Last Hope (Kellin Quinn) {Book 3}

17. epilogue

Epilogue

Song: All of the Stars by Ed Sheeran

It's just another night, and I'm staring at the moon. I saw a shooting star and thought of you. I sang a lullaby by the waterside and knew if you were here, I'd sing to you. You're on the other side as the skyline splits in two. I'm miles away from seeing you. I can see the stars from America. I wonder, do you see them, too...

~Della~

High school is weird. I'm only in my sophomore year, but I swear it's like a whole different world compared to middle school, where James is. You have more classes, more stress, and more homework. Allix was sat on the floor next to the couch while I lounged on the piece of furniture in the library. We had our textbooks and homework in our laps, pencils in hand. We were currently studying human anatomy, something is remember reading about in seventh grade with the loony science teacher. She probably doesn't work at my old middle school anymore.

"Quiz me," I mumbled. Not like I needed quizzing though. I know we're learning more about anatomy now, but I already knew so much from middle school. I feel like I'm repeating the class I took almost three years ago. Except my teacher this year is a bit more sane. And she knows what she's doing. But still, I don't want to relearn something I already know.

"How many bones are in the human body?" Allix asked expressionlessly. I noticed her fingers mindlessly brushing through her newly dyed hair.

"Two hundred and six to two hundred and eight bones, in adults that is."

"Correct. How about how many organs in the body?"

"Seventy-eight organs. Ask some hard questions, Al."

"Fine. Yellow bone marrow is made up of osteoprogenitor cells. True or false?" Osteopro-what? I asked for harder questions, not extremely hard questions with long words I don't know in them.

Well, if it has a big word I can't pronounce it must be... "True, right?"

"False. Yellow marrow is made up of adipose," she said.

"What's adipose again?"

"Adipose, also known as fat, is tissue made of adipocytes," she read.

"Gosh you're smart," I teased. We both let out little giggles, well sort of. She got our father's giggle. That meant her giggle was often loud and more of an uncontrollable chuckle.

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever, Miss Smarty-Pants. Hey, wanna know something cool?" She looked up at me from the floor. I shrugged and nodded. "You know how some heart attacks can be caused by stress? Well sometimes that stress is derived from the stress of a breakup or losing a loved one. It could be so much emotional stress and too much sadness for you, the arteries could tear or clog, and you could literally die from a broken heart."

"Wow. I don't know if that's scary that you know that or morbid that you think it's cool," I joked.

Her cheeks turned red. "It's not scary or morbid," she whispered. "I think it's sweet, in a way. Of course it's crazy that happens, but what if that happened if someone's husband died. They just lost their soul mate, and love is hard to find in this world these days." Love is hard to find?

"What would you do? You know, if you lost your husband?"

"I don't know, really. And I don't really want to find out. If it get married I hope the man, or woman, would stay alive with me until we're like, eighty." You know, sometimes it's really hard to remember my sister is bisexual.

"Where'd this come from, anyway?" I asked.

Allix shrugged. "I was thinking about Mom earlier, and remembered that I read the thing about the heart last night online."