Prologue

       Five months to live. That’s what the doctor said. It still hadn’t really sunken in. At only seventeen years old, I was facing death. Pancreatic cancer that had metastasized to my liver and both kidneys before the doctors caught it. The silent killer they called it.

       “What do you want to do?” my mom asked me with tears in her eyes.

       “It doesn’t really sound like I have a lot of options,” I replied, still in shock.

       “Chemotherapy is about our only option at this point,” the doctor addressed my mom. “We will do a couple months of chemo and radiation then see where we stand. After that, we can see about clinical trials. I’m not going to lie to you, there are no guarantees.”

       All I could do was nod. My mom was sobbing next to me. I put my hand on her knee. How funny that I was comforting her when I was the one dying.