An Abundance of White Blood Cells // [WATTYS 2017]

TWENTY-ONE

Sunday was kind of eventful. Mom and Dad brought me two things. A stack of book pages waiting for me to blackout some poetry and Gramma. She was her same usual self, she didn't show any sign of sadness or anything. She smiled and told me I'd be outta here sooner than you can say leukemia. I smiled at that. From anyone else, that might have come off as a little offensive, but I didn't mind it coming from Gramma.

"Shall we play some card games?" She asked, pulling a deck of cards out of her purse.

My family spent the day with me. We played Go Fish, because my parents didn't approve of the game Bullshit. Gramma won most of the rounds we played. I had no idea if she was just lucky, or if she was cheating. They stayed and ate lunch with me. By lunch, I mean, I ate a good and healthy lunch, while they ate vending machine food. They left around seven at night, telling me they'd be back tomorrow, I made them promise after I'd met Colton Steele. When they promised, I promised I'd take lots of pictures.

***

Lena and Rose came to the hospital at a very unreasonable hour. Eight in the morning. Yes, I know I was awake at that time the day before, but I didn't sleep that night. They came with me to get my shot of Ordagon and then they tried to help me plan what I was going to wear when I met Colton Steele. I just told them that he knew he was coming to see someone who was hospital bound and I didn't need to dress up. "I'm perfectly fine in my hospital gown." I finished.

"Then let us pick the cardigan." Lena pleaded.

"Fine." I sighed.

While she was at it she found me a pair of pajama shorts to wear, incase I wanted to show him my tattoo. She handed me a tan colored cardigan and then we waited. I decided to work on one of my blackout poems while Rose told me about her prom date. Brock Anderson. He'd asked her a week before prom. Apparently he'd been coming to the library a lot, to try and ask her, but she was always busy, she was a library T.A.

"That sounds cute." I smiled.

"So where's Nate?" Lena asked as she looked through my pile of CDs.

"He's at school, he didn't want to see me fawning over another guy." I giggled. "Why aren't you guys in school?"

"Because we want to meet Colton Steele too...and we wanted to see you." Lena teased.

Just then, there was a knock at my hospital door. Our eyes all went as wide as they could. I commanded my friends to sit in the chairs next to my bed as I went to answer the door. I took a deep breath and turned the nod. And there stood Colton Steele. In his six foot glory. His blonde hair was even blonder in person, and his blue eyes were so sparkly. "Hi." I said in absolute awe.

"Hey, are you Sloane?" He asked.

I nodded, opening the door wider for him to step in. There were two body guards with their backs to us. They were probably guarding the room so no crazy fan tries to kid nap him or something. He stepped into the room, He was wearing a grey t-shirt and a pair of jeans. God he was amazing. "It's so nice to meet you." Colton said, pulling me into a tight hug. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Lena snapping a picture. "It's nice to meet you too." I smiled.

I walked over to my bed and said "You can sit here if you want." I pointed to the spot in front of me. Colton smiled and sat down, leaning his guitar against the bed. I hadn't even noticed he had a guitar with him. "Um...these are my friends, Lena and Rose." I said, pointing at them. They shook his hand, I knew they probably wanted to hug him.

"I love your music." I said, smiling.

"Thank you, what songs your favorite?" He asked.

"Outside Looking In." I smiled, rubbing my ribs. "I got some of the lyrics from the song tattooed on me."

"Oh yeah?" I watched Colton brush his own tattoo with his finger tips. His tattoo was of the forest. It wrapped all the way around his forearm. "Can I see it?"

"Sure." I smiled.

I pulled the hospital gown up just below my bra. I turned my body so he could see it properly. He looked at it for a minute. A smile on his face the whole time. "What do those lyrics mean to you?" He asked.

"They just kinda...made sense to me, when I was having a rough round of chemo." I replied.

"You guys wanna sing the song with me?" Colton asked, reaching for his guitar.

"Sure!" I nodded.

I pulled his guitar and put the capo on fret three. He started to strum the beat and sing. When he got the chorus we joined in with him. It was like a dream come true. Singing with my idol. I smiled at Lena when I realized that she was recording. I was pretty sure that she was going to do this all the time.

Once we finished the song Outside Looking In, Colton noticed my blackout poetry. "This is really good." He smiled. I felt myself blush when he said that. "Thanks." We talked for a little while longer, I asked him where he got his inspiration for his songs, if he really was that love stricken. He told me that he mostly just loved telling stories but he couldn't do it to the extent of a book, so music was his next choice.

"Mr. Steele, we're going to have to get going in a minute." One of Colton's body guards said as he popped his head into the room.

"Okay Frank." Colton nodded.

Colton got to his feet, I did too, and walked to the door. Lena and Rose got up to and hugged him and told him how nice it was to meet him. Lena whipped her phone out and said she wanted a picture of me and Colton together. Colton wrapped his arm around me and I wrapped both my arms around me. Once the picture was taken Lena opened the door,

"Hey, Frank?" She said. "Could you take a picture of us all together?"

Frank stepped inside and held her phone up to take the picture. Lena stood on Colton's other side, and Rose stood by me. Frank took a few pictures and then said in a very deep voice. "Let's do a silly one." I tried not to laugh as I pulled a face.

"Thank you." Lena said as she got her phone back.

Colton gave me a hug and whispered in my ear. "You'll fight through this, and you'll win." And then he left. I cried a little after he was gone, mostly because I was so happy I got to meet him, but partly because I felt like his wishes were for nothing.