No. No. No. No. No. No. No. Why? No. No. No. Why? Why him? That’s all I can think about. Tears rush down my face, but I clean them up quickly when I hear footsteps. There is a knock on the door, and Tim comes in. I turn to him and his face lowers, and I run to him, letting the tears run. I hug him and don’t let go.
“It’s going to be okay, he will be fine. You have me to talk to. We can talk as much as you and Archie talked. We can talk about anything. Yeah?” I sniff, and smile a little. It’s nice having a brother that is there for you.
“I saw Aloha.” I tell him. I feel his arms tense, and then slowly ease when he breathes out. “She paid for our date."
“I know she did. I saw her this morning.” I let go on Tim, and look him in his eyes. “She came round. She defiantly misses you; she told me that it was really nice seeing you yesterday.”
“And then what happened?” The best part about Tim and me is that we tell each other almost everything, and we never usually sugar code our conversations to each other. We have no filter when we talk to each other, unless someone tells us to keep a secret from one another.
“We hooked up.” He says smirking. This conversation gets my mind off Archie for a while, which is good. Like Archie said, he doesn’t want me to worry about his safety.
“Are you back together?!” I do an identical smile as Tim to him.
“I’m waiting for her to call.” He replies. My smile widens, and then I hear footsteps up the stairs. “Whatever you do, do not bring it up. Archie wants you to be happy while he is away. He doesn’t want to think about you crying about this while he is gone. Okay?” Tim lets go of me, and there is a knock on the door, Archie turns the doorknob, and slowly walks in.
“Okay.” I whisper to Tim. I smile at Archie; Tim leaves us and shuts the door. I walk to my bedside table, and check the time. “4 hours.” I tell him. He walks up to me and grabs my hand, he pulls me to the door and we run around the house to the front door. I get outside, and we keep running. I know exactly where we are going. Then Archie stops, trying to catch his breath. “Do you want to sit down for a while?” I ask him, he looks up to me, and coughs.
“No. I’m good.” But I can tell he is lying.
“I’m a little worn out, can we please just sit down.” I try and cover up the fact that we are going to sit down because of him. In the end, Archie agrees, and we sit down in the middle of a field.
“You know. Don’t you.” He tells me when he gets his breath back. We sit together, sitting legs crossed, I lean against his armpit, and he puts his left arm around me. I start to shake my head, but then I notice that he knows that I know. He can tell because of my lame cover up to allow his to catch his breath. He can tell because I still have mascara running down my face. He can tell because I just burst into tears. “Please don’t.” He tells me. “Please.” I try to stop by hiding my face on his chest. I feel his heart race. Making mine even faster. He puts both of his arms around me. “I will be back. It’s only small.” I look up to him, but without a smile on either of our faces.
“What type?” I ask which is all I can get out before hiding again.
“There is a tumour in my left lung.” He tells me. “It’s minor. It will be okay.” He tells me again.
“Be Brave Archie. Be your brave self.” I tell him.
