Death Sentence

""Emmy," he said softly, and she flinched. "I'm... sick."

Her mouth dropped open and she bolted upright. But it wasn't pity in her eyes: it was pure, unadulterated rage. She slammed both her hands on the table; it shook, and a few hipsters glanced up from their poetry books. Emily leaned forward and hissed out, "I swear to God, Nicholas, if you gave me fucking AIDS, or, Jesus Christ, gonorrhea or - fuck. I swear, I don't know what I'll-"

"God, it's been two years; if I'd given you something you'd know by now, don't you think?" He shook his head and quirked his lips up in a small, twisted smile. "No need to worry about yourself; it's a prion disease, it's genetic."

She raised her eyebrows.

Nicholas sipped his coffee. "I have maybe two years, if I'm lucky. I can't pronounce its actual name - it's GSS, if you remember from microbio."

She blanched, opened her mouth, and snapped it shut again. After a few heartbeats of silence, Emily finally managed to say, hesitantly, "And you called me to...? Make amends?"

"What? No, of course not. My car was towed, I need someone to drive me to my doctor's appointment. It's in," he tapped his phone, "Thirty minutes." He smiled that smile again. "I figured you wouldn't say no to a dying man if you only had to deal with me for half an hour, otherwise I would've invited you out for brunch or something. Do people still brunch? Is that a thing?"

Goddammit, Nick, she thought."