Just Once

Just The Beginning

I am seventeen years old and completely ordinary, I am a regular teenage girl who had some friends and went to school every day. The only thing that separated me from most kids my age was my cancer; I was diagnosed with cardiac sarcoma when I was thirteen years old and have dealt with it every day since. Cardiac sarcoma is the rare form of cancer that develops in your heart. People would always tell me how sad they were or how they wished that never would have happened to me but pity was something that I hated, I hated people worrying about me especially when they have no control over what happens to me let alone, in this world. I have a full set of hair, walk, and breathe just like everyone else. Yeah, sometimes I wonder, why me? But then again, I do not sit around moping about it all day, you just learn to accept what you have and who you are as a person and move on, life does not stop for anyone so you just have to make the best of it. Life is a precious thing and it is important to surround yourself with good people such as the dreamers and the doers, the believers and the thinkers. Above all, surround yourself with those who see the greatness within yourself even when you do not see it yourself, relationships are all there is. Nothing exists in isolation. We have to stop pretending we are individuals that can go it alone. Two of those very important people are Rylie and Maggie. My life would be completely different without them, in so many ways, shapes and forms.

Maggie, Rylie and I have all been best friends sense we were five months old. Even though Rylie is the only boy in our group, he doesn't really care. The strange and kind of cool thing about us all is all of our parents were best friends in high school and still are today, we all live a block away from each other which is beyond awesome. We live in the small town of Ailey, Georgia, population a little under five-thousand people. When you live in a small town like Ailey, it is easy to forget the world and disappear for a while. There's a willow tree on top of a hill that me and Maggie always go to when we want to escape our everyday lives and just take a couple of minutes to talk. That tree has been our place to go since we were six years old. Maggie was a brown haired, brown eyed, seventeen-year old girl who loved to laugh. Rylie was a tall, brown haired, blue-eyed boy. Rylie was one of the most athletic people along with one of the most popular people I know. Girls loved him. Many people thought of him as an arrogant poser, well, honestly, Rylie is one of the sweetest people I know, he will do anything for his family along with his friends. Rylie and I hung out a lot at school, at home or wherever, people have always thought that we were dating or we have dated. We have not actually, Rylie and I have just stayed friends, we have talked about it a couple of times before but neither of us wants to ruin our friendship and that has kind of been that. Maggie and Rylie have dated however; it was in seventh grade and lasted a whole four days. It was one of the funniest days of my life. 'It was like kissing my brother' she said that day.

Rylie and I were walking the path home from school like the one we always had; he was acting weird for some reason. I could not quite put my finger on it but I could tell he was nervous about something.

"Ry, what's wrong?" I asked.

"Nothing, just thinking" he laughed.

"I didn't know thinking made people nervous" I replied.

"Well it depends on what you're thinking about"

"Well then, what are you thinking about?"

He blushed for a second "A girl"

"Ooh, Rylie Callum has a lady friend?" I laughed, "Please, do tell me about this 'girl'"

"No, that's okay. It's a secret," he laughed.

"Rylie, you can't do that to me," I said pushing him playfully.

"Fine, I'll tell you later"

"No, right now"