Where We Fell by Amber L. Johnson Read Free Book Online

suspect my
mom is growing antsy about the time. She’ll be able to stay with me but Hannah
will have to go. And my dad, well, my dad already had to go back to work.
                “Don’t tempt me.” Hannah chuckles and
leans forward to press her nose to my cheek. “I’ll write you every day. You
call me when you feel up to it. We’ll Skype or Facetime or whatever you want.
Whenever you want.”
                She’s handed me a loaded grenade and
pulled the pin. I’m a teenage boy, after all. “Whatever I want? Do I finally
get to see your boobs?”
                If she could punch me in the arm, she
would. Or she would throw something at my head and call me a pig. She’d do
something other than laugh and cover her mouth . . . if I wasn’t
in a hospital bed. But I am.
                “Oliver Bishop?”
                “Yeah?” I’m staring into her eyes as she
inches closer, her lips just out of reach of mine.
                “I’ll make you a deal.” Her eyelids
flutter and her gaze drops to my mouth and then back up to my eyes. “You get
better, and the first weekend you can drive up to see me, I’ll show you my
boobs. Rock your entire world. I will wreck you.”
                “Deal.” I close my eyes and give her one
final kiss before my mother clears her throat and arranges her features into
something that resembles ‘apologetic.’
                “Visiting hours . . . I’m
sorry, Hannah.”
                My girl smiles at me and kisses my cheek
one last time. “I’m not.” She scoots delicately off the bed and crosses the
room to give my mom a hug. There’s determination in her steps as she moves to
the visitor’s chair where her purse has sat for the past few hours. She lifts a
hand to her head and smoothes out her hair a couple of times before she turns
to look at me one last time. “I’ll call you tomorrow. Don’t pick up if you’re
tired or sleeping or whatever.” Placing her fingers to her lips, she blows me a
small kiss and then disappears beyond the curtain.
                It feels as if my heart has walked
itself out of the room in a pair of bright blue flip flops.

10.
     
                THEY SAY LYMPHOMA IS the cancer to have
if you’re going to have it. And they say that once you start treatments, you’re
a warrior. ‘They’ say a lot of things . . . but honestly? I’d
rather have not been diagnosed with any kind of cancer, period. I’d rather it
had been Non-Hodgkin’s. I’d rather not be considered a fighter because I don’t
really feel like I’m battling anything other than myself.
                And maybe therein remains the struggle.
Maybe your mind is one thing you have control over when your body is working so
very hard to kill you off. When your body goes to war against itself, what is
there left to fight for?
                I choose to believe that, if I keep my
focus on the future, I could very well be fighting for a chance at something
great. A second go at life. There could be the smallest possibility of going to
college and starting something with Hannah. Of letting my parents see me grow
into an adult. These are the things I focus on as the hours become days. As the
days become weeks. During my treatments and in between the little bits of
exercise my doctor has allowed.
                She keeps her promise and writes me
emails every day. Sometimes they’re long. Sometimes they’re short. But just
getting them makes me feel better. They instill strength in me that I wasn’t
entirely sure I had.
                Then there are the Skype
conversations . . .
                She lives with a roommate named Coco who
is, for all intents and purposes, completely batshit crazy. It makes Hannah
laugh, but sometimes I can see that she’s legitimately worried that her
roommate could go off the deep