DYING WISH ( HARRY LEWIS ) [SLOW UPDATES]

TEN

( CHAPTER TEN )
I DO KNOW HOW TO PLAY FIFA

HARRY FUMBLED WITH THE WIRES BEHIND THE TV ATTACHED TO THE WALL AS THE SCREEN BUSTLED WITH STATIC, THE SOUND FILLING THE ROOM.

"Got it!" Zoe exclaimed suddenly, sitting up in her bed the blanket falling into her lap as she had found herself freezing recently even though it was summer weather. The screen had cleared out to now show the start log in screen for the xbox.

Harry leaned out from behind the television with a wary look on his face but when he saw the perfect picture his face broke out into a smile and he raised his fists up in a victory pose which earned a laugh from Zoe. Happily he walked back to her bed, dropping a controller in her lap before settling into the chair and picking up his own.

"So what are we playing?" Zoe asked, watching Harry flick through his account.

"Up to you, my friend" Harry said in an over exaggerated formal voice and he emptied a bag onto the bed, in the space between them.

"You're the YouTube gamer" Zoe laughed as she sieved through the green boxes of games that had came out of the bag. Harry helped stifle through them too before picking up one that Zoe had never heard off, in reply she shook her head. After a while her hand found a familiar box and she chuckled as she held it up to him.

"It's only fitting" She smirked, shaking the fifa box so they could hear the disc rattling inside. He rolled his eyes at her, shaking his head slightly with a laugh as he took the box from her. After he'd closed the disc port and ran back to his chair, the pair settled down to play.

Once the loading screen appeared, Zoe sat up suddenly with a gasp which made Harry tense and his eyes widen as he quickly moved to her side.

"I forgot!" She exclaimed, jumping out of bed and towards the drawers that held her small amount of clothes. Harry let out a quiet sigh of relief - that Zoe didn't notice - and relaxed back in the chair, his body sagging as if he'd just been working out. Zoe scrambled around in the drawer, moving her warm sweaters until she found what she was searching for.

"Found it!" She smiled, spinning around dramatically and shaking a bag of toffee popcorn.

"How did you get that?" Harry asked shocked like it was illegal in this dystopian world, as he leaned forward in the chair to look up at her.

"I have my ways" She smirked secretively as she tapped the side of her nose. Zoe's 'ways' was begging for days to the nicest nurse she had sussed out in the years she'd been there. The nurse usually gave her stuff on the down low like chocolate or good potatoes because if Zoe was going to die, she wanted to at least have edible food that had taste before she did. Plus she was good at making the nurses feel bad for her, she'd even go as far to say she'd perfected it. However it wasn't that long ago she'd asked the nurse for wine so she wasn't due for another treat for at least a week. That's how it went, she'd have to space the favours out and she had five nurses on rotation; so she got five times the treat at one time. She was hospital street smart. But Zoe wanted Harry to feel at ease in the awkward sterile hospital room and for it to be the best time, for it to be a normal time. So when she brought out the sobbing tears and the 'I just want to be a normal girl' and the 'I just want to spent time with a boy, I just want a friend' she fooled the nurse for just one more favour.

"I had to hide it, I'm not supposed to have stuff like this. Especially not something that could be seen as a 'choking hazard'" Zoe air-quoted the phrase as she walked back to the bed, throwing the bag of popcorn straight at Harry's face but he caught it with both hands before it collided with him.

"It might be a bit warm, it's was buried under my jumpers" She said, clambering onto the bed and crossing her legs.

"Just the way I like it" Harry smiled, as she took the bag from him opening it and resting it between the pair, making sure she hid it with a blanket so neither of them could get in trouble.

"Okay so the controls are-" Harry started as he searched through the teams and chewed on a popcorn piece she'd tossed into his lap.

"I do know how to play fifa you know, I didn't cough it up" Zoe said, playfully with a smile as her eyes rolled over to look at him. They were now at ease joking about her illness, but not talking about it; they never spoke about it.

He laughed and held his hands up in surrender, "Alright, alright. If you lose it's all your fault then, since you know how to play" He matched the playful tone and cocked an eyebrow. They both knew that this was a competition now.

After a couple of games - the first one Harry let her win, and then she let him win, and then Zoe really won the next two games. She was better at fifa than the fifa youtuber. Ironic. Well she did have much more free time than he did. They had both decided that now they were comfortable playing video games together, soon they'd play one for his channel.

Whilst Harry changed the formation of his team before they started a new game (he swore he'd beat her at this one and was taking extra precautions), Zoe chewed on the last piece of toffee popcorn.

Beside him the empty popcorn bag rustled and something soft and itchy tickled his arm that was rested on the bed. He turned to look down at what the heavy mass was. It was Zoe's head. Harry's heart seized and his stomach dropped. His mind raced, thinking the worst situation, his mind focused on the 'choking hazard'. But once he felt the warm breath on his bare arm, he knew she was asleep. She'd never been this social before and it had tired her out, she hadn't even noticed. She was enjoying herself too much. But she'd be embarrassed once she woke up.

Instead of waking her, he watched her with gentle eyes and a smile. He didn't realise what he was doing until he'd done it and he still didn't know why; as he raised his hand to Zoe's head, stroking her black hair softly off her forehead. She looked so peace and happy like maybe she wasn't dying. Like maybe she was just a tired girl who had fell asleep on him.

He didn't realise he'd been watching her for so long until the nurse came to usher him out, telling him the visit hours were over ten minutes ago.