Us (boyxboy) ✧Book 1✧

✧ Fifteen ✧

Jamie

I had to wait until Damon left for work so that I could call Christian.

"I didn't know who else to talk to that I knew wouldn't tell Damon," I said as I opened the front door.

"Don't worry about it." He waved me off, stepping inside so that I could close the door behind him.

I lead him into the dining room and we sat at the table. "Last week, we were helping your mom clean out the attic-"

"So she suckered you guys into helping her?" He smirked.

"Yes," I wanted to roll my eyes. "Anyways, she found all of her old scrapbooks and she started going through them and she wanted me to look and Damon wouldn't let me until he snatched a bunch of them out. So, I waited until he was asleep and I literally went through everything until I found where he hid them...and I don't understand."

"What were the pictures?"

"He was in a hospital bed, and he was balding, and you were all there, and it was dated 2004." I explained.

He suddenly looked grim, scratching his beard before rubbing his palms together. He squeezed his eyes shut, his lips tightening into a form line. "He still hasn't told you?"

"Told me what?" My heart dropped.

"I'm gonna kick his ass," He mumbled under his breath. I didn't know if I wasn't supposed to hear it or not. "I told him to tell you, he said he would. I threatened to tell you if he didn't. Well, it looks like it's up to me, anyways."

"Christian, can you tell me what the fuck is going on?"

He let out a harsh sigh. "When he was eight, he was diagnosed with a pleuropulmonary blastoma."

"....Fucking cancer?" I suddenly felt numb. "He had fucking cancer?"

Christian hesitated, maybe shocked that I actually knew what that was, but of course I did. I was a med student for children. Pleuropulmonary Blastoma was a type of lung cancer, commonly found in little kids.

"Yeah, he had cancer." He nodded. "He went through chemo and he went away before he hit puberty."

"That's why he didn't want me to see those pictures?" I demanded. "Because we never told me he had childhood cancer?"

"Jamie," He looked me dead in the eye. "He was re-diagnosed with it."

"Ex-fucking-scuse me?" I demanded.

"He told me the night before the wedding, and he told me he was going to tell you. My guess is he didn't want you to see the pictures because he hadn't told you, yet." He said. "Jamie, I'm so sorry."

"It's not your fault." My eyes burned as I could feel the tears start.

"You have every right to be mad at him," He said, "But don't shut him out, okay? Please, he's really gonna need you, whether or not he admits it."

Christian went home not too long after dropping that truth bomb on me and I'd never felt so numb. How could Damon hide something like this from me? Why couldn't he just tell me? Why couldn't he just tell me the truth? Why had no one else ever told me before today?

He left at 1:30 in the afternoon for work, and he wouldn't didn't get off work until 9, meaning he'd be home around 9:30. It was only going on 7. Might as well get some sleep now, because I had a feeling once Damon came home, there was gonna be no such thing.