I'd Live For You, If Only I Could (Completed)

Nine

For the next week, I sit at home, basically doing nothing. I spend a lot of time watching movies and drawing, the two things that make me happy other than my friends. Every day after school ends, Scott and Kirstie come over and entertain me. It has been five days since I got out of the hospital, a Friday, and Scott comes barging in without telling me. I hear the front door open and close.

"Mitch? Are you in the basement?" The door at the top of the stairs opens, too, letting light into the dark room.

"Shut the door! I have the lights off for a reason!" I hiss, covering my eyes as a new wave of nausea hits me with each pound of my headache.

"Sorry, sorry." He closes the door, cutting off the light source, and makes his way carefully down the stairs. "Are you on the couch?"

"Yeah." I adjust the pillow under my head and pull one of my five blankets up to my chin, trying to ease away the chills that inevitably come with a fever.

"Headache?"

"Mhm."

"I'm sorry."

"Not your fault." I mumble, curling into a ball and purposefully getting tangled in the mountain of blankets. "It's just one of those days." The TV is showing the menu of one of my Family Guy disks, waiting for me to select an episode. It's been doing that for two hours. The remote is on the table and I am too cold, even under all the covers, to get out of my cocoon and get it.

"The Family Guy menu, a wise choice." Scott jokes, coming to sit on the floor in front of the couch.

"How long can you stay for?" I ask, wanting to reach out and touch him but not willing to move.

"A while, since it's Friday. Kit should be along soon. She's with her boyfriend right now."

"Funny, so am I." He brushes his thumb over my cheek and rests his hand there.

"You're burning up."

"Mhm."

"Do you want to watch a movie?"

"What movie?"

"You pick."

"I'm not getting up to look, so you pick. I'm tired. I don't want to talk anymore."

"Okay. I'll pick one, don't worry about it." He stands up, letting me lay in still silence as he looks at the rack of DVD cases under the light of his phone. My eyes fall shut for the millionth time today and, even though I'm not sleeping, Scott quiets his movements when he notices. The exhaustion that comes with the simple task of keeping my eyes open is enough to drain all of my energy at once. I smile as much as I can manage when the opening music of Grease reaches my ears, and the air shifts near my face when Scott plops back down onto the floor. I venture to timidly reach out of the blankets to touch his shoulder. I'd meant to hold my hand to his cheek, but I am so purely exhausted that it is the best I can do. He shifts slightly and kisses my hand. "I love you." he says quietly.

"Love you too." I murmur, prying my eyes back open to see the opening scene.

****

At some point during the movie, my fever broke and I started sweating buckets under the blankets, but I was too tired to move them. Scott moved them for me and let me sit on his lap, where I promptly fell asleep. Kirstie showed up while I was unconscious, and when I wake up I find her sitting next to Scott, under his arm, staring at me.

"Hi." she says quietly, smiling at me brightly.

"Hi." I say with a yawn, turning my cheek against Scott's shoulder. Grease is still playing, which means I didn't sleep nearly long enough.

"Bad day, huh?"

"Horrible." I attempt a shrug, my shoulders barely moving. "It happens. Cancer tends to beat the shit out of you." I feel around on my face for my oxygen line, hardly able to find it because of the numbness in my fingers, and secure it in my nose and behind my ears.

"You'll get through it." Doctor Jayne's words to me from earlier this month come back to me: "It is very possible that you only have three or four months left. Likely, even."

"You know I won't."

"Don't say that." Scott says.

"What? The truth?"

"You keep getting better."

"Better?" I can feel my energy levels lowering with each word. "I haven't been this bad since...ever. This is definitely not better." My eyes start to fall shut again and my breath becomes slightly more labored than before. Instinctively, I grab my stomach with one hand and the trash can next to the coffee table with the other, feeling my stomach threaten to empty itself. Scott rests his hand tentatively on my waist. "No..." I mutter as I start retching into the can. My head starts to hurt worse as I start crying, something that naturally happens when I throw up. Desperately, I try to take deep breaths through my nose as I clutch the can as tightly as possible. Over my pounding heartbeat, I hear Kirstie whisper something to Scott, who has tightened his grip on my waist. It is the only thing that keeps me grounded. When I finish and push the can away, I collapse against his chest. "Sorry." I mutter, wiping at my mouth with my sleeve.

"Don't apologize. This is in no way your fault. Kit, can you go get him some water?"

"Oh, yeah, sure." She stands up quickly and sprints up the stairs. Above us, I can hear her moving around the kitchen.

"Mitch, I'm asking this because I genuinely don't know. Do you need to go to the hospital?"

"No. I'm fine he-" I am cut off by a fresh wave of retching and I barely get the trash can in time.

"Honey..." Kirstie trails off when she comes back, handing me the water and a towel as I lean back against Scott again. I take them both gratefully, but the water glass is so heavy to me that I nearly drop it. Scott catches my arm before the glass slips out of my fingers and lifts the cup to my lips, letting me take a long gulp of it before setting it next to us. I relish in the feeling of the liquid flowing through my body.

"How will you react when I die?" I say quietly, addressing them both. And even though neither of them answer, I know.