The Fault In Our Future

Just Sorry

My house was my sanctuary once again. It was where I kept all my Gus mementos, and where the memories didn't sting as bad. I didn't go back to the Literal Heart of Jesus because undoubtedly the Literal Heart of Jesus would just bring back the pre-death funeral, and the first looks, and his crooked smile. Mom stopped trying to get me to go. She understood on some level, I suppose.

Strangely enough, I found myself asking Isaac over more and more. We shared something that bonded us like atoms; Augustus Waters. Sometimes we could lay on the couch like sedentary beings and play Counterinsurgence for long hours. Other times I told Isaac about the things he couldn't see. I tried to tell him only about the beautiful things he couldn't take part in, but being the cynical sullen cancer kid I am, I couldn't help but mention all the ugly things.

"So the sky looks like a pile of dirt about to rain an apocalypse down to obliterate humanity and leave us with an irreparably damaged Earth."

"Wow. Nice." Isaac replied, taking Counterinsurgence out of the console and snapping it back in its case. We sat in silence side by side, me breathing with my crap lungs and constant supply of oxygen, him not-seeing but cancer-free. We kept sitting there, but the silence was never awkward between us. It's something about sharing important things, like pain. It leaves no need for words.

"I wish he was here." Isaac mumbled eventually. I nodded, forgetting about Isaac having no eyes to see the nod. I was eternally thankful that Isaac had avoided his name, because pronouns seemed to cause less pain than names. "Him" could have been anyone, but of course it wasn't anyone. It was the one I'd shared my first little infinity with. The one with the metaphorical cigarettes and eyes that saw the world for what it really was.

"Isaac, I'm sorry." I said, not really knowing what for, but knowing for certain that I was sorry and that I wanted him to know that. He leaned his head back against the wall and I saw his Adam's apple bob as he swallowed hard.

"Why?" he wondered aloud.

"I just am. I'm sorry you can't see. I'm still sorry about you and Monica. I'm sorry that you had fucking cancer and I'm sorry that we lost...him." It all rushed out with no preamble and at the end my voice started trembling in that shitty way that signaled an incoming bout of sobbing.

"Don't be, Hazel Grace Lancaster." He said my name slowly and it sounded so similar to the way Gus used to say it. So beautiful. Isaac's hands reached for me, patting around to find my increasingly shaky body. Ironically, his hands grabbed the tube feeding me oxygen through my nubbins instead of my skin. I pulled his hands away and clutched them and all of a sudden he pressed me against his chest and he was so warm and steady and his breath tickled my neck. I let the tears fall, dripping down my face in ceaseless rivers, falling onto my lap and staining his black tshirt.

"I miss him," I sobbed into his shoulder, too far gone to care about my mortifying loss of control.

"Me too, Hazel. I know, I know." His words turned into comforting nothings and little soothing noises. And we stayed pressed together releasing our inhibitions for a long time.