A Star for Baby (boyxboy)

Columba

This is the end of the line everyone. Thank you all so much for your support, and I hope you enjoyed reading this book as much as I enjoyed writing it. Much love x

_____

Oliver laid the newspaper down on the trash can in front of him. The cigarette butts sticking up from the ashtray made the paper lumpy and gray, but Oliver didn't care. He wasn't even looking at it. He didn't need to see his name on page three to know it was there. One last review, he'd said. And after he'd handed it to Jack, he'd handed in his resignation.

Instead of reading, he was fishing in his pockets for his cell phone. His hands shook as he dialed a familiar number.

It rang and rang, and no one picked up. Probably because they saw his caller ID. But when the message system beeped, he took a shuddering breath. His chest felt empty, empty, empty.

"Hi Mom, hi Dad," he said into the receiver. "I'm just calling... I'm calling because..."

He paused to swallow down a sob, swiping underneath his eyes.

"My... boyfriend died," he said. "And I just... I wanted to say thank you. Thank you for raising me to be the man that I am today. Thank you for teaching me to love this much."

He gave a wet sniff. He paced outside of the tattoo parlor, free hand jammed into his opposite armpit. It was cold outside, but he welcomed the bite of it. It kept him grounded, kept him awake. Oliver closed his eyes, breathing in the world around him and clutching tighter to his phone. It felt like it was the only thing keeping him from flying away.

"I um... I wanted to talk to Hope," Oliver said, biting his lip. "I know you don't want me to see her anymore, but she's... she's the most important person in my life right now. I love her so much, can you tell her that? Can you just tell her..."

He trailed off, unable to finish his sentence. The aching space in his heart demanded to be filled.

"I love you all so much," Oliver confessed. "I miss you. I miss family dinners and I miss hugging my little sister."

He crushed a hand to his face, pressing down hard enough on his closed eyes to have spots dance in the darkness.

"I can't apologize for being who I am," Oliver whispered into the receiver. "But I just want to come home."

Because home was no longer the apartment. Oliver had realized this the first night he'd tried to go back. He'd turned right around and asked to sleep on Emmett and Francesca's couch. What made that apartment home wasn't the building, it was who he shared it with.

"So, call me," Oliver finished lamely. "I love you. Thank you."

He hung up the phone and dropped it back in his pocket. Oliver tilted his head up towards the sky. It was an overcast day, and a v of geese flew across his line of sight. The sound of cars rushing past echoed loudly in his ears, but it didn't feel quite like he was hearing anything at all. He felt outside himself and inside himself all at once, staring down at a world that was no longer his.

He turned slowly around to the door behind him, marked with hours of operation and a little sign that said 'open'. Oliver Eze walked into the tattoo parlor, his back already burning with the weight of another star.

Cancer: The good, the bad, and the dissection of the universe

A review by Oliver Eze

Baby Parker came into my life like most stars do -- with a flash of brilliant white light and an explosion to rival the gods. In this case, the explosion was a few wicked guitar riffs and the white light was a lightning bolt of blue hair, but there's only a very small difference.

Also, like most stars, I didn't know he was dying until he was already dead. From light years away, we could be looking at stars that have been gone for billions of years. That's what it felt like to look at Baby, in those last few days. Like I was looking at a brilliant star that had already died, and I just didn't know it yet.

For those of you that have been living under a rock or off campus, Baby was diagnosed with stage III lung cancer at the end of January this year. And he died yesterday. But this isn't what he was most known for. Baby was a singer, a composer, a flame that could burst across your Saturday night and make your entire week glow. A good friend of mine once told me that everybody fell a little in love with Baby Parker. I guess I was no exception.

Some days, I still don't understand why he chose me to love back. And a part of me will never understand.

But love me he did, and stay with him I did. I stayed with him through all the late hospital nights, feeling like I was turning into the same plastic as the chair my ass was glued to. I stayed with him through all the mornings digging my knees into bathroom tiles and holding his hair back as he puked. I stayed with him through his brilliant performances, his quiet breakfast humming, his music and his poetry and his undying sarcasm. And I stayed with him through his final moments, while he tugged each labored breath through a ventilator and tried to choke out that he loved me.

I will say one thing about cancer. It's the only beast I've ever seen that never fails to find the truth. You can't hide from cancer. When you're diagnosed, you don't have time for bull shit anymore. And when you start losing your hair, losing your energy, losing yourself, you don't have time for pretending to be someone you're not. Baby didn't hold his punches, and once he was in the thick of it, I realized that neither did I. Because a patient isn't just diagnosed with cancer, a family is diagnosed with cancer. And that's infinitely worse.

Baby was my family. I lost the one I was born with, so I had to make my own. Baby was who I found. And cancer, the bitch, ripped him away from me before I even had a chance to love him like he deserved.

He'll never play on stage again, he'll never croon over crowds with that beautiful voice again. He'll never graduate college, he'll never have children, he'll never travel the world. Baby Parker died a kid. He was a child that lived a life too tough on him, and now he's immortalized as the blue haired boy who couldn't beat a disease.

Don't remember him for that.

Baby was many things: Annoying, persistent, sarcastic, sappy, proud, brilliant, talented, and electrifying. But above all, he was a person, not a disease.

Baby Parker was the love of my life. And that's all I can remember him as.

I loved Baby more than I ever thought I could love. I loved him like the moon loves the tides, like the sky loves the stars. And now I'll never hold him again. I'll never look into those beautiful blue eyes again, I'll never see him throw his head back in laughter, never hear him bite on a sarcastic comment, never see his texting bubble appear at the bottom of my screen ever again.

Our apartment is empty, and our bed is still unmade. I don't know how I'm going to sleep without him next to me.

So what do I think of cancer? Cancer taught me that the universe does very cruel things to very un-cruel people. It also taught me that no matter how hard you fight, sometimes you still lose. No matter how much pain and suffering you go through, sometimes there is no happy ending. Cancer stole away my family. It stole away my heart. And yet, without it, I don't know if I ever would have come to love Baby in the way that I did.

In the short of it, I am lost. An empty ship on an unbreaking sea. Don't ask me how I feel, or how I'm doing, because I won't even know what you mean.