Confessions of a Lab Rat

Chapter 6

I wake up to the undeniable sound of someone crying. I rush down the hall as fast as my weak, cancer body will let me praying, "Please no, please no, please no," over and over again.

The hallway is full of people in lab coats that I've never seen yelling at each other and filling the lab with loud noises.

Some one has died.

"Lillian," I call, tears of panic rising up in my throat. "Sugar? Lillian!"

I'm crying, I realize. The hairs on my arms are beginning to rise. "Lillian?"

"Pepper!"

My heart slows with relief.

"Sugar," I squeeze her tightly. "Oh thank you. Okay. You're here. I love you."

"I know, I was so scared," Sugar says, squeezing me back. "I don't know what's going on, I can't find Lillian."

We make our way through the crowd of people. Some of them turn to frown down on us. Others don't even acknowledge that we're there.

"Lillian?"

"Pepper, Sugar," Lillian appears out of the blurs of white. She bends down to hug us tightly.

"Is everything okay?" Sugar asks, her voice muffled as she speaks into Lillian's shoulder.

Lillian pulls away from us and I can see the tears running down her cheeks.

"Candle died last night," she says.

"Oh," Sugar says, her face grows even more pale.

I'm not sure what to say. I've known Candle for half of my life and now she's gone.

"Why is everyone here?" I ask.

"They're just doing some tests," Lillian says, brushing at her eyes. "Just some tests on the body to see what went wrong."

Anger boils up inside of my chest like white hot lava. It spurts up my throat and out of my mouth.

"What went wrong?! Are they seriously asking that question?!"

"Shhh... it's okay, Pepper," Lillian says.

"No, it's not okay," my voice cracks with tears. "It's not okay at all."

Beech's eyes are red and puffy when I see him next.

"Hello," I say first.

"Hello, Pepper Rat," he says.

There's a shocked silence. Then he takes in a breath.

"Wow," he says.

"Yeah," I agree.

"Pepper, there has got to be something more to this life," he says. "We're just living and dying... I take that back, we're not even living."

"Then what are we doing?" I ask.

"Existing," he replies. As he says it, he puts his hand on my shoulder and looks me straight in the eye and his gaze is so intense that I notice every detail of his copper eyes. Then he breaks away. "We are just existing, Pepper Rat, and there's no way that this is it."

"Did you exist in your old life? When you were free?" I ask, because I don't know what being free is like.

"Sometimes," he says. "Sometimes. I existed in church, when I should've been listening. I existed at boarding school. Then I met some guys who taught me how to live, but it wasn't the right way to live, you know?"

I shake my head because I don't know.

"I swear, Pepper, if I ever get a chance to live again, I.will.do.it.right."

I decide that if I'd ever had a chance to live, I'd want to do it right too, so I nod. And suddenly my heart starts to ache with longing because I just want one chance to do it right.

"Pepper, where did Sugar go?" Lillian asks me.

"She was tired, she barely ate any of her food," I say, picking at my own.

Lillian gives me a grave look over her glasses.

"Yeah," I say. I'm afraid that if I say anything else, I'll burst into tears, so I don't.

Lillian sighs and seats herself next to me.

"Eventually she'll just stop, you know that, right?"

I nod because that's what Salt did. She just stopped. Stopped opening her eyes, stopped eating, stopped talking. And she started sleeping. And then she just stopped breathing.

"Yeah, I know," I say. I'm feeling a little braver so I ask a question. "How long do you think she has?"

Lillian breaths in through her nose, making a long sniffing sound like she does when she's trying to look like she's not about to cry.

"Two, maybe three weeks, Pepper."

I want to throw a tantrum, throw something, expend all my anger and sadness.

"Okay," I say. Then, "Lillian, I'm tired of existing. I want to live."

"You will, Pepper," Lillian says. "I think you will."