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He made me feel like a grown-up.
I took the blunt, allowing myself a little smile that I hid in the dark. Everyone else treated me like I was made out of glass. Only Dean ever did things that could break me. Took one hit. Inhaled. Exhaled. Stayed alive. That was a win in my world.
But of course, I had to cough like a dog who was about to throw up a lung or two. Dean gave me a sideways glance, smirking. “Next time you wanna get high, I’m baking your ass pot brownies.”
I ignored him, looking up to the sky. It was nice to forget about my family, even if for a second. Even if it was with the man I considered somewhat my enemy.
“I once heard the sun gets closer to us every year. That one day it’ll burn the whole planet,” I said, circling the sky with my finger and passing him the blunt. Dean took a swig from his beer, everything about his body language light and youthful and reckless. He looked like a teenage boy for a second.
The teenage boy I loved once upon a time.
“Well, the sun is likely to last seven billion years more than its current four point five billion age. Then it will most likely balloon into a red giant star and collapse down into a white dwarf. Safe to say that by the time that happens, neither my stoner ass nor your perky one will be here to witness the shitshow.” He patted my head with the hand that held his beer, like I was a precious toddler. “Unless you’re planning to still be around? You’re gonna make a fuck-hot old lady. Even a few billion years old.”
I laughed so loud my voice echoed in the sky. “Suffice to say, I won’t be here.”
“None of us will.” He shrugged, passing me the blunt. Our fingers touched, and electricity rolled down my skin, making it tickle. I ignored it, thinking, But my time will probably come long before yours.
How many years more did I have? Twenty? Ten? Less? That was the problem with cystic fibrosis. It wasn’t as immediate and urgent as cancer or ALS. I still had time. Just not as much as everyone else.
Maybe it was the alcohol, or the weed, or life in general, but it happened. After a few, good years it happened. Again.
My ex-therapist once said it was completely normal, considering my circumstances. The realization of dying—how real it was—gripped me and panic coursed through my veins in alarming quantities. I froze. Stopped breathing—not by choice—when images of my body rotting inside a coffin assaulted my mind. These panic attacks have been going on for a long time. Since I was ten and the concept of death started making sense. That was around the time I knew I wasn’t going to die of old age.
I was having a panic attack while hanging out with Mr. Chilled, but he couldn’t have known that, because these attacks weren’t extreme. After a few seconds, I resumed my breathing, and the only physical thing that bothered me was wave after wave of uncomfortable heat that seemed to have smacked my face and an out-of-control pulse.
Back when I saw my therapist—my parents took me to someone who specialized in teenagers with terminal diseases—we tried to find the root of my problem. Everyone was uncomfortable with the idea of death, but I was one of the rare teenagers who spent sleepless nights lying in bed imagining her dead body being cremated. The therapist was good. I’ll give her that. She asked if I remembered being a fetus. I said no. Then she asked if I had any memories of not living. I said no. “That’s what death feels like, Rosie. You won’t remember it happened, so, in a sense, it’s almost like you live forever.”
Mostly, when my panic attacks found me, I tried to remind myself of this conversation, but usually it helped to just get distracted by something else entirely. So I shook my head, peeking into Dean’s tranquil face, and asked, “What else do you know about stars? And spare me the fun part where they explode and we all die.”
He tucked a lock that fell on my forehead behind my ear. “By the time the sun explodes, no one is going to be here to witness it. Well, other than the Kardashians. Those people are always fucking everywhere.”
I swatted his shoulder, playful without meaning to be. “Don’t go there, Cole. Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami is my one guilty pleasure.”
“That’s just plain sad. Especially when the neighbor upstairs can take you anywhere in his penthouse. Now that’s a pleasure worthy of the guilt.”
“Focus,” I groaned. He put the blunt out on the bench and flicked it into a nearby trashcan. He laughed his one hundred percent genuine laugh, the one no girl stood a chance against. His voice felt good against my skin. In the air. Everywhere.
