My first reaction is to scream. Scream out because I'm not ready. So when my ears are filled with my own high pitched screeches. My lip starts to quiver, my teeth chattering underneath them. Through the darkness, I can see nothing but a black sheet of nothing. Then an over head interrogation light flicks on and there's a girl, she wears a hospital gown identical to mine. She's crying, well she sounds like she's crying, her sobs sirening through the thick musty air. I can't see her face.
She rushes forward and embraces me in a tight squeeze, my anxiety starts to flare up and I try to fight my way out of her grip. But she holds me tighter. I start to fight harder, thrashing against her body. Then she grabs my shoulders and shakes my shoulders violently. "WAKE UP VICTORIA!" She screams into my face.
So that's what I do, I wake up.
The scare of everything, the anxiety, the panic, it makes me cry with my eyes squeezed shut. My lip quivers furiously, making my teeth chatter. I go to cover my ears and find my hands have already found their way to my head, blocking out the cruel world that holds me like a prisoner.
"Vic, I'm here. I'm right here. It's me. You're okay, you're safe." Through my hands I can hear him. I can hear Ethan, but I'm too afraid that this isn't real, and I'm only going to open my eyes to the pain of not having him. "Breathe Vic, it's me Ethan. I'm real, I'm here." I feel his hands around me, his warm touch that I find comfort in. Putting all my trust in his hands, I open my eyes, they flutter as tears stream down my red cheeks.
I see him. His perfect face. His beautiful eyes. He gently departs my shaking hands from my throbbing head, only to put my hands on either side of his own face. I feel his jaw, I feel that he actually is here.
"See I'm real." He smiles. "I'm here." He says.
"Ethan?" I cry. "I thought I was dead. I didn't get to say goodbye." I helplessly sob. He hugs me again, he lays down with my shaking body in his arms. My face buried in his hoodie, he holds me. Ceasing the shaking, until it slowly fades into small twitches in my lip. With the shaking gone, I get a grip on myself and stop crying. Just like before, Ethan's hold on me brings me back.
While laying in the darkness, Ethan shushing me gently, rubbing his hands up and down my back ever so slowly. Soft coos and whispers fall from his lips to my ears. With the graze of his large hands, all the fine hairs on my body stand on end and an unnoticeable shiver sprints down my spine.
Each word he says, immediately sending butterflies into a flutter deep within my stomach. His words never to be forgotten.
"I should take you home, your mom is probably worried." Ethan suggests with a sigh, his fingers now running through my hair. His hands give a warm feeling to my head, that feeling spreading to my toes as his fingers continue to rake through my loose brown waves.
"Ya." Is all I can say. I can feel that he doesn't want me to leave, the way he never stops caressing my hair, and how he doesn't make a move to stand. I don't want to leave either. I could lay here in his arms until the day I die and be completely happy with my being.
"Who am I kidding what are we even doing?" He shakes his head and slips into a sitting position. I study him, his arm, his jaw. I see all the muscles tense and release, tense and release. They continue to their cycle until he turns his head to look at me. Even in the dark lighting of the room, I see his eyes seem father than the rooms boundaries, off in some far away land yet set on mine like he owns them.
"Well, I could always leave of you want me to." I offer, trying to be polite.
"You didn't answer my question though." He turns back to face the far wall.
"I don't know, why don't you answer that question." It's hard to say what are both picking at. It's the huge pink elephant in the room filled with tiny black mice, something that everyone sees and no one wants to point out.
"I wanted to lay with you.." he trails off and cocks his jaw off to the side. "I wanted to lay with you because..." like a fire running out of oxygen to burn, his words slowly die out. Leaving only his thoughts to know those hidden words. "because you're important to me." He suggests quietly as if the words were only meant for him to hear. "because I don't want you to leave." His fingers intertwine with one another. His hands start to squeeze together, the color draining from his skin with the strain. I slide myself up next to him and put a hand over his intertwined fists.
"I'm still here though aren't I?" I feel the tension in his hands release and he looks up to me. His eyes dig deep into mine, but I don't know what he's searching for. All you'll find is a poor girl with a broken heart who is slowly desiccating.
"Yes, and you are still most beautiful girl I've ever seen." All the blood in my body seems to rush into my face and I have to take a deep breath to keep my heart from fluttering out of my chest. I look down at our hands for a moment, hoping and praying my hands don't start sweating. He called me beautiful.
"It's a shame you think that, you would've liked me more before all this happened.." I lift my hand from his and stand up to search for my phone. I find it and jam it into my back pocket. I look at him sitting there, his body slouched over, his head bowed, starring into the palms of his open hands. "I was really fun, ya know?" I smile at the remembrance of the endearing memories long gone.
Ethan lifts his head and stands abruptly, and with one large stride the space between us has diminished completely, with wide eyes, I stare up at him as he slowly brings his vast hand to the side of my cheek, to cup my face. "But I like you now." He says, his green and brown eyes flicking back and forth between mine. He looks as if there is too many feelings tied up inside. So when his words fall "But I love you now." I freeze and tense up ever so slightly so he doesn't notice. Ethan's words are filled with such emotion that it scares me. So when he leans into me a bit more, slowly moving his lips closer to mine, I push my face to his chest and hug him instead as my hands start to shake vigorously.
"I'm sorry." I whisper so quietly I don't think he hears me. "I.. I.. I'm so sorry." Like a coward caught up in a tizzy. I twist around, grab 'Phil', and speed down the stairs to the door. I shut it and hear Ethan's pleads behind me. But I keep running until I get the the sidewalk. I find myself completely out of breath. The pain in my side returns and I start to panic. If this turns into a problem I will have to go back to the hospital, I will have to die in the hospital.
I cough into my hand and see the hot, thick blood I've grown to hate. Oh shit. I continue to cough, with each heave I find myself feeling more and more dizzy, like my body is slowly shutting down. I hear Ethan's muffled yells from behind me. My respiration picks up, sounding as I've just finished a marathon.
My eyes roll into the back of my head. My legs give out and the cement from the sidewalk bites my hands and knees. The last thing I hear is Ethan's cries for help, then I fade from the world.
YOU ARE READING
cancer, egd
Fanfiction"Wait, so why did you want to do this?" I ask. "Why not?" "I don't know." I look around the dull room. "It's boring." "The only the boring about this is the way you are currently thinking." He laughs, propping his legs up on my bed like he owns it...
