Words: 1000+
Characters: Augustus W., Hazel L.
Rating: T
A/N: I do not own The Fault in Our Stars, and I have no relation or contact to author John Green. I own nothing. I found this though in my drafts and I was like "oh hey...more tfios stuff..." and so here it is.

He'd never met a girl like her. Hazel Grace Lancaster. Even her name flowed nicely.

"So much depends upon a red wheelbarrow..."

He wanted to keep listening, wanted so badly to hear her voice. The sweet, soft wind chimes echoed through his brain as he drifted off into space. No, he thought, let me stay. Please let me stay.

The fates didn't think so. She was so different from other girls. For one, she had cancer (not a good thing) which made her empathetic. He hated sympathy. Of course, cancer perks were amazing, yet so common. Not NEC anymore, he began to realize how much cancer perks rocked. And how much he'd miss them.

"Glazed with rain water..."

From the very beginning, he knew. She was the one. She'd always be the one. His very own Hazel Grace Lancaster. Not even Caroline Mathers could compare. Caroline Mathers would never compare. And as his gut ached and his bones ached and his head ached, just everything, everything hurt, he wouldn't focus on Caroline Mathers. Hazel Grace had stolen his heart. And he liked it that way.

Wearing that old yellow t-shirt (not featuring the Hectic Glow quite unfortunately) and those jeans that sagged in (all the right) places, Hazel Grace Lancaster was beautiful. And he knew from the moment that he laid eyes on her: she was it. He'd never looked for another girlfriend after Caroline, never even thought of it really, and then BOOM! Here comes Miss Hazel Grace Lancaster walking into the room. (Talk about 'the party don't start til I walked in.') And whoosh, there went his heart.

And everything after that. Watching that movie, V for Vendetta, and admiring just how much she looked like Natalie Portman. He never really had a liking for that actress but after seeing Hazel Grace Lancaster, he had a fondness for her. Playing Counterinsurgence. She died like a million times in a row. But thanks to his amazing teaching skills, she was almost a pro. Almost. No one would be as good as him and Isaac.

"Beside the white chickens."

Her voice. That was another thing. Sweet, calm, soft, it made him want to record it just to hear it over and over again. It soothed him, made him think that everything would be okay. He could vaguely hear her voice shake just the slightest bit. No, don't cry, Hazel Grace, he thought. Ironic, isn't it? You were scared of hurting me. And you'll never know how sorry I am that the tables have turned.

It was almost over. He knew it. There would come a time when his presence on this planet would be no more, a time when all of the suffering, all of the pain, would subside and he would be free. Free from these chains that held him down, free of Prosty, his prosthetic leg that replaced the one he had lost. He knew that that time was coming soon.

And for the second time ever, he thought about bodies. A weird thing to think about at a time like this. He thought about how no one appreciated them. 'You don't know what you have until it's gone'. Could anything ever be more accurate? He'd played basketball, used his legs everyday and not once had he even thought to say thank you. People take the little things for granted. Don't take things like body parts and air for granted. Because one day they won't be there and you'll finally understand what you really had.

"And so much depends a blue sky cut open by the branches of the trees above."

The sky, the trees. God, it was really depressing. He'd never see the trees again, never see the sky. What was beyond the grave? Unfortunate for him that no one came back to tell. Was it nice? Was it pretty with the clear blue skies and the red and gold trees of autumn? He'd always loved the fall. It reminded him of cancer. Summer became the life before sickness, the life that people didn't quite understand but took for granted anyhow. Then fall came, sickness and despair following soon after. Suddenly the days of laughter and happiness seemed menial, unimportant. All that mattered now was the coming winter, the time of death. Except this time there would be no spring. Just ongoing winter.

"So much depends upon the transparent G-tube erupting from the gut of the blue-lipped boy."

Stupid G-tube, stupid cancer, stupid everything. It started all of this. The cancer, the spreading disease through his bones, claimed everything. For a while, it had stolen his happiness, and when he finally accepted the fact that he was dying a little faster than most humans, it took his leg. It took his freaking leg. And now what? What else was there to take? He could have been the pessimist. Never mind glass half empty, what glass was there at all? What water could sustain him now? But he didn't want to be that way. He wanted people to remember him for more than just the boy that "put up a good fight but lost in the end."

"So much depends on this observer of the universe."

Of course there was more to be taken. He'd never see Hazel again. Her smile, her laugh, her beautiful eyes that shone in the light all the time, even in the dark. It'd all be gone by morning. Everything, she'd become everything he needed. No more need for water, no more need for food. No more need for air. As long as she stood next to him, he felt safe. He felt at ease. He felt at home.

And now she'd be gone. She'd leave and he'd be left alone in the dark, waiting, hoping for her sake that he'd be forgiven.

Going to that stupid support group was the worst thing that ever happened to him. No one told him that he was going to find her. Unexpected, what she did to him. He was fine with dying, didn't like the idea, but everyone croaks in the end. Then he met her. And now look where he was. He'd seen her, talked to her, admired her natural affinity to turn simple nouns, meant to stay only as nouns, into adjectives. He had accepted his condemnation of death, embraced it. It gave him something to strive for: to be remembered for. But now he wanted something he couldn't have. Augustus just wanted a little more time.

How could he tell her? How could he express his love? A sonnet? A poem? A kiss? None of it mattered. Even if he showered her in everything she wanted, even if he could somehow miraculously free Hazel Grace of her ill-fated affliction, it could never compare. He could give her the sun, wrap the universe in a bag as a Christmas present. But he loved her so much more than that. And nothing, nothing he could ever do would be enough to show her.

And so half unconscious, coming back into the world of mortality and red wagons, he looked at her and mumbled, "And you say you don't write poetry."