Lilly & Julian

Chapter 24: 'When did you become so wise?'

"Outrageous, scandalous, ostentatious, atrocious-"

I rubbed my temples, "Can you shut up?!"

"You literally dug yourself into a deeper hole. What in the-"

I groaned, "J-J! It was just a kiss and we both knew what we were getting ourselves into! Besides, I thought you were the number one person who'd be rooting for us."

She scoffed dryly and waved a hand, "Excusez-moi, but I've always been this ship's sailor. I'm just worried about how poor Julian will make you out of people fall in love during a break. No thanks to you, Lilly."

I clamped my hands shut on the table, "Then what the heck did you want me to do J-J?! There was no other option!"

She rolled her eyes, "You can take the damn chemotherapy Lilly."

I shook my head and closed my eyes muttering, "Not this again."

Aunt Jenna sighed and raised my chin with her finger, "Look at me."

I reopened my eyes exasperatedly, looking into her rich brown ones. The next words came out shockingly soft from her mouth given how much of a bubbly personality she was.

"People believe a lot of things, Lilly. Some believe women exist only for household chores, some believe not everyone should be given equal rights on the basis of their race, caste or religion etcetera. But that doesn't make their belief a truth.

"You might believe something kiddo, but that doesn't mean it's the truth universally nor does it mean that its right. You're living in a preconception Lilly and you need to come out of that shell. We don't know how a dish tastes until we decide to take a bite of it ourselves because everyone has different taste buds so we can't really trust someone else's experience."

I stared at her with my mouth hanging open while she softly smiled at me, "Similarly, the treatment might have not worked on your mom but it doesn't mean that there's no chance that it would work on you. Think about it Lilly and I'm not saying this for mine or Julian's or anyone's sake, I'm saying this for your sake."

"When did you become so wise?" I whispered into thin air while she threw her head back and laughed loudly.

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Everyday since our oh-so-romantic kiss, Julian had been sending me these cute little messages randomly. In the morning they would contain 'Good morning chéri, I hope you had a comfy and warm sleep, I love you so so so much <3' with a hugging GIF or something similar.

In the evening when I'd be rewatching Brooklyn 99 they would contain 'This flower is for you 🌼' and not even two minutes later I'd receive a bouquet of my favourite flowers on my door step with a sweet little note in between.

And at night they'd contain 'good night <3 you're the most imperfectly perfect person I'd ever meet and I'm so grateful for you 🥺 ily.'

All these efforts by him always put a damningly enormous smile on my face and I would be reminded how much lucky I was to have him in my life.

One night when I was cleaning my closet, I found an old scrap album lying around there covered in dust.

I swiftly sat on the floor board, gently opening the album when I felt a shiver of déjà vu ran through my body once I recognised the cursive writing of Hannah on the very first page titled 'Remember when?''

I turned over the page and saw the first picture in which a thirteen-year-old Blake's face was smudged with cake. I vividly remembered that day when Julian smashed Blake's face in the cake just after he blew the candles on it. Not long after he started crying and someone took that picture.

I laughed at the memory and even more once I saw the scribbled handwriting of Blake cussing out Julian below the picture which Julian responded with a middle finger drawing.

The next page was the picture of us four with my mom when we were having lunch at our place with aunt Jenna too. She was the one who clicked the polaroid of us without our knowledge to make it look 'candid'.

A picture where my mom was laughing freely at a joke Hannah was telling her, Julian busy stuffing his mouth with more food and Blake and me playing some kind of board game with extreme competitiveness.

A single tear escaped my right eye at the memory because it was just a week before my mom got diagnosed with cancer.

I went through the whole album for the next few hours cleaning forgotten for the time being, reliving each and every memory and photo, laughing at the stupid notes we wrote on the sides with funky tapes and stickers to make it look cool.

The time when Hannah came knocking on my dorm after she saw Blake on a date with some other girl, the time when we pranked a guy who bullied everyone in our school by putting a fake bomb in his bag, the day of prom and graduation.

Every special moment cherished no matter how random, common and normal they were.

Who knew it was the perfect moment when I realized how much life held value for me, how much the people in it held value in my life? Because little by little I was reminded of everything we'd been through to make it till here, the memories both- good ones and bad ones we made.

What if they were right? What if the treatment actually worked?

I clicked the picture of the scrap album and sent it on our group chat with the text 'Look what I found!' feeling satisfied and content with their response to it as well as the decision I made.

A spark of hope, I'd caption if it were a picture.

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its official this my fav chapter ive ever written also i think weve established i never hold onto my promises lmfao cuz i updated on a day which is neither sunday nor saturday lol

also i wrote the whole 'scrap album' scene while listening to 'tera yaar hoon main' AND THE FUCKING FEELS ISTG- 🤚 

anyway, 

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