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“So your mom just came to see you because she wanted you to know?”
I pass her the joint and hold my breath, feeling the weed burn in my throat before releasing it. “No. She wanted me to get tested as a living donor.”
Her eyes snap to mine. “And did you?”
“Yeah, I got tested.”
“And?”
“No go. Something about tissue incompatibility.”
“I’m sorry.”
I shrug. “Mom says it’s for the best anyway. If he ever found out it came from me he’d probably kill me.”
“You mean you would’ve done it without him knowing?”
“Of course.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because he’s my dad,” I say simply.
She looks up at the stars and I do the same. And we stay that way, passing the joint between us.
“Did it feel good?” she asks.
“What?”
“Yelling and beating the shit out of things and just letting it all out.”
“Yeah. At the time. Not so much now, though.”
She rolls to her side and looks at me with a smirk on her face. “I want to try it,” she whispers.
“Go ahead.”
She starts to stand up on the hood of the car. “It stays between us, okay? Don’t tell Blake.”
“You’re keeping a lot of secrets from your husband.”
“It’s for the best. Trust me.” She hands me the joint and I take a puff as I get off the hood, waving my hand through the air.
“The stage is yours, C-Lo.”
She clears her throat and suddenly looks unsure. Then she nods once and rolls her shoulders. “Fuck you, cancer!” she shouts, her voice echoing through the night sky.
“Yeah!” I encourage. “Fuck you, cancer!”
Her head throws back with laughter, and then she stops. Her smile fades and her breaths become heavy. She shakes out her hands and I notice her eyes begin to glaze with tears. She sniffs once, her sob following after it.
I swallow anxiously, waiting for her to continue.
“I was eighteen!” she shouts to no one. “No one should have to deal with that at eighteen! Wasn’t it enough? My mom? My aunt? Weren’t they enough for you that you had to take me too?”
I stay still, my heart in my throat and my mind on her and Hunter.
“I’m sick. And I’m tired. I’m so fucking tired of acting like it didn’t bother me! Do you know what it’s like to sit in a fucking chair for eight hours straight while the person you love sits and holds your hand and you wonder the entire time why? Why the fuck am I here? Why is he here? And I have to pretend like I’m okay with you. I’m not okay with you, cancer. Not at all! I fucking hate you. I hate everything about you.” She’s pacing up at down on the hood now, her footsteps heavy against the metal. Her fists are balled at her sides—the anger and frustration and hurt all coming out. “And now everyone around me treats me like I’m going to die at any minute. Blake—he watches me like a fucking hawk. He helps me with every little thing and I love him so much but I hate that. If I want to jump up and down, I’ll fucking jump up and down!” I cringe as she jumps on the hood, denting the fuck out of it. “And I’ll do it and I’ll laugh about it and he doesn’t need to stop me! He doesn’t need to tell me that I’ll overexert myself and that I need to calm down. I don’t want to calm down!” she shouts, crying as she does. She wipes her face across her sleeve and looks up. Then she collapses.
“Holy shit!” I rush to her. “Are you okay?”
She’s fucking laughing. “You’re just like Blake. I’m not going to die, Josh.” She takes the joint from me and inhales a drag, then blows it out slowly.
“You overexerted yourself, didn’t you?”
She pouts. “Yes. Don’t—”
“Tell Blake. I got it.”
I lie back down on the hood with her. “Did it help?”
“At the time,” she says, “Not so much now.”
“Yeah.”
“You know what I hate the most?”
“What?”
“The word remission.”
I face her. “Yeah?”
“It should be called intermission. Like they have in plays. Or, like, TV shows when they have the mid-season breaks. It’s like the diagnosis and the chemo are the first half of the season. Then the intermission comes and you’re just sitting there waiting for the next appointment. And it’s like… oh yay, the show ended well, you’re cancer free. Or, it can be like, oh a cliffhanger… the cancer’s still there. Sorry. And then you have to wait for the next season and the first half is just a fucking recap of everything from the previous season until another fucking intermission. And then you wait for the outcome and it still might not end—it can still be a cliffhanger. I fucking hate cliffhangers.” She rolls her head to the side and looks at me. “And I fucking hate cancer.”
“Fire truck cancer,” I tell her.
She smiles. “Fire truck it right in the ass.” She pounds her fist on the hood. “With this car.”
“With a fire truck.”
She laughs. “Fire truck it with a fire truck, right in the ass.”
“We’re so high.”
“Maybe.” She shrugs. Then moves closer and settles her head on my chest. “Hey Josh?”
