Heal // z.m

83.

(Video she is presenting is referred to chapter 52)

Rose

My heart was pounding. There was only one thing I hated about university, and that were the presentations. I hated to be the center of attention, I hated that everyone was looking at me, especially because I didn't really have a connection with most of my classmates.

What was probably even worse was that my presentation was the video with Zayn and I didn't know if I could handle that at the moment. I knew he was still his old self in the video. He still wasn't diagnosed with the term terminally ill. There was still a chance he'd survive around that time, but now everything had changed. It would be hard to watch.

"Alright, thanks Charlotte. Very interesting to see how this woman got postnatal depressed after giving birth. You'll get your marks soon." My teacher spoke, "Next, Rose West."

I took a deep breath and slowly stood up, taking as much time as possible because I didn't want to do this.

I walked over to his laptop and plugged in the USB with the video on it. I had edited it, so no one heard my voice and the questions were texts on the screen. It needed to be like that, because I sometimes just said something that wasn't relevant for class.

Once it was plugged in, I pressed on the video and paused it before looking at my classmates and teachers while fiddling with my fingers.

"Okay, you can start. Remember not to say the patient's real name for privacy." The teacher spoke.

I frowned, "Oh uhm.. but he said his real name himself in the video."

"In that case, he probably didn't mind. You can still use a nickname if you'd like. Go ahead Rose, and good luck." He smiled briefly and wrote something down on a paper, making me feel even more nervous.

"Alright, well my presentation, or video, is about a guy from twenty two.. uh twenty one, he was twenty one around that time, he's twenty two now.." I stammered, gulping for being so extremely awkward. "Anyway, he has had Leukemia when he was five until the age of seven but was clean and had stayed clean for years. But after years, he got it again."

I pressed on the button and the video started to play. I sat down on a chair nearby and bit my lip as it already hit me the way he was looking around that time. Of course he was sick, but compared to now he still looked so healthy.

"Hi, I'm Zayn, twenty one years old and I'm diagnosed with Leukemia for the second time in my life." I stared at him on the big screen and blinked rapidly as I heard his happy, enthusiastic and deep voice. I wasn't going to cry, they couldn't know that I had a personal relationship with him. Even more than a personal relationship.

I got goosebumps when I heard the beautiful sound of his laugh and at that moment- I wished I could turn back the time, where he was still much healthier than he was right now. Where he would tease me, joke around and laugh most of the times.

The video was so precious, yet it hurt me so much because I knew times like that were never going to come back. He wasn't going to be here anymore any time soon and the thought of that was heartbreaking. I kept asking myself.. how can I live without him?

The last question came and I once again heard his laugh as he didn't understand the question and said something that didn't even make sense. I laughed, but at the same time a sudden sob left my mouth.

I hid my face behind my hair and bit my lip extremely hard so I wouldn't start sobbing even more, but it was just so hard to hold it back. A few tears had already slipped from my eyes but I quickly wiped them away and took a deep breath, getting myself together as the video had stopped and I had to face my class again.