The Boy Upstairs /tronnor/

eighteen

Troye

((HI BEAUTIFULS. I'M SO SORRY FOR NOT UPDATING, COLLEGE HAS BEEN CRAZY AND I'M JUST NOW FINDING THE DOWN TIME TO WRITE. I HOPE TO HAVE THIS FIC DONE THIS WEEK. I LOVE YOU GUYS))

It was finally Christmas Day, and just as the clock struck one am, I had just finished watching the Jim Carrey version of The Grinch on my laptop when his heart monitor started to fluctuate next door.

 A nurse ran into his room and started yelling multiple profanities. "Shit, code blue! Code blue!" She pressed a button and immediately every doctor and nurse in the cancer ward was paged to his room next to mine, so I could hear everything that was happening.

"Connor Franta, age 18," She briefed them. "Has been battling pancreatic cancer for about four months now."

I hate that word: battling. When you have cancer, it isn't really much of a battle. You can fight like hell to stay alive, sure, but you know you're ultimately going to lose. No matter what you do, the cancer always wins.

I put my headphones back in and try to block out the nurses and doctors sprinting in and out of Connor's room for what felt like forever but was actually about two or three hours. I put on some random movie and focus all my time and energy on it, trying hard to conceal my tears over the fact that my boyfriend was going to die on Christmas Day. 

They declare him at around six am. 

His mom lets out a painful wail as my eyes flutter open and immediately fill with salty tears. A few moments later, a beautiful young girl walks into my room, her cheeks stained with tears. She must be Nicola. I look down at my nails, which I had painted with her blue nail polish that Connor had brought me just a few days before, and suddenly feel really self conscious. 

"Are you Troye?" She croaks out, and I smile and nod my head, letting out a steady breath through my nose. "Thank you."

This takes me by surprise. "F-For w-what?" I can't help but stutter.

"Making my brother happy until he...yeah." She looks down at her boots as a few more tears make their escape. They're slowly starting to escape me too. "He told us about you all the time. Every time me and him were texting, he'd say something about you. He really loves you."

"I love him too." I smile softly.

"Which is why..." She lets out a deep sigh. "My parents and I have decided to give you his lungs."

"What?" I splutter, the water I had been drinking going all over me. 

"He was an organ donor. And we know he really cared about you. So what better way to show it than to give you his lungs?"

I thought about it, how just last week he was sitting sheepishly in my doorway, red in the face and groaning. I didn't get you a Christmas present. I'm so sorry Troye. What if this was it? His present to me? What if, in some twisted and sick way, this was Connor's Christmas present to me?

"I...I don't know what to say." My mouth is dry, and I can barely croak anything out. Nicola smiles sort of sympathetically. 

"It's okay, I understand you need time to think." She wanders over and sort of hesitates before hugging me gently. A sharp pain rackets my side as she hugs me, but I hold in my cry. She pulls away with tears all over her face. "You made him so happy, Troye. You're going to get through this. We all will."

And just like that, Nicola Franta stood up, smiled at me, and walked out of the hospital and out of my life.

That was the last time I saw her or her parents.