Being happy didn't last long.
The fairytale I was living in slowly started to fade away, and I went from having a glass slipper to having a pumpkin carriage.
It started a few days after my birthday barbeque. I woke up screaming in the middle of the night from the pain. My parents ran through my room and without even asking anything, my dad carried me to the car and they took me to the hospital.
What I haven't been honest about is that I haven't been taking my pills. And I have been skipping going to chemo. My parents couldn't always go with me, so i told them I was going when I actually wasn't. Because I always felt like shit whenever I went. It always reminded me of the painful truth,the tragic reality.
"Maisie, you gotta work with me kiddo. Take your pills, and don't skip your chemo sessions. Do you want your year?" My doctor asked. He was one of my dad's friends.
"Yeah, Jack I want my year." I nodded.
"Then promise me, you'll help me while I help you." He said and I nodded again agreeing with him.
I had to stay in the hospital for a couple of days to regain my strength and get better. I didn't want to tell anyone and by anyone I mean Grace, Ashton or Darren. But they found out anyways. Lucky me!
"Maisie!" Grace burst through the door, Ashton and Darren following behind, all three of them wearing worried expressions.
"I'm fine." I stated, but I guess my pale face and dead eyes gave another impression.
"What were you thinking? Maisie, why did you stop the pills?!" She continued blabbering on and on.
"Okay, Mom! I'm sorry, just please can we move on." I said with a tired smile.
When she wouldn't shut up and continued talking on and on, I moved my eyes to the other two. Darren was trying to calm down Grace, while Ashton. Ashton was standing a few feet away from the bed, arms crossed, facing the floor.
"Grace! As Miley once said to Lilly, build a bridge, and get over it."
She must've realized that it really annoyed me, so she finally stopped talking.
"I'm sorry, it's just-" she was starting to talk again but I cut her off.
"Grace, apology accepted. It's okay." I calmly said holding her hand.
Her eyes teared up and she said she wanted to get coffee and left the room. Darren wished me a quick recovery and followed Grace down to the cafeteria, leaving me alone with the silent boy.
"If you keep chewing on those nails, you're gonna end up in a bed next to me." I said sarcastically.
"Bad habit." He said with a low voice.
"Yeah it is... Stop it Ash, it's not good." I said getting annoyed by the image.
"How could you do something like that Maisie?! I thought I lost you. "He slowly said finally gathering up the courage to look at me.
He though he lost me.
For some reason that sentence kept replaying at the back of my head.
"Ashton-" I started to say, only to get cut off.
"You know what my first thought was when Grace called me in the middle of the night crying last night?!"
"She shouldn't have done that." I said getting mad at my best friend for doing that.
"No I'm glad she did. Do you know what my first thought was?"
"No." I said in an obvious way.
"I thought, what am I gonna do if something has happened to her? I couldn't move on Maisie, I couldn't go on living, if something had happened to you."
And that's when it hit me. The things he said on my birthday were all true. Me and Ashton were too attached to each other, it wasn't gonna end well for either of us. I knew what i had to do. No matter how much it was gonna hurt.
"I'm sorry." I whispered.
"Promise me you'll take care of yourself." He said walking over to me cupping my cheeks, and placing a kiss on my forehead.
"Ashton, sit down."
"What's wrong?" He said sitting on the bed next to me.
"I like you and you like me, there's no surprise there, we've stablished that."
"Yeah." He smiled holding my hand.
"Which is exactly why we can't keep doing this."
He let go of my hand slowly. "What?"
"This whole fake dating thing Ash. We're not even really dating, and it's already affecting you. We can't keep doing this. I dont want to do this to you, i dont want you to go through this. I'll send you the rest of the checks, just like I promised-"
"Whoah whoa, what makes you think I'm still in this for the money?! Maisie come on. And it's not your choice."
"It is my choice. We're too attached Ashton, this isn't gonna last, you know that. I don't want to hurt you any more than I already am. You know my situation. We should end this while we still have the chance to get over each other." I said as a tear rolled down.
"If you could see yourself right now, you'd know that what you said is pure bullshit, because we won't get over each other." He said and left slamming the door behind him.
The next day, I was discharged from the hospital. Grace and Darren found out about what happened. I tried calling Ashton the next day, to make sure that everything will be okay between us, that we can remain friends. But he either ignored my call, or asked Darren to lie to me saying he's busy with his sister.
Two months passed and no word from Ashton. I haven't even seen him around the diner, or the movies, or anywhere for that matter. I don't know where he is, what he's doing. He never calls, or answers my texts. I can't come up with the courage to go to his house, because I'm pretty sure he'll slam the door in my face, and I'm just not ready for that kind of treatment. Speaking of treatment, I have been going to all my chemo sessions, and taking all my pills. My last two months of summer went by pretty dull. Not having Ashton around with his cute surprises and gestures was hard considering I was used to it. But I knew I did the right thing. I guess my parents were right, it wasn't fair for him or me. I realized that a little late, after we both had fallen for each other. But you know what they say, better late than never right? Not having Ashton around also had me distracted from trying to be distracted. I kept on thinking about the situation I was in just like before. About what will happen after I die.
Before I knew it, October had arrived, so did my senior year. This is not how I imagined my first day of school will begin, seeing Ashton with his "friends" ignoring me like he always had. The thing that most annoyed me was that Bianca was all over him, and he didn't seem annoyed by that as he was before.
"Just ignore them." Grace said slamming her locker.
"Easier said than done. " I said slamming mine as well.
The next thing I knew, the bitch walked over to me.
"Hey Maisie. How was your summer?"
"Perfect considering I didn't have to see your face all day everyday." I said mastering my most expensive fake smile. Hers though, wasn't good considering I could see the result of my insult.
"By the way, no hard feelings. But I told you he'll dump you sooner or later. You should have listened to me."
"Right, thank you for that advice. And in return I would just like to tell you I'm glad that you're the rebound and not some other petty girl who's in love with him."
"I'm not a rebound." She chuckled getting angry.
"We'll see. There's nothing wrong with that." I patted her on the head.
She was about to say something, but Ashton cut her off. "Bianca! Let's go!" He yelled, making her cheeks go red from the embarrassment of being yelled at, while he looked away avoiding my gaze.
I have never thought things would be like this between me and Ashton. What I had in mind of how this was gonna end, is so much different than how it really ended. I always thought, I'd hand him his last check and say "thanks for everything, I hope you can make it to my funeral." Instead, we fell in love and then broke up and now he won't even look at me.
I'm starting to doubt if what I did was the right thing or not. And as much as I want to say "No it wasn't" everything else seems to prove otherwise.