Chapter 5

November heralds the beginning of the end. The chemo sessions aren't getting any easier, if anything, Ryan just seems to be getting sicker. He's almost constantly got a low-grade fever nowadays and his bones have this deep-set ache that never goes away. He's lost enough weight now that he was worried people would start to notice the shirts hanging from his body and his ribs bulging under his skin. Peyton's probably already noticed, but she's Peyton so it's not like Ryan could really hide it from her. Julia's noticed too, but she brushes under the rug because he had the flu a lot and he was going to get better she thought. He knows what Julia's doing when she pushes an extra helping of food onto Ryan' plate and then glares at Ryan until he eats it.

And Ryan does eat it, just to make her feel a bit better, even though he knows he'll just throw it up.  Ryan is so goddamn tired all the time. His eyes droop a little lower and the bags under his eyes darken each passing day.

At first his dad was healthy most days and the cancer even went into remission for a while before it got really bad. Ryan doesn't think it's going to be like that for him, it will be persistent and quicker than his fathers. He watched it happen slow once before and it ruined him; he won't make anyone else watch it too.

By the middle of October he's just about done. He can't take much more, but then he thinks of his mother, all alone in the world and he can make it another hour. It's hurting his mom more than it's hurting him because in some ways he guesses that he is the fortunate for having all of these people around him that cared, yet didn’t understand, it was better they think he will get better, not worse.

But still he doesn’t want to tell them yet. Give them another day of happiness, another day without shadows then another day after that and another after that. He will give himself 2 weeks before he tells them, before he breaks them. If Ryan was honest with himself he was lonely. He is just so god damn tired of being alone.