Chapter 22: That Was Strangely Philosophical
“Are you trying to get frisky?” I sleepily ask Bradley the following morning as my eyes flutter open and I feel one of his hands rubbing up and down my thigh underneath the covers as he continually peppers my neck with light kisses.
“No,” He denies with a gentle laugh, his cool breath brushing across my neck as he drops his head down onto my pillow. “But could you really blame me if I were? You’ve been giving me mad blue balls since like, last week,” Bradley complains to me with a loud and very dramatic groan. I can tell that he’s only kidding though and that he’s not actually angry— a little sexually frustrated, maybe, but he definitely isn’t seriously upset with me. Honestly, Bradley is hardly even like, legitimately pissed at me. I mean, we have those cute little coupley banters all the time, but those don’t count because obviously they aren’t real. He only really gets mad at me whenever I do something stupid- *cough* the Drew thing *cough*— so if he was going to be mad at me about something, it’d definitely be because of something a bit more serious than our sex lives.
“I’m sorry, Bradford,” I reply with a small giggle, rolling over in the bed so that I’m facing him before I push my lips into his gently.
“That’s okay,” He mutters against my lips. “I’m sure you can find some sort of way to make it up to me,” Bradley retorts, suddenly rolling over on top of me, leaning down and brushing his lips lightly against mine as he holds himself up over me on his elbows.
“I’m sure I can,” I agree with a nod and another giggle, knowing that Bradley and I are supposed to be spending the day alone together. Alone as in like, none of our friends(or anyone else for that matter) will be with us. That happens so sporadically, the two of us being all alone, so I already know that we’ll be taking full advantage of it, if you catch my drift. I mentioned the Milan thing to him yesterday and he said that he was totally fine with it, so after we leave the hospital— we’re going there so that we can all get our bone marrow tested to see if it’s a match to Walker’s— we’re going to the train station and then we’re going to take a train to Milan. We’re staying at a hotel there tonight and then we’re going to leave and come back here to Rome tomorrow night.
Obviously we’re not just going to be there at the hotel the entire time that we’re there though, I’m sure we’ll go sight-seeing and other fun stuff like that. Bradley seems to think that ever since the thing with Walker came to the light, I’m like, permanently grumpy, which isn’t true at all because I’m not in the least bit grumpy— I’m gut-wrenched, which is— if you’ve ever been in my situation— you know, completely understandable, given the circumstances and just everything else that’s happened these past few months. I think that I can honestly say that this has been the absolute worst summer of my entire life and that’s just so tragic considering the fact that I’m in freaking Europe— more specifically, freaking Italy.
“God, I love you,” He randomly informs me, obviously excited about the idea— for what, I don’t know because it’s not like I’ve deprived him of having sex, because I mean, I obviously don’t do that. It’s just that ever since we were informed about Walker’s diagnosis, I’ve just devoted so much of my time to him. Walker, I mean. And that’s part of the reason that Bradley and I are going away together tonight, so that we can like, re-connect and such. I don’t know for sure how much longer I have with my boyfriend and I want to cherish every single millisecond of the little bit of time that we do have left together.
I mean, this time next month, we’ll all be about to head our separate ways to our separate universities and after that, we won’t see each other anymore. We’ll still be friends though, of course but not as close. That’s just not even practical for me to assume that the six of us would still be as close to each other as we are now even though we’re not going to see each other anymore. Well, not until like, Thanksgiving, which isn’t even until the freaking end of November.
“Not as much as I love you,” I chirp truthfully, changing our position by rolling from underneath him so that he’s now lying on his back and I’m straddling him, sitting atop the very lower part of his stomach, which is bare because he’s got a real distaste for wearing shirts to sleep, Bradley does.
In fact, all he ever really wears to sleep are his boxers, which I don’t really mind at all because it gives me 24/7 full access to his beautifully and gorgeously toned and tanned torso. I lean down to Bradley, gently placing my lips on his, ready to engulf us in a full but brief make-out session since we probably have to be leaving soon to head to the hospital.
Bradley rests one hand on my waist, slipping it underneath the big t-shirt that I’m wearing that belongs to him and places the other one of my bare thigh. My hands work on their own accord too, one of them tracing over the planes of his stomach and the other one teasingly tugging on the waistband of his plaid boxer shorts.
He slyly slips his tongue in my mouth and I let out a small moan. We roll around there on the bed, kissing and groping each other lightly and just as he starts easing my (his) t-shirt up over my head, my bedroom door bursts open without warning and I let out a startled yelp, successfully falling off of the Bradley and toppling off of the side of the bed, hitting the floor with a thud, my head just barely missing the nightstand.
“Jesus Christ, Drew, haven’t you ever heard of knocking?” I irritably snap, glaring up at my stupid friend all awkwardly, red-faced and out of breath.
“Um, sorry— I thought you said 10:30 is when we were leaving to go to the hospital? It’s 11 o’clock right now,” He explains, pulling his iPhone out of the pocket of his khaki knee shorts and checking the time then putting it up.
“Is it really?” I ask, grabbing my own iPhone off of the bedside table nightstand thingy that I almost just banged my head again when I fell down. I unlock it— I’m not even really sure why I have a lock on my phone because literally all of the guys know the passcode to it. I didn’t tell them, they just figured it out because they know me so well. Since it’s a four letter password, I did the first and most prominent four letter word that I could think of at the time: dean. As in Dean Winchester from Supernatural because that man is perfect and there’s nothing you can say to convince me otherwise. “Oh,” I say, realizing that it actually is 11 now. “I guess we just like, lost track of time. We we— ”
“I do not want to hear about your sex escapades— I was just wondering if we’re still going,” Drew interjects, raising his hand to stop my talking.
“That is not what I was going to say, stupid,” I tell him, rolling my eyes at his stupid-ness. “But yeah, we’re still going, of course. We’ll just meet you and everyone else downstairs in like, ten minutes,” I inform him.
“Alright, well, whatever you say,” Drew responds with a small sigh and chuckle before turning away from Bradley and me and walking out of the room, closing the bedroom door on his way out.
“Is it weird that I still sort of feel bad about the thing with Drew?” I sheepishly ask Bradley as he reaches down to the floor, grabbing my hand and pulling me back up into the bed with him.
“What thing? If you mean the fact that he’s still madly in love with you, then no, I don’t think that it’s weird that you still feel weird about it. I mean, it makes complete sense to me— he’s our friend, so you obviously don’t want to hurt him and neither do I. Still though, just because he’s our friend, that doesn’t mean that we need to put our own happiness on the backburner just so that his feelings can be spared or whatever,” Bradley casually explains in that same tone of voice that his dad uses whenever he’s trying to explain a surgery to the family of his patients, you know, since he’s a surgeon.
“That was strangely philosophical,” I note, realizing that Bradley is actually right. Even though I love Drew with all of my heart— as I do all of my guys, apart from Bradley, I love him with all of my heart and with every other piece of me— I can’t just stop being happy just because he doesn’t like me being with Bradley. Especially not after I fought so hard to get them both back— Bradley as my boyfriend and Drew as my best friend.
“Well, I am a very philosophical guy from time to time,” He tells me matter-of-factly with a goofy grin, leaning over and kissing me on the cheek. That makes me blush, him kissing my cheek, though I’m not quite sure why. Probably because cheek kisses are just so sweet and adorable and so like, chaste compared to what we were doing just two minutes ago, which was shoving our tongues down each other’s throats and feeling one another up. I mean, that sounds really dirty in that context but it was a lot less dirty than I just described it as being.
“I’ve noticed,” I giggle, getting up from the bed and walking over to my closet, pulling it open as I begin to rifle through the materials for something to wear today. I took a shower last night, for which I’m thankful for since we’re running just a little behind on time. The train that Bradley and I are going to catch to Milan arrives at the station at 12 o’clock and right now, it’s just after 11:00. Hopefully then, this bone marrow transplant test thingy doesn’t take too long. “Hey, can I ask you a question? It’s kind of serious,” I say to Bradley as something that I’ve been thinking a lot about as of late finds its way back into my cranium, totally and completely invading my thoughts. It’s not something that I particularly enjoy thinking about but it’s something that I occasionally have to think about because I know it’s coming and it’s coming real soon and there’s nothing I can do about it except accept it.
“Sure,” Bradley complies with my request and I hear him sit up in the bed behind me. “What’s up?” He wonders.
“So, you know how you said you got accepted into that university in London?” I ask him, which is a super dumb question because I know he remembers. I mean, you don’t just get accepted into an amazing college in a freaking foreign country and then forget about it— that just doesn’t happen to anyone ever.
“Yeah, Syd, I remember that,” Bradley confirms with a chuckle. “Why?”
“Just wondering,” I mumble with a shrug that I try to make come off as careless but I don’t think that it’s believable. “Are you gonna go there?” I query, my voice trembling slightly in anticipation of what his answer might be. That’s another reason that I still have my back turned to him right now, trying to pick out something to wear is just a façade. I never pick out what I’m going to wear unless it’s for something special like a party or a date with Bradley or something. For just a casually normal day though, I just grab the first t-shirt and pair of pants out that I can find and throw it on.
“No, I’m not going to England just for college, Sydney,” He denies with no hesitation at all. “I’m going wherever you’re going,” Bradley enlightens me, getting down off of the bed. I only know that he’s getting out of the bed because I can hear him walking. Suddenly, his arms wrap around my waist lightly and he rests his chin on my shoulder and I almost giggle at what he must look like doing that. He’s obviously crouching down because I’m so much shorter than him. It’s really not fair at all, this whole height thing. Why isn’t everyone just the same height? That’d make everyone’s lives a whole heck of a lot easier and I know I’m not the only one thinking that.
“I don’t even know where I’m going yet though,” I giggle, leaning into Bradley slightly as I take out a pair of greenish-blueish shorts that are probably too short, but I really like them so I’m going to wear them anyways. I also take out a cute Vila Kaktus Short top that almost matches the shorts in hue only it’s a few shades darker, I think. It’s a ¾’s sleeve type thing so I could potentially pass out in the Italian summer heat if I wore it but that’s a risk I’m will to take because it is just so cute.
“Then neither do I, but when you decide, let me know,” Bradley says, letting me go so that I can go over to my dresser and take out a bra before getting dressed quickly. “Where’d you apply to anyway?” He queries.
“UPenn, Lake Superior State, Lake Michigan College, Washington State and Florida State,” I explain as I begin to finger comb my hair, deciding to actually wear it down today just because I don’t feel like trying to perfect a messy bun and I don’t really like ponytails that much. I also slip on a pair of a brown leather thong sandals and then put a cute pair of adorable yet simple polished rose gold heart studs.
“Well, my dad went to Harvard, which is an Ivy League like UPENN so maybe as an alumni, he can get the admissions officers to get me in there and I’ll refuse to go without you and they’ll have no choice but to let you in,” Bradley suggests, smiling widely because I guess he’s proud of himself for coming up with such a plan.
“No, Bradford,” I giggle, rolling my eyes and shaking my head. “Firstly, you’re a freaking genius, literally you’re like the hotter, older and living version of Jimmy Neutron or whatever that guy’s name was from that TV show. So, yeah, you can totally get into any Ivy League you want without your dad’s help and I’m no Walker or anybody, so I don’t think they’re gonna let me in— my mom said made me chose five to apply to though and that was just the last one I thought of it,” I inform him with a small shrug because I know I’m not getting into UPENN and I really don’t care— as long as I get into one or more of the other four colleges I applied at. Like I said about Walker though, he’s super smart and he got accepted in a lot of Ivy Leagues— Yale University, Princeton University and Columbia University.
“What’re you talking about— you’re plenty smart, you can get into UPENN,” Bradley assures me, knitting his eyebrows together in confusion.
“Okay, sure,” I appease him even though I know it isn’t true. Not that I think I’m stupid, because I don’t but there’s two different types of smart in this world. There’s the people that just have exceptionally large brains and are just unfairly good at storing stuff in their brains, like Bradley and Walker and then there are smart people like me who tend to collapse under pressure. “I’m gonna go and brush my teeth and you need to get dressed, mister,” I tell Bradley, grabbing my tooth brush and walking of my bedroom, heading towards the bathroom.
“Wait, what’s wrong with what I’m wearing?” He calls after me, following into the hallway but he doesn’t actually come into the bathroom with me and I’m guessing that that’s just because I’m standing pretty close to the door at the sink, wetting my toothbrush.
“You’re wearing a pair of gym shorts and a t-shirt, Bradley,” I remind him with a small giggle, referring to how he got dressed when I was getting dressed in my clothes. Only he got dressed in what he wore last night before he stripped down to his boxers to sleep in.
“And your point is what?” He asks, cocking his head to the side.
“Go get dressed, stupid,” I joking demand— I think it sounds a little garbled though since my mouth is full of toothpaste and whatnot right now but he evidently gets the gist of what I’m saying though because he just laughs and then walks off towards his bedroom, going in and closing the door behind him.
__________________________
“I am so hungry!” Tanner wails in complaint about thirty minutes later as the eight of us (Tanner, Elena, Jaime, Mikey, Drew, Orlando, Bradley and I) sit together in an isolation type waiting room down the hall from Walker’s room. We were going to go in there but he’s sleeping and his nurse said we couldn’t interrupt him because he needs his rest. It’s almost 11:45 now and the train station is about ten minutes away from here, so Bradley and I are going to have to be leaving really soon if we want to catch our train to Milan, which we obviously do.
“How the hell can you think about your stomach at a time like this?” I ask him raising my eyebrows at him incredulously.
“Because my starving isn’t going to help Walker in any sort of way, now is it?” He shoots back with a small grin tugging at the corners of his lips. That makes his girlfriend laugh but I just narrow my eyes at him and then roll them half-irritated because I don’t really find it funny and definitely not funny enough to laugh. Nothing about this entire situation is funny to me. I’m sure than in a completely different context though, I would have laughed at it.
“You are ridiculous, Tanner,” I tell my friend, not able to fight back a miniscule smile. Seven of us have undergone tests that collect data about our bone marrow and peripheral blood stems cells and now we’re just waiting to lean who out of the seven of us could be a potential match for Walker’s system. I said seven of us because out of the eight of us, only seven of us can legally donate stem cells or bone marrow. You have to be eighteen to do it and since Mikey’s not eighteen until November, he couldn’t get tested which is complete fuckery to me because what if Mikey’s the only one who would be a match? We’d never even know because he isn’t eighteen yet.
Walker’s family is here too, we saw them once we first got here. His parents and sister got tested but not his brother, Trevor, because, like I said, you have to be eighteen and he’s only fifteen. I was in the cafeteria alone though, getting some gum about fifteen minutes ago though and I ran into Walker’s dad— Mr. Davis— and his eyes were all red and I deduced that either he was baked or had been crying. Obviously, the latter was the most appropriate, so I asked him what happened and he informed me that Dr. Acardi had told them (him, his wife and Shannon, Walker’s sister) that neither of them were matches in either bone marrow or stem cells, which pretty much tore my heart into two. I mean, think about it— what are the chances of seven teenagers who aren’t related to Walker in any way being his bone marrow or stem cell donor match if none of the members of his immediate family were matches? They are very, very slim. I’m trying to remain positive though and I haven’t divulged on the fact that Walker’s parents and sister aren’t matches because I know that’d just make everyone else all grumpy and pessimistic because they’re all stupid jerk-faces. Okay, no, they’re not but I’m just grumpy right now, I guess. Or maybe I’m being hormonal, I don’t know.
Anyway, if none of the seven of us are a match for Walker, then his name will have to go on the National Bone Marrow Registry, which is basically just a long ass list full of other people who need bone marrow. Then they’re probably put him at the bottom of the list, which is so dumb to me because I literally don’t give a rat’s ass about anyone on the list and I feel like Walker’s name needs to be number one on it, need it come to that.
Then what would happen is the people around the world who are donating marrow and stem cells would be matched up with the people on the list— at least, I think that’s what stupid Dr. Acardi told us, which is why Walker needs to be number one on the list so he can get the first transplant available.
It’s that selfish of me? To undermine the problems and terminal illnesses of other’s for Walker? Probably but I don’t really care at all— Walker deserves to be alive more than anyone else I know. I’m just hoping and praying that at least one of us is a match. That’s literally all I want.
“Hey, do you want to go on and leave now?” Bradley asks me quietly, grabbing my hand in his and lacing our fingers together.
“Y-yeah,” I stammer, nodding and forcing my thoughts away from what the results of the tests are going to say. I’m going away with my boyfriend and I need for my attention to be on him. I mean, I’m only going to be away from Walker for one day and I think that I can handle that. “Let’s just go and say bye to Walker first though,” I suggest.
“Okay, if he’s even up now,” Bradley agrees, standing up and pulling me with him. “We’re about to say bye to Walker, then we’re heading out to Milan, guys,” He says to our friends, who are, for the most part, in their own little worlds right now.
Well, Mikey and Jaime are talking, Elena is running her fingers through Tanner’s hair because his head on his lap and bitching about how hungry he is and then there’s Drew, who is on his phone with his earbuds in, I guess listening to music, and Orlando is playing some sort of car game on his iPhone.
“We’ll come with,” Mikey notes, standing up and reaching his hand out to his girlfriend, who grabs it. “In case he’s awake and we can just stay in there with him— these chairs are uncomfortable,” He observes.
Everyone else agrees with that plan and so all eight of us walk out of the room together, heading down the corridor to where Walker’s room is. When we get to it, I pull the door open gently and walk in, a huge smile spreading across my face when I see Walker’s gorgeous brown eyes open, staring up at the ceiling. When he hears the door, he averts his eyes over to me and smiles a small smile.
“Walky!” I exclaim, practically running over to him and hugging him as best I can, which isn’t a lot since he’s laying down still. As I’m hugging him, everyone else comes in, perching themselves down on the couches and chairs, greeting Walker in the process.
“Hey, sweet cheeks,” Walker replies, his voice a little hoarse and when Bradley hears it, he, being the good friend that he is, grabs the water pitcher thingy sitting on top of Walker’s feeding table thing and pours him some in one of the plastic cups before handing it to Walker, who quickly gulps it down.
“I’m so happy you’re awake!” I exclaim, still beaming because I haven’t actually had a conversation with Walker since in about three days since yesterday when I came, he was sleeping and I was forbidden by my dumb friends to see him the two days before that.
“Well, I’m happy to be awake,” He replies with a grin and I wonder if he knows that his demented ex-girlfriend is here. I hope not. I wonder if she got tested. She’s such a selfish demon though, so I’m not even sure she’d be willing to give Walker any of her stem cells or bone marrow— assuming demons have stem cells and bone marrow.
“We all just got tested so hopefully one of us is a match for you,” I inform him. “Well, apart from Mikey, since he’s still a little baby,” I correct teasingly, looking over at Mikey, who playfully tells me to shut up before he goes back to being all lovely dovey with Jaime. “Bradley and I can’t stay though, we have to leave because we’re going to Milan for today and tomorrow but I just wanted to tell you bye before we left but as soon as we get back, we’ll come and see you, okay?”
“Okay,” Walker agrees with a nod and then gets a look of confusion on his face. “Why are you guys going to Milan though?” He questions.
“They claim they need some alone time, but that’s just code for, ‘we want to be alone so we can have lots of sex’,” Tanner nonchalantly chirps from the couch he is sitting on with Elena on his lap before I can even get a word out.
“Tanner!” I hiss, picking up the first thing that I can find and tossing at his stupid head. Lucky for him, it was just a little plastic cup so it really couldn’t hurt him— not that I’d ever intentionally hurt him, he just needed to be hit in the head in that moment.
“What? I think we’re all know why y’all are really leaving,” He adds.
“You’re horrible,” I inform him, my face going redder than an apple in fifteen seconds flat.
“I love you too, baby girl,” Tanner relays with a laugh.
“Anyway, we’re just going there because we wanna see Milan,” I inform Walker truthfully.
“Okay,” He laughs but tries to disguise it as a cough. “Well, have fun and I’ll see you when you get back.”
“I love you,” I tell him, leaning down and hugging him again even though it really isn’t necessary— I like hugging, I’m a hugger.
“Love you too, shortcake,” Walker replies as I pull away and he does the weird guy handshake with Bradley. Well, a variation of it, not the actual thing because Bradley doesn’t lean down just so they can bump chests or whatever boys do when they do that handshake.
“See you guys later,” I say to everyone else before waving at Walker and then lacing my fingers through Bradley’s and walking out of the room, taking the dumb bouquet of balloons left by Alison with me. When we pass a large enough trashcan, I toss them in and rip the card into two because it’s just an awful card to leave and an awful present— Walker is nineteen years old, he doesn’t want balloons from his demonic ex-girlfriend.
Like I said, the train station is only about ten minutes from the hospital, so Bradley and I get there in no time. 12:00 on the dot, actually and we purchase our tickets (well, Bradley insists on getting them both because that’s just how he is) and then we find and board our train, which is really fancy and so not how I imagined a train interior to look.
“I’m so excited!” I squeal as the doors of the train close at precisely 12:20, fifteen minutes later and stars down the rails. Thankfully, there’s not too many people on the train and I hate people, which is why I’m glad about that fact.
“You seem excited,” Bradley notes with a chuckle, grabbing my hand in his and bringing it up to his lips, kissing the back of it lightly because he does stuff like that and that’s another reason that I truly am so incredibly in love with him, he’s just unlike any other guy I’ve ever dated. He’s just wonderful and perfect and I’m so thankful for him because he puts up with my sassiness and my sarcasm and my occasional bitchiness and I just couldn’t ask for a better boy to call mine and I wouldn’t want to call another boy mine that isn’t Bradley Edwards.
“Aren’t you excited to go to Milan?” I query, looking up at him with a curious look.
“Well, yeah of course, Milan sounds pretty cool but it’s the lovely girl that I’m going there with that makes it even cooler,” Bradley explains, which I can’t help but blush at and then push the armrest in between us up before cuddling up close to him as he throws his arm around me, placing a small kiss at the crown of my head as the wheels of the train carries us out of Rome.
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
Author's Note:
1. So, I think I'm just gonna throw it out there that this story is almost complete, as is Like Crazy. Only, this one is going to be finished before Like Crazy is, most likely. I'm thinking there'll only be about like, five-ten more chapters of this story left, so it should be done either right around the New Year or a little bit before. I'm not sure yet though. Anyways, thoughts on this chapter? Predictions for the next? Notice the song and picture too!
2. Also, I started posting my newest story on Tuesday, November 5th and it's called Clarity (previously, The Lucky One). So, if you guys would check that out and comment and vote and just let me know what you think of it and all of that good stuff, that'd be super cool and the updates are every Tuesday. The link is in the external link and I'll post the link in a comment below! (:
3. I don't know if I've mentioned it but just recently, writerbug44 and I started our third joint story together on our joint account, so if you want to read it and comment and vote and all that wonderful stuff, that would also be really, really good. It's called State of Grace, the story is and the account if RelentlessDreamer, so don't forget to check it our, por favor!
4. I posted a new Upcoming Story on my second account, halcyon_, so if you want to read the summary and comment and vote on it and let me know what you think, that'd be super cool-- I'll post the link below in a comment. (:
See you gorgeous people next Monday! <3