horrible for having to say what was coming. "Gus, someday, and someday soon, I'm going to die and there's nothing you can do to prevent it. There's nothing I can do. My tumors are getting bigger, it's harder to breathe, my lungs fill up more often, and the doctor said that I only have a few months left."

He had this tiny spark of anger in his eyes showing just above all the sadness. "Hazel this is not a conversation I want to have." He said, getting upset.

"Well we have to have it!" I said getting slightly angry. "I already told you, I'm a grenade, and when I blow up, the pieces will fly everywhere, in a lot of different directions and you won't know what to do, or where to go. It's going to hurt, and I don't want you to hurt so you need to be prepared for it! I can't le-"