Life in Vegas || Brendon Urie

Chapter 20/End of Book I

Kendall's POV
It was early July, and I was packing my things to move to my dad's house. Taylor, Maria and Jessi all pitched in to help me get things into boxes and load them into the car. I was appreciative, but it was sad to think I wouldn't see them for a long time.

My three friends and I carried the last boxes to the moving truck, then rallied back in my kitchen.

"Hard to believe you'll be gone 24 hours from now," Maria sighed. "That's really going to suck."

"I'll come back to see you guys," I promised. "We'll stay in touch. I would never just leave you behind like that. I promise I'll come back to see you guys every once in a while."

"And Brendon," Taylor winked. "I'm sure he's going to miss you."

"Yeah," I said, laughing to cover up my disappointment that Brendon hadn't taken back what he said.

"So we'll see you around," Taylor said.

"Of course," I nodded. "I'll let you guys know when I land in Michigan."

They nodded and took turns giving me bone crushing and heart wrenching goodbye hugs. I sat on the porch and waved to them as they piled into Taylor's car and drove away.

My mom sat down next to me. "I'm sure going to miss you."

"I'll miss you too," I replied, taking in her aged features in the sunlight. "I'm glad that you've gotten back to being my mom."

"What do you mean?" She cocked her head and peaked a brow at me.

"I just know that you had a hard time getting clean, and I'm proud that you got your act together in time to be my mom for my last months of high school. It's hard for me to leave you," I admitted. "Are you sure you can't just come with?"

"Your dad and I aren't ready for that," mom declined. "I don't think we ever will be. We love each other, but sometimes things just don't work out the way we plan them to. And you need to remember that too. Life doesn't always stick to an agenda."

I nodded at her advice. There was a question lingering in my conscience that I simply couldn't hold back anymore.

"Mom, what's wrong with you?" I blurted.

She frowned. "What?"

"I heard you and dad talking about something that was wrong with you," I admitted to my eavesdropping. "Something with your health."

Mom sagged a bit, dragging a sigh. Her brittle bone structure seemed to grow tired at once.

"Mom?" I mumbled. "You can tell me. It's okay."

She cast her eyes down to her lap and hung her head. She was ashamed of herself. I grew worried by her disgrace, because I knew it couldn't be minor if she felt so upset about it.

"I have liver cancer," she admitted.

I was dumbfounded. There's no way my mom had cancer, she had better luck than that.

"The doctors said that with treatment it could be reduced to something that's not a problem," she reasoned. "They said it's early stages. I have time to get it under control. Please don't worry about this, Kendall."

I was relieved to hear that it was still early. That was good. But still, there was so many problems that would underlie the cancer.

"How long have you known?" I asked.

"Since I started rehab," she answered. "Like I said, treatment is helping to slow it down. It'll be okay."

"I don't want to leave you here alone," I worried.