Page 7 of What Should Have Been Ours

And then he left and stopped contacting me. After everything we shared.

I had accepted that I would never see him again. That my first heartbreak would never be mended.

I clung to the hope of seeing him again for way too long. I would constantly imagine our lives magically coming back together, and us finally having what should have been ours. The happy ending we deserved. Especially after the cards we were dealt with so early in life.

Then, those years just kept passing by. And slowly, I had to let go of the dream of us. It was obvious that’s what he did.

Some days, when I would be feeling pretty low, the thoughts of him would creep back in, like telepathically he was trying to tell me everything was still okay. Then I would start spiraling from the thoughts of how he was doing and if he was okay. To the point where I would search up obituaries just to make sure he was still alive out there somewhere.

It all got very morbid for a while.

I had to keep myself together and stay strong. I had to let him go. It wasn’t healthy to be clinging to a love that was never going to exist in the same space as me again.

So, I slowly started to pick back up the pieces of my broken heart and glue them back together alone.

When I felt like it was whole enough again, I tried giving it to other men. But no one else ever held a flame to his memory. And eventually, I just accepted that at twenty-eight, a successful love life wasn’t in the cards for me, the family I always dreamed of having wasn’t in my future.

But I already knew that part.

From an early age, I knew that a family might never be in my cards. With all of the chemo and treatments I’ve had that spanned on and off over the course of eight years, I knew my chances of having any children were slim to none.

Now, after many remissions and many more relapses with my cancer—Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia—I have now been cancer-free for thirteen years. My longest stretch ever and hopefully my last.

It’s crazy to think I didn’t know if I would see my eighteenth birthday, let alone still be here at twenty-eight.

Some days, it feels so surreal that I actually made it.

And now, standing in front of me is someone who had worse odds than I did.

Even though my heart is very confused right now, it warms at that fact.

“You actually became a doctor,” I blurt out, still trying to wrap my head around him really being here. Standing in front of me. Touching me.

His hands are still on my arms, and he’s looking at me like he’s trying to make sure I’m real, too.

“Yeah, I’m in my third year of residency, and I just transferred. I figured after all the trouble I caused here, I owed them one. But I’ve had a pretty crappy start to my first day so I came down here to grab a cup of hot chocolate.”

He releases my arms, and I already hate the loss of his touch.

“That’s funny. I just got my annual scans done and came here on my way out to celebrate the good news—thirteen years of clean scans going strong,” I say, trying not to come off as awkwardly as I feel.

“Good days call for hot chocolate,” he says.

“Bad days require it,” I finish.

And just like that, any awkwardness disappears, and it feels like we’re just two kids again.

“I’m so happy to hear your scans were good,” he says in a low voice as he stands entirely too close to me. “I will say, I kinda wish I hadn’t picked the pediatric ward now, so I could have been one of your doctors. We could have finally made our many pretend appointments real this time.”

I think if he were any closer, he would be able to hear how loudly my heart was beating right now.

Maybe he can already hear the loud, thumping, traitorous organ in my chest from where he’s standing.

I swallow, trying to ignore how my entire body reacts to his presence—too close, too warm, too familiar.

“I don’t think I’d want you as my doctor,” I say, smirking. “Last time I trusted you with my medical care, you prescribed me a spoonful of sugar and a juice box.”

“I plead the fifth,” he says with his hands up. “But I can assure you my medical knowledge has improved a little since then. Now, I would prescribe you a large hot chocolate, eight hours of sleep, and…a follow-up appointment. Preferably over dinner or drinks. You know, just to monitor your progress.”