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I press my lips to her forehead. “I know, Charlee. Mine, too. Let’s go show them how much we care, and that they can always count on us.”
As soon as we step off the elevator and onto the third floor, I can hear Claire. She’s crying, that much is certain. And screaming. Charlee’s fingers tighten around mine and I give her hand a gentle squeeze, trying my best to be reassuring.
“How could you do this?” Claire’s frantic voice fills the hallway as we move toward the sound. “This isn’t a decision you get to make on your own!”
A throat clears before a voice I don’t recognize starts in. “Claire, I can understand why you’re—”
“No!” she growls out. Her forest eyes, rimmed red as tears cover her pink face, flicker to us as we step into the room, quietly shutting the door behind us. The man she’s yelling at appears to be the doctor. “I haven’t even started on you. How could you lie to me? Right to my face? That’s so unethical!”
“Claire, honey.” Gavin’s voice cracks from his spot in bed. He’s propped up on a bunch of pillows, looking pale and absolutely depleted. “He did it because I asked him to. I didn’t want you two to know.” His eyes move over her and Casey, before sliding to Charlee and I. He gives us a weak smile. “My favorite significant others.”
Claire grits her teeth so hard I can hear them clacking together from across the room. I go to move to her, but Charlee holds me back. When I glance down at her, she gives me the tiniest headshake.
“How could you not want us to know?” Claire steps toward him. Casey follows every one of her steps, like he’s ready to restrain her if he needs to. He looks absolutely wrecked. “We’re your kids! What if John hadn’t come to check on you? What if Casey had come with Vivi tonight like he was supposed to, and found you there, passed out? Your granddaughter!”
“I’m sorry,” Gavin pleads. “I knew you both would have tried to convince me otherwise.”
“You’re damn right we would have!” It’s Casey this time. “We need you! Your grandkids need you!”
Charlee flinches at my side and Casey’s eyes close as he inhales a deep breath through his nose. When he speaks next, it’s a quiet whisper, his voice gravelly as he attempts to hold back the tears. “Claire’s right, Dad. This decision should have been made together, the three of us. We’re your family.’
Tears slide down Gavin’s face as he looks up at the ceiling. “This doesn’t change that. We’ll always be a family, no matter what.”
“But you won’t be here!” Claire shouts. “You’re leaving us! You’re choosing it!” Her scream dies on her tongue as she buries her face in her hands, her small body wracking with sobs.
“Oh, sweetheart, come here,” Gavin begs, reaching for her.
Claire twists away from him, pushes past her brother, but halts. She turns back to Casey, and with a sigh, he pulls out his truck keys and tucks them into her hand.
“Be careful,” he whispers, squeezing her fingers.
Claire just nods and runs right out the door, leaving us all staring after her.
I’m two steps behind her, already halfway out the door when a deep sigh comes from the bed. “Just give her some time to calm down before you go after her, Avery.”
Charlee asks the question that I’m afraid to. “What’s going on?”
Casey opens his mouth to answer her but all that comes out is a choking sob. He shakes his head, tears streaming down his face, and Charlee rushes to his side. He envelops her in a hug so visibly crushing as he cries into her hair.
“Gavin came to me in March complaining of extreme fatigue and bouts of weakness,” the doctor says softly, stepping up to the bed. I’d almost forgotten he was here. “We ran a few tests and determined that the cancer had returned a third time, more severe than before.”
“I declined chemo,” Gavin says quietly. I’m not sure he’s even telling us, so to speak, or if he’s really just coming to terms with his own decision, like he’s saying it out loud for the first time, truly realizing the weight of his decision.
Charlee’s cries strengthen in volume and intensity, and I can see the way her body is shaking from here while she falls apart in Casey’s arms.
Me? Well, I’m having a hard time feeling anything, because it feels like I have a black hole in my chest where my heart should be. Something’s cracked wide-open, and it hurts like hell. That’s about the only thing I can focus on.
Gavin studies Casey and Charlee for a long moment before his gaze slides over to me.
“I’m dying.”
***
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
Claire
I’m not sure how I even made it here, in the kitchen of my childhood home, the only real home I’ve ever known. Blinded by the tears that slid relentlessly down my face, it’s a miracle I was able to make the fifteen-minute drive from the hospital.
