One of the strangest feelings in the world is being so very aware of your own mortality. Of course, everyone is more than familiar with the fact that they will some day die, but for most it's not exactly imminent. However for me, its a lot closer than I initially thought.
When you're diagnosed with a terminal illness, the eagle that will swoop down and steal your life, you kind of come crashing down to earth. You become more than aware of your own mortality, more aware of looming death. You begin to regret all that time you wasted; sleeping in, fucking about. All of a sudden you want to do everything, try to fit thousands of worthwhile activities into whatever little time remains. And as each day draws to a close and your breaths become shallower and your muscles weaken, you begin to fully realise the extent of your mistakes.
You would give anything to turn back time and start over, do anything to escape the knowledge that your months are quickly dwindling to days.
And what's even shittier than feeling all of these things first hand? Having to watch them all happen to someone you love. For I am Augustus Waters, and as I watched Caroline's slow deterioration, it is today that I watch as Hazel faces the same fate.
I met her at support group, just about a year after Caroline's slow and painful death. She had the same dark hair and puffy cheeks, and the image of my angry and, to put it simply, deceased, ex-girlfriend jolted my heart in a way I didn't think possible. I stared, almost angry, and she stared back, but from that moment I had absolutely and irreversibly fallen for this girl.
Love comes at a price, and Hazel Grace was sick. And here she lies before me with her eyes closed and her head leaning back on her pillow, sicker than she has ever been. Even with her grey skin and scruffy hair, with the skinny limbs too heavy for her to lift and her chilled blue lips, Hazel Grace is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. What kills me is that I know these are her final days, that she won't make it out. It'll just be me stepping out into this world alone., to live in solidarity until my own cancer takes over completely and whisks me away to be with her in that great big Something. In this moment, I can not describe to you how much I really hope there really is a Something, and not just a great big Nothing.
Watching Hazel die is one of the hardest things I have had to do in my lifetime, in fact probably the hardest I will ever do. The fact she is so close to oblivion only reassures me that she won't have to watch me suffer the same fate, slowly being suffocated and strangled from within. Her eyes flutter a little and she turns her head in my direction, looking up at me through tears of pain and remnants of sleep. I put down my book and take her thin, cold hand in mine, cradling her fingers twixt mine and drawing soft circles on the back of her hand. She smiles faintly and opens her mouth to whisper my name.
"Augustus."
"Hazel."
"Okay?"
"Okay."
Her voice is strained, contorted by her weakness and muffled by the mask over her lips. She closes her eyes again and I gently run my fingers over her hair, soft as the downy feathers on a week-old chick. Her breathing falls back into the rhythm of sleep and I watch her for what feels like an infinity, undisturbed.
A friend of mine once pointed out that in literature, we always refer to the character in the present tense, but that once a person has passed away we view them as in the past. While he turned out to be the biggest of all douchebags, he kind of has a point. And so you begin to understand why I'm writing this. I had a PET scan last week, and I lit up all over. I know for a fact that soon after Hazel departs from this world, I will follow on. So this is what I'm leaving behind, this is my mark on the world. Is, not was. Always present, never past.
The ironic thing is that Hazel really was a present, a gift. In sharing her life with me, she saved me. I was so close to just ending it all, then Isaac dragged me along to that support group and I met her and all the light suddenly came back into my life.
Her breaths wheeze in and out, her lungs straining with the exhaustion. The heart monitor beside her bed shows her struggle in graphic detail. And it's this that gives me the strength to leave. Its not that i don't want to see her, because oh god how i want to see her. Its more that i don't want to watch her die. Shadows move behind the curtains and i know it's her parents, waiting for me to say my final goodbye.
"I love you, Hazel Grace Lancaster." This time there is no response, no reply, no okay. Just for one second, I remove the mask from over her face and plant a firm kiss on her cool lips. It lasts but a second before I place the mask back on her face. I just stand there, unable to leave. I am empty, alone. Her eyes flutter in faint unconscious recognition as I kiss her forehead and choke back a sob, because I know she can hear me. I don't want to say goodbye, I don't want the last words she hears uttered in my voice to be a farewell. With the sound of her forced breaths filling my ears, I turn to leave. Each step feels like it takes a lifetime, the squeak of my sneaker and the clunk of my prosthetic sounding too loud on the silent ward. When I pull the curtains aside her parents embrace me, drawing me into their bodies as tears and black spots cloud my vision.
"Thank you, Gus." Her father mumbles into my ear, and then they let go and step inside, and I am alone. I resist the urge to turn back, rip through the curtains and climb into her bed. Tell myself that gripping hold of her and telling her not to leave will not make her stay. It's for the best.
I lie out in the little courtyard with the sun beating down on me, my arms and legs dangling over the sides of the picnic table as the salty tears drip down my cheeks and splash onto the aged wood.
It isn't long before my mom finds me and helps me up. I'm numb as she guides me to the car and fastens me into the passenger seat, then climbs into the other side and drives us across town.
When we get home, I limp down to the basement and sit on my bed, leaning against the wall and thinking only of her. I don't know how long I stay like this, staring at the opposite wall with salty tears running down my cheeks.
My phone rings and wakes me from this half-sleep, and I look at Hazels number on the screen and feel everything collapse inside of me. I answer anyway, and her mom just chokes back sobs on the other end of the line.
"She's gone, isn't she?"
Through tears and wracking sobs I hear the confirmation of her mother, the drowned wailing of her father. Now the parents of a dead child. I don't even bother to hang up, just launch my phone at the wall opposite and watch as it shatters into a million pieces. Filled with hopelessness, I twist on my bed and lie there looking up at the ceiling, for hours and days, inconsolable.
My stomach roars for food but I don't eat, my throat screams for water but I don't drink, because what is the point? I must sleep at some point because when I wake up I am lying on a bed in the front room, my head propped up on pillows, everything feeling so, so heavy, and I know I am dying.
I thought dying would be difficult, but inside I am already dead.