When former beauty pageant queen, Ellie Wilde, hears of her grandmother's sickness, she's the first to offer to drive her to her chemotherapy. What she didn't know she was agreeing to was an obnoxiously cheerful blond boy somehow nudging his way int...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Ellie bids her grandma a quick goodbye and heads in the direction of the already smiling boy sitting next to the elevators.
For some reason she feels a bit nervous as she approaches him. Like maybe after hanging out with her outside of these dreary hospital walls, he suddenly won't be so interested in the odd friendship they've seemed to form. Her nerves all but fade when his eyes meet hers and his smile grows.
"Is that skin I see?" Is the first thing he says to her, widening his eyes dramatically and grabbing onto her arm as if he can't believe it's not covered.
She rolls her eyes, shaking his grip off her. "It's laundry day. I had to wear what I could find."
"You're just trying to impress me. Admit it."
She ignores him, taking a sip from her usual coffee and settling down in the seat next to his. He reaches over once more and places his hand on her arm, moving it slowly and studying his precise movements. She frowns and shakes his hand off her for the second time.
"Stop stroking my arm."
A light chuckle passes his lips as he leans back into his seat, folding his arms over his chest. "I'm just in shock. I had to see if those were actually your arms or just really impressive skin sleeves."
"What the hell are skin sleeves?"
"I don't know." He shrugs. "Sleeves that look like skin I presume. If anyone was going to wear skin sleeves, it'd be you."
"I feel like I should be offended."
He laughs, his eyes moving back and forth between the coffee in her hand and her. "Can I have a sip?"
A look of confusion settles over Ellie's features, earning a small laugh from Cooper and a reassuring, "Don't worry. Last I checked, cancer isn't contagious. Though if you're worried about my boy cooties, I can neither confirm or deny the allegations of them being contagious. That'll just be a risk you have to take."
She shakes her head, a smile playing at her lips. "I'm not so worried about your boy cooties, though maybe I should be. The last coffee I bought you ended up in the trash."
"Yeah. I hate coffee."
His statement only leaves her more confused. "Well then why do you want a sip?"
"I'm going through chemo," he says, as if that should clear everything up.
"And?"
"If radiation can give people super powers, maybe chemo can make me like coffee. We'll just have to keep testing it and see if it changes. Who knows, I might become a coffee lover before I die."
Ellie doesn't say anything, deciding that she doesn't have much of a response. Instead she just hands him her coffee and watches as he takes a sip, his face scrunching up in disgust, as expected. He holds the coffee back out to her as he attempts to force himself to swallow the contents in his mouth.
"Are you really going to die?" She asks suddenly, regretting the words as soon as they've left her mouth.
He tilts his head slightly and her jaw drops just enough to convey the regret she feels. "I'm sorry. You don't have to answer that. I just—you just make a lot of jokes about dying."
"I was diagnosed pretty recently but the cancer is pretty far along. I was always one of those kids who didn't tell anyone I was sick. I just sort of dealt with it and waited for it to pass over. I guess that was a mistake this time."
"So there's no chance of you getting better?"
He gulps, bringing his hands together in front of him and focusing his gaze on his lap. "I don't know. They're trying chemo and then we'll see. I might get better."
"Then why do you always talk about dying?" She asks quietly, unsure if she should even be pushing the subject. "I mean, doesn't it make you sad? Thinking about it?"
He nods, raising his gaze back to hers. "Yeah. But I guess it's easier to talk about it like that."
"What do you mean? How is that easier?"
His shoulders lift slightly as he lets out a long breath. "People always talk about fighting cancer and being strong. Everyone that knows I'm sick tells me I'll beat it. That's great and all. Hopefully I can beat it. But if not, they're only setting me up for disappointment. If I treat it like it's going to kill me, maybe it'll be easier to accept the reality that it might."
