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- 02 | LIVE FAST

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"Are you kidding me? Of course we're watching The Goonies, who do you think I am? Near-death experiences call for grand movie nights." Frank rolled his eyes, as if this was obvious, but he had lost Eddie at 'death'. The brunette's smile faded, and he stared at his father for a moment, breath hitching.

"I think you should stay in the hospital for a few more days!" Sonia fretted, tugging at his blanket so it was smoother. Eddie snapped out of his daze, looking down at his hands silently. He listened to his parents' quiet bickering for a few minutes, lost in his own world as he thought about the condition of his father.

Frank refused the drug treatments outright, which was probably smart, although Eddie wishes he would have just said yes. He'd prefer a drugged up version of his father over a dead one. The man also turned down the offers for surgery to give him a pacemaker, which would regulate his heartbeat. The procedure was overall too expensive, and they had neither the money, nor the time to earn the money since Frank refused to use Eddie's college savings no matter what anyone said.

There were lifestyle changes that could help, but the doctor had said rather skeptically that they showed little change in patients, and that he was to be very careful in the future. Eddie made him promise to take it easy, and he planned on making it easy. It had been a week since the incident, and Eddie had gone home from school every day to a messy kitchen from the previous afternoon, cleaning up and starting over. He brought his father a new meal every evening, making sure to follow a healthier diet of veggies and healthy amounts of meat.

His father was already scrawny, which was where Eddie got his stick-like figure, but weight-loss was supposed to help, it said so in the pamphlet he had been given. They were supposed to reduce stress, as well, so Eddie had bought fans and humidifiers so he could switch up the atmosphere based off of his father's preferences that day. He convinced his mother to set up the living room with his father's chair right in front of the television and out of the sun that trickled through the window, which was where the man had been wanting to put it for years.

"Eddie! Get your head out of the clouds. We're leaving, kiddo." Frank ruffled Eddie's hair, swinging his legs over the side of his bed. He had been given clothes to change in to earlier in the day, and was now ready to leave the facility. Eddie had taken note to the fact that supervised physical activity was also supposed to help, and had looked in to physical therapists around Bangor, but they were all rather pricey, so he opted to get a book on it and was well in to the reading already. He had made plans to take the man out for daily walks, either before or after school.

"Right! Sorry," he mumbled, standing up as well. He picked up his hefty book, following his parents out the door. They had already done all of the paperwork clearing his exit, so they walked outside and clambered into the car. Eddie was driving, and Frank sat on the passenger side because Sonia took up the entire back.

Before he could turn the keys in the ignition, his father reached across the middle of the car and grabbed his wrist. Very seriously, he looked into Eddie's eyes and said, "First you have to do the Truffle Shuffle."

"Come on!" Eddie whined, deciding to play along as a smile tugged at his lips. His father folded his arms over his chest and raised his eyebrows.

"Do it!"

"Come on!"

"Do it!"