The Boy Who Saved Me From Me

Chapter 10

Elizabeth's POV

Thankfully Tanner brought along a flashlight so we could find our way back to the park. At first we walked in an awkward silence. After a few minutes I began to talk.

"I'm losing."

"Huh?" He looked at me, clearly confused.

I took a deep breath before continuing. "I have a really high chance for kidney damage and I have two micro-aneurisms in my left eye. I'm losing and I don't care enough to keep fighting." I have no idea why I decided to tell him what the doctor said, but I did.

This seemed to have caught Tanner off guard. He stopped walking and just stared at me.

When he didn't say anything I continued talking while looking off into the darkness. "I don't see a point in trying when I'm already losing. My body obviously hates me so why keep delaying the inevitable." At this point tears have started streaming down my cheeks. It feels so much more real now that I've said it out loud. "I'm dying and I've helped speed up the process."

Tanner stood in front of me and wiped my tears. After another moment he spoke, "That's a lot to keep to yourself, but I'm not going to let you give up. You're the bravest, strongest, most beautiful girl I know. There's nothing I can say to make this go away, but I'm not going to let you go through this alone. Now let's get you home so you can get some rest."

He slowly guided me out of the woods and back to my house. When we walked in Chris immediately started lecturing me. I was not in the mood for a lecture so I just kept on walking and left him and Tanner standing at the front door. I walked into my room, locked the door, and went to bed.

Chris' POV

I sighed as I watched Liz completely ignore me and go straight to her room. "I don't know what to do anymore."

"Just give her time."

I ran my hands over my face. "I wish mom and dad were here. They always handle this better than I do."

"Chris, she told me what the doctor said. I want to respect her privacy so I'll let her tell you when she's ready, but shit man she's going through a lot. No one can help her until she's ready to accept help. Just let her have some space."

Unbelievable. This kid is a miracle worker. The only people she opens up to are our parents.

"Come on man, you have to at least give me a hint!"

"I really want to, but she needs to be the one to tell you."

"Okay. Thanks for helping out tonight. It's pretty late, you should just stay here and get some sleep."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, definitely. Maybe in the morning you can talk to her some more. She won't talk to anyone else but you and our parents, but they've been gone on some cruise trip thing so she's kept a lot bottled up recently."

"okay, thanks man."

"No problem, I'll show you where the guest bedroom is."

I finally laid down in bed, but I still couldn't sleep. Whatever is wrong with Lizzie must be serious. She hasn't been this upset in a really long time. I really wish mom and dad were here so she didn't have to keep all this bottled up for so long. I wonder how much longer til they get back?

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I woke up to a soft knock at my door. I open my eyes just enough to see the clock, 11:23am.

"Hey Chris, can I talk to you."

I sit up to see Lizzy standing in my doorway.

"Hey sis, what's up?" She sits on the edge of my bed while looking like she's lost in thought.

"I- I'm- it's just that-, ugh I can't do this yet!" She quickly gets up and starts to leave.

"Hey wait. What if instead of telling me you write it down?" She thinks about it for a second before nodding. I get up and walk over to my desk to get her a piece of paper and a pen. She writes something down before folding it in half then walking out of my room with the paper sitting on my desk.

Elizabeth's POV

I felt really bad not telling Chris what the doctor said, but I just couldn't get myself to say it out loud again. After I wrote it down I quickly left the room so I didn't have to see his reaction. I walked down stairs to make some lunch. I rounded the corner to find someone standing at the fridge.

"I didn't realize you were still here."

He jumped at my voice. "Oh, hey Liz. Chris let me stay last night since it was so late."

"I'm sorry about that. You didn't have to come looking for me. I would've found my way out."

He gave me a knowing smile then continued to look through the cabinets for some food. "Have you told him yet?"

"Uhm.. sorta. I-"

"Lizzie! Why the hell did you keep this to yourself for so long?!" Chris yelled while joining us in the kitchen.

I looked at Tanner, "This is why I don't tell anyone anything." Taking a deep breath and turning to Chris I said, "I didn't say anything because your reaction was going to be worse than what's wrong with me. Anything something like this happens you flip out and make me feel even worse. I don't tell anybody because nobody understands." With that said I grabbed a banana then walked out of the kitchen before anyone could respond.

I walked into the hallway just as Jackson was walking through the front door. I stopped and looked at him. He is pretty attractive, he seems to care about me. He may be annoying, but I'm dying so might as well do something rebellious. "Hey Jackson?"

"H-Hey Liz, what's up?"

"I know you just got here, but let's go. I need to get out of the house."

He looked at me dumbfounded for a minute. "Uhm yeah sure, come on."

We drove in an awkward silence until he broke it, "So where are we going?"

"I don't care, I just need to do something I wouldn't normally do."

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Weeeeeeee I finally updated! I found my mojo to write again! Huge shoutout to Ready4Foxina for being the first one to vote and comment on mah story!