After Cancer
She jolted awake and gasped for air, surprised that breathing was easier than it used to be.
She climbed out of whatever it was that she had been lying in, finding it to be a machine not unlike the ones that plagued her existence before she…
"Oh, that's right." She said to herself, "I'm dead."
She found this fact strangely consoling, and she reached for a blanket to cover herself with. The afterlife, it seemed, didn't have the decency to clothe her before she woke up.
She found a quilt and wrapped it around her body, immediately feeling warm enough to stop shivering.
She walked over to the door, and opened it, noticing that the hallway had many more doors like the one she came out of. And it seemed that all of these held rooms similar to the one she woke in.
She heard music coming from down the hall. She recognized the song, but she couldn't understand why.
She crept toward the music, seeing the name on the room plaque as 'Van Houten'.
"Hello?" She asked, getting no response. She hadn't noticed that the quilt had become a dress.
She walked into the room, finding a man who was dancing with a woman whose daughter was sitting in a chair nearby. The daughter noticed her, and alerted the man.
The man turned his head, and the two of them shared the slightest look of recognition.
"Do I know you?" She asked the man,
"I don't believe we've met." The man replied, "At least, not in this life."
"I just woke up." She explained, "What is your name?"
"Peter." He answered, with a warm smile. "And this is my wife, and our daughter Anna." He gestured to the woman, and then the girl.
"Where are we?" She asked Peter,
"The afterlife." He answered, "Whatever that means."
"What is your name, young lady?" The woman asked,
"I…" She began, thinking, "I don't remember." She admitted,
"Don't worry. It'll come back to you eventually." Peter said reassuringly.
She turned back to the door, and walked out, feeling drawn further down the corridor.
She continued walking down the corridor, seeing a light illuminating one door.
She stepped through, finding a white room with messy handwriting all over the walls. She eventually figured out that the scribbles said "My name is Isaac." Over and over again.
Suddenly, a dark-haired man shuffled into the room. He was mumbling what seemed to be nonsense, but she soon discovered that he was repeating that same phrase over and over again. He looked at her, and started sobbing.
"Hazel Lancaster is here?" He asked, through his sobs, "Why do memories torture?"
'Hazel Lancaster.' She thought, remembering,
"Isaac?" she asked,
The man lifted his head, "Yes, Hazel Grace Lancaster?" he asked,
"Isaac, it's me." She said, "Hazel."
Suddenly the broken man stopped sobbing, as he seemed to remember something.
"Hazel…" He said, before he remembered who she was. "Hazel!" He hugged her, "It's so good to see you!"
"When did you die Isaac?" she asked,
"I got hit by a bus, or something, last year." He replied, nonchalantly, "What about you?"
"A few hours ago." She replied, "Cancer finally caught up to me. Have you seen Gus around?"
"Yeah, he's over in that" he pointed to the east, "Direction."
"So how do I find him?" She asked,
"The same way you found me." He said, "Just keep walking. Eventually you'll be drawn to his place."
She bade him farewell, then continued down the corridor.
She felt drawn to a door that was beaten badly.
Through this door, she saw dozens of piles of papers stacked to the ceiling. In the back of the room was a desk with a typewriter. On the other side of the room, a door was ajar leading into another hallway.
She pulled a paper from the top of a pile, finding that it was addressed to her.
'My dearest Hazel.
I realize that you wouldn't be reading this unless you were dead, and I wouldn't be writing it unless I was in some kind of afterlife, which would mean that my theory of oblivion was rather off. More off than I would have liked. I met Van Houten a few weeks ago, and he is much less of a douche here than he was in life. It took awhile, but we've reconciled our differences, and I helped him write a proper sequel to AIA! It's waiting for Van Houten's publisher to get here first. Anyway, Isaac is here somewhere as well… He was freaking out because he could see again. It was awesome.
Missing you, Augustus.'
It was dated '6/14/2027'.
'That was ten years ago…' She thought,
She made her way through the cluttered room to the door at the back, and walked down the hallway, finding more piles of paper obstructing bits of the path.
Through the other side of the hallway was a bedroom, where a man was sitting playing a video game.
She stood there, not making a sound. Out of the blue, the man said,
"Hazel Grace, I know you're here." Before he stood and walked over to her.
"So you were wrong." She said; their faces an inch away from each other, "Oblivion does not exist."
"Well, sure it does." He argued softly, "Just not in the way I thought it did."
Then he kissed her, and they loved each other for the rest of eternity.