It was her.
And that made me want to fight even more. Just like Gabe said. I could do this. I could beat it. I’d sure as hell try. In the past, fighting for football or for school had never been a huge pull for me.
But beating this for her?
Yeah. I’d fight demons for her. I’d fight the darkness in me, the sickness. I’d fight that damn tumor. And I’d live. Because I sure as hell wanted a 2014 with that girl in my arms.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Words aren’t really coming at this point. I mean I knew he was basically a billionaire but…everything seems so normal so wonderful. I feel like I’m waiting for the ball to drop. Why do I keep feeling that way?
Kiersten
Overwhelmed didn’t even begin to describe how I felt. I had my own bathroom, with a rain shower, heated tile, a heated towel rack, a flat screen TV. I mean seriously, I could go on and on. I even Facetimed Uncle Jo so he could see everything.
He gasped like I knew he would. Pretty soon I had Uncle Jo, my aunt, and their two dogs, all gaping at the iPhone screen as I slowly did a panoramic shot of the bathroom. Wow, how lame, I was actually taking pictures of someone else’s bathroom like a complete and total stalker.
“Can I move there?” Uncle Jo asked. Aunt San swatted him across the chest while he chuckled and asked again. The dogs barked. I missed them. Before I knew it, I started to get emotional. What had I been thinking these past two years? Locking myself in my room to grieve when I had a family waiting outside the whole time.
“You okay?” Uncle Jo asked when I took him off Facetime and pressed the phone to my ear.
“Yeah.” I sighed. “Just really thankful for you guys. I love you.”
“We love you too, kiddo. Now, get off the phone and take lots of pictures so I can live through you, okay?”
“Deal.” I laughed and said goodbye, hanging up the phone and walking around my giant bedroom. It had a deck that overlooked the Puget Sound. It was also bigger than five of my rooms back home. It had a large over-stuffed bed, and I’m pretty sure if I snapped my fingers an iPod would turn on.
A knock sounded on the door and then it opened.
“Good thing I wasn’t changing.” I joked as Wes stepped in.
“Damn.” He grinned. “I was hoping I’d catch you unaware.”
“Clever.”
He stalked toward me. “I thought so.”
I turned my attention back to the water. The view was so pretty¸ and for it being Thanksgiving it wasn’t all too cold outside.
Wes went and took a seat in one of the deck chairs and then patted his knee. I shook my head no.
He smiled. Seriously that’s all it took. One smile and I was putty, absolutely useless against his magic boy powers. With a heavy sigh — you know, to show my disapproval at his manipulation — I sat on his lap and leaned back against his chest.
“Thank you,” he whispered into my hair after a few silent minutes, “for coming with me.”
“Pretty sure it should be me thanking you.” I linked my hands in his. “And thanks for being my boyfriend for two weeks.”
He tensed.
“What? You did say two weeks, right?” I elbowed him in the ribs. “I mean, you’re throwing me a bone. That’s it, right?”
“No.” He turned me in his lap. “No bone, no pity dates. I want you…” His hand caressed my face gently, his fingertips grazing my skin and then pulling back as if the contact was too much for him to handle. “I like you a lot.”
“So… the two weeks is up for discussion?” I joked.
He swallowed, staring into my eyes as if searching for something, “I’ll tell you what…” His voice cracked. “I’ll give you as much time as I have.”
“As much time as you have.” I searched his face trying to figure out why he would say it like that. “Are you planning on not having much time?”
He looked straight through me. It was as if he had seen a ghost, his face went pale and his eyes watered.
“Sure.” I answered quickly. “As much time as you have.”
“Promise?” He jerked his head away and looked out at the ocean. “Promise me?”
“I promise.”
“Good.” His smile returned, he kissed me on the cheek. “Let’s go get dinner then. I’m sure dad’s hungry and you’ve had a long day. We can watch a movie later, alright?”
“Sounds good.” I hopped off his lap but didn’t release his hand; for some reason it seemed important. Important that I touch him as much as possible. How crazy did that sound? I felt this urgency to be near him as if he was going to disappear at any minute. Wow, who was insecure now? I pushed the thought out of my head and swore to myself I wasn’t going to overthink it. I liked him, he liked me, and I officially had more than two weeks. I knew it was like we were moving fast, but I really liked him, and I knew in my heart two weeks would never be enough. Actually, I was pretty sure that whole year wouldn’t be enough. Summer might just ruin me if I didn’t get to see him at least once. Who knew? Maybe I could take summer school so I could be close by; that was, if he wasn’t bored with me by then.
****
Dinner went by smoothly. You know, if smooth meant I couldn’t decide which fork to use with my salad and which one to use with the salmon. At one point Mr. Michels, or Randy as he preferred I call him, began showing me which utensil to use by lifting it high in the air and diving into his food. I kind of loved him. He had Wes’s fun personality but still seemed to be grounded.
I was stuffed by the time the meal was done.
“And now…” Randy pushed back his chair. “I bid you farewell. Tomorrow we have turkey and I’m watching football.”
“Amen,” Wes said.
“Um, Wes, can I talk to you for a minute?”
“Sure.” Wes pushed away from the table and followed his dad into the hall.
I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but at one point it looked like Randy was trying to feel Wes’s pulse. Weird. They seemed to be arguing, and then Randy swore and pinched the bridge of his nose and walked off. Wes’s shoulders slumped as he slammed his fist against the wall, not hard, but hard enough to show that he was upset.
“Everything okay?” I asked in a small voice, coming up behind him.
His eyes scanned the house, as if memorizing it one last time. “Yeah, just father-son stuff. Football stuff really.” Wes shrugged. “No biggie. Hey—” He flashed me another killer smile. “Let’s go watch a movie.”
“Cool.”
When he said movie I thought he meant in the living room.
Not a theater room.
With popcorn and reclining seats.
From here on out when I think of heaven this is the picture I’m going to have in my head. Sitting with Wes in our own private movie theater, at his house, holding his hand.
“Any movie, but it has to be a Christmas movie.” He clicked through the Apple TV. “You pick.”
“Why Christmas?”
“I love Christmas.” He shrugged. “And I may not be around for Christmas this year, at least not in this house, so I thought it’d be nice to watch.”
“Where are you going to be?”
“Oh, we have other houses around the area, just depends on my dad’s mood which one we stay at.”
“How awful for you,” I teased.
“My cross, my burden. Now pick.” He flipped me the remote and put his hands behind his head.
“I choose…” I clicked through. “This one.”
He squinted at the screen. “You’re kidding.”
“You said any Christmas movie and I believe you said lady’s choice.”
“It’s Mickey Mouse.”
“My favorite Christmas movie. You gonna go back on your word?”
“You really are my little lamb aren’t you? All innocent, wanting to watch Mickey Mouse Christmas.” He reached out and stroked my face. “Tell me it’s wrong to want to
blot out all that purity… right here, right now.”
“It’s wrong,” I said simply, ignoring the buzzing in my head as his fingers ran down the side of my cheek.
He sighed and pulled back. “Fine, the lamb speaks, Big Bad Wolf listens.”
“As it should be.” I leaned into him and then moved the armrest so I could truly lay across him.
“And then Lamb tempts Wolf,” Wes said in a low voice.
“And Wolf rises above temptation,” I sang.
“Wolf likes temptation.”
“Wolf needs to watch the movie.”
“Lamb needs to stop talking before Wolf silences her with his teeth.”
My grin was so huge, I swear I couldn’t see out of my own eyes as I laughed and turned away from him. “Stop!”
“Not used to hearing that particular word. What ever does it mean?”
“It means no.” I pushed at his hand as it rested on my hip and lifted my shirt to touch bare skin.
“Hmm, what’s no mean?”
“It means…” The movie suddenly blasted across the screen.
Wes leaned down and spoke against my ear, “Saved by the Mouse.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
I should have walked away. Instead, I blocked the way, made myself so impossible to walk away from that it was too late. Late, early, not that it mattered, time wasn’t on my side, and she wouldn’t be either, not when I told her.
Weston
She fell asleep in my arms during the first fifteen minutes. I closed my eyes, not because I was tired, but because it felt normal. I could almost imagine it was normal. I’d taken my girlfriend home for the holidays, we got bored, watched a movie, and she fell asleep.
But it wasn’t.
I checked my watch.
I needed to take more meds, so as much as it killed me to move that gorgeous girl away from me — it was time for bed. I picked up a piece of hair and examined it, twisting it between my fingers. It wasn’t an obsession with hair, it was more of an obsession with everything that made her unique. Her red hair, her smile, her laugh, the way she pushed people away — the way she let me in.
Damn. I was screwed, so damn screwed.
She would find out soon. I’d have to tell her. I had one game left and then Coach was going to bench me. He said I wasn’t the same player I used to be. I couldn’t argue that. Not with me puking at practice every day. I knew I was letting the team down, but it was better to step down from the entire team then to allow them to get their asses kicked or worse, allow any of them to get hurt because I couldn’t hold my shit together anymore.
I just hadn’t realized Coach would call my dad, or that my dad would tell him I was sick.
“Sick?” Coach had asked, “Well, will he get better?”
My dad hadn’t said anything because he didn’t know, just like I didn’t know, just like the doctors didn’t know.
He’d argued with me about it again. Wanting me to at least see if the tumor was shrinking. I didn’t want to know. Who the hell would? I had a freaking tumor twisting its way dangerously close to my heart, and they wanted to know if it was growing?
Hell. No.
I’d rather live in ignorance than see the scan of that monster inside my chest. If the drugs weren’t shrinking it, chances were, I’d die in surgery or come out of it and be made comfortable.
Dad didn’t know, but I was going to ask the doctors about that.
Why would I want to live through surgery? Only to die a few months later in pain?
Maybe that made me a coward. Hell, I felt like one most days. Especially as the days got closer to my surgery. I had three more weeks until D-day. Three more weeks to either tell Kiersten the truth or break her damn heart.
What the hell had I been thinking to give her as much time as I had left? Her eyes had lit up. I knew she was thinking that was a great promise. It was all I freaking had to give her.
Time was the most precious thing in the world to me, and I’d just given her all of it. Because I was falling for her. Because I cared for her. Because I wanted to give her something to remember me by, even if it would eventually fade like its namesake. Time… what an absolute horror-inducing word.
Chapter Thirty
I wish I could forget the dreams… I wish I could be with him every night. And here I thought the nightmares were gone.
Kiersten
I woke up screaming. And then for reasons I really didn’t want to dig into, let alone discuss with that logical part of my brain that normally made good decisions, I padded my way to Wes’s room.
Just as I lifted my hand to knock, the door swung open.
And I stared slack-jawed at that amazing eight pack. Was I sighing? Yes. Biting my cheek to keep from grinning like a fool? Absolutely. I took my time looking, and my nightmare was officially forgotten.
“Feeling better?” Wes tilted my chin up so that he could see my face.
“How did you know I was feeling bad?” I asked in a sleepy voice.
He sighed and opened the door for me so I could walk in. “I heard you screaming.”
“Oh.”
I looked down at his clenched fists and felt instantly guilty. Embarrassment washed over me as I took a step back. His hands came around my waist, lifting me into the air. In an instant I was lying on his bed.
“No, it’s fine. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you. The nightmare’s gone and—” I struggled to get up from the bed, but he held me firm in his arms.
Wes brushed a kiss against my forehead. “You didn’t let me finish.” He gave me a sexy grin. “I was on my way to your room to beat whatever monsters were hiding under your bed.”
“You slay dragons now?”
“Is that what you dream about?” He pulled me against him so we were lying chest to chest. “Dragons?”
“I wish.” I shuddered in his arms. “A lot of times I dream about death, about my parents’ death. They’re drowning and I can’t reach them. I’m always too late.”
Wes’s grip tightened around my waist, his breathing seemed to pick up. Licking his lips he kissed my forehead. “Time’s a bitch, isn’t it?”
I laughed. “Yeah, it really is.”
“If only I would have done this, I should have done this, I could have done this…” He swore. “Life is full of those three.”
“Three?”
“Woulda, shoulda, coulda.” Wes traced my jaw with his fingertip. “It’s human nature to assume that we have that sort of control over what happens to us, but the truth is… life happens and sometimes you’re too late. Hell, sometimes you’re too early. Sometimes you make the wrong choice just like sometimes you make the right one. The only time people ever use those three is when things don’t go the right way. People don’t question themselves when things are going well. They question themselves when things have gone to hell.”
I hadn’t really thought about that.
“You can spend your life in that zone, thinking you have even a sliver of control over things that you have no power over. Rather than concentrating on what you should have done, concentrate on what you can do now.”
“And what’s that?” I asked breathlessly.
“Kiss your totally sexy and wise boyfriend…” He kissed my nose. “Let him slay your dragons.” His lips moved to my cheek. “And know that in this moment… you’re not living in the woulda, shoulda, coulda zone. You’re exactly where the universe wants you to be.”
“In your bed?” I grinned.
“Nah.” His mouth met mine. “In my arms.”
Breath hissed out of my mouth as he pressed his lips against mine. Everything about him was so warm and alive. I pressed my hands against his chest, loving the way his skin felt against my fingertips.
He pulled back, eyes closed, and swore, clenching my hands to his chest as if they were his lifeline, as if my touch was somehow changing his world.
“I can feel you,” he whispe
red. “I love having your hands here.” His eyes opened, but it didn’t look like Wes. It looked like a ghost of him, as if he wasn’t really present with me but somewhere far away. “I wish I could be whole for you.”
“Whole?” I slid my hands to his shoulders and pulled him closer. “You gonna tell me you’re half a man?”
He hesitated and then shrugged “Nah, just wish I could be totally yours, only yours. I wish I could get a do-over.”
“A do-over?” I pulled away and lay. “Weren’t you just spouting nonsense about woulda, coulda, shoulda?”
“Right.” He laughed. “Thanks, smart ass.” A pillow landed on my face before I could stop it. I pushed it away and sat up as he did the same.
“All I’m saying…” He sighed as if he had the world on his shoulders. “…is that I wish all my firsts and lasts were with you and only you.”
“Bummer.” I sighed. “I wasn’t the first freshman you kissed?”
“Actually…” H smiled thoughtfully. “You were.”
“Mission accomplished. And I better be the last freshman you kiss.” I jammed my finger in his chest as he winced and threw the pillow again.
“First, last, only.” He bit down on his lower lip. “Favorite.”
“Oh wow, you must want me to have good dreams tonight then, you’re really laying it on thick.”
“Just covering my bases.”
“Oh yeah?”
“What?” He pointed down at himself. “I’m not dream material?”
“Point Wes.” I held up one finger.
Grinning, he reared back and pounced on me, pressing my back against the pillows and the bed as he hovered over me.
“What if my dream turns into a nightmare?”
His face fell. “What do you mean?”