A wave of fear crashed over me.
This was no longer something we could fight our way out of easily.
This was real.
And it was taking him away from me.
“I’m sorry to say this,” Dr. Mitchell paused, his voice heavy. “Between four to six months… if you’re lucky.”
The words hollowed me out from the inside.
I turned to look at Cole.
He swallowed thickly, his jaw tightening.
“We could try radiation and immunotherapy—” the doctor started.
“But that won’t cure it. It will just delay the inevitable,” Cole said, cutting him off.
I flinched slightly at the certainty in his voice.
“That’s correct,” the doctor confirmed.
Cole lowered his gaze for a moment before lifting it again and turning to me. “I’d like to spend whatever time I have left with my family.”
My chest constricted so tightly that I could barely breathe.
Whatever time I have left… The words echoed in my mind as if they didn’t belong to our life, as if they had been spoken about someone else.
I droveus home in silence. I don’t remember much of the road or the turns we took.
My hands gripped the steering wheel, my eyes fixed ahead, but my thoughts were unravelling like threads pulled from a seam.
After a while, I forced myself to speak. “Why don’t you want to try the treatment options that he suggested?” I asked.
Cole turned to look at me. “Because the survival rate with those treatments is only four percent. I?—”
“Four percent is still a possibility,” I interrupted quickly, my voice barely holding it together.
I couldn’t break.
Not now.
I needed to be strong for him.
But underneath that strength, I was upset.
I was angry.
Angry at the situation.
Angry at him.
Angry at the fact that he was already giving up.
“It’s not a possibility I want to live with,” he said firmly. “Stop the car here.”
I blinked, startled, but pulled over as he asked.
