Soar // Hamliza

• chapter 8 •

• Eliza •

Needless to say, my SAT's were a wreck.

I woke up yesterday with anxiety rushing through me, but I pushed through it. I ate breakfast, got dressed, talked to Alex on the phone. I went to school and walked into the testing room, pencils and gum in hand. I was ready.

And the anxiety I pushed through? It came back and slapped me in the face.

The TA began to pass out the tests, row by row. She read over the rules and told us to begin our tests. Everyone around me began to work, scribbling down answers and filling in the little bubble sheets.

But I was frozen. I couldn't move at all. I felt my throat tightening as my breathing became heavy, my chest feeling crushed and my body as a whole feeling constricted. I forced my head into my hands and tried to massage my throbbing head, trying to take deep breaths and keep myself from breaking down.

By the time I was calm, most people were on the second page, and I was behind. I rushed through the first par and a half before the anxiety came back and hit me again.

This cycle repeated itself multiple times throughout my SAT testing, and I know it screwed my results. I mean, I'll still probably do well but I could've done so much better.

This wasn't the first time the anxiety has ruined something. My grades in other classes are slowly declining, falling from their solid 100% to 97, 96, 95. 3-5% doesn't seem like much, but as someone who's always aced everything, it is a big deal. And being in AP classes, it's even more important to me that I keep my grades up.

I think Alex has started to notice that the anxiety is getting worse and worse. He gives me a lot more reassurance than he did before, and always tells me that everything will be okay, no matter what situation he's saying it in.

I need to tell him. I told Angelica and Peggy but I can't just leave him in the dark.

I know he's going through his own struggles too. On the phone yesterday, he mentioned something that I didn't really catch all the way, but I heard something about dying and 'feeling the way he used to feel, mentally'. It worried me a lot, seeing as he was in a really bad spot with mental health before he was diagnosed with cancer. He also said that he'd been feeling some pretty strong anger and jealousy type feelings lately from all the medication and chemo.

It's been a week since I've seen him in person, so I'm going to visit him today. We decided that since we took the SAT's yesterday (Friday), we weren't going to go because we were all exhausted.

I packed up some food as usual and brought him another notebook and a few pens. He mentioned that he filled up another notebook in the past week or so, since he has literally nothing else to do. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if he's finished with all the homework for the next two weeks. He has a ton of time on his hands and since it's hard for him to sleep, he works on stuff at night too.

I also brought a few others items from my house and his apartment. He's been in the hospital for nearly three months and he has a long time left to go, so I'm sure it'd be nice to have it a little less like a hospital room and more like a normal bedroom.

Soon enough, I was on the all-too-familiar route to the hospital. I checked in and went up to his room, knocking on the door softly in case he was asleep.

But what I walked in to see is not what I expected. See, throughout this whole experience, Alexander only ever cried in the very beginning, just after his diagnosis. He hasn't cried at all ever since, for the past two or three months.

So to see him holding his head in his hands, sobbing and shaking, was something that definitely concerned me a lot.

I rushed in immediately and set the bag of stuff down next to his bed. I pulled out one of the pillows from my house that he would always hold, for some odd reason, everytime we would watch TV or a movie.

I wrapped my arms around him and tucked the pillow into his arms, stroking his hair occasionally and wiping his tears from his face when they fell.

He slowly began to calm down, hiccuping slightly ever now and then, but ended up drifting off into light sleep. I curled against him and sighed, deciding to wait for him to wake up on his own before making him explain.

The two of us.. two halves of a whole mess.

a/n: I kinda feel like I've neglected this book :((( but I'm gonna try to post another chapter tonight! Sorry I'm posting so late, I had a crazy busy day