Hazel slouches on the floor in the furthest corner watching Augustus across the hotel room. He fans through his stacks of photo essays while adherent to not letting the champagne stray further than an arm's length away. He weighs against the grandeur window that serves as the fourth wall for the living room, as if Augustus is daring the boisterous 18' x 18' windowpane to give out and send him 25-floors to the hasty San Franciscan street. A cigarette dangles from his chapped lips and falls with his mindless swig of champagne. In the weeks leading up to Hazel and Augustus's Cancer Motivation Tour escape, Augustus had become mesmerized by photo journalism. Like any addiction, it started with a gateway, The Best of LIFE: 37 Years in Pictures. During the final weeks of Augustus's bid on the tour, he would retire early to his room with a bottle of champagne and his LIFE. He could easily sniff out the empathetic liquor store clerks who'd overlook his age. Augustus would spend whole afternoons obsessing over a single picture. He'd stare deep into the subjects' eyes and figure out what was running through that somebody's mind. Did they know this picture would make them famous? Did they know they would become immortal? Post-tour Augustus is not so meticulous but now merely leafs through the photographs like a robot trying to absorb as much information of the humanoids as possible. He lives in a different universe; one which Hazel has yet to be invited.
Hazel wishes that Augustus would pick up his own camera again. Somewhere in the hotel is a shoebox replete of undeveloped film that tells a happier version of the Hazel and Augustus tale. They recorded their travels from the past year while on the Motivational Tour. Proof of their love story is recorded in front of every hackneyed attraction that was afforded them. In those thousands of dormant negatives not so much as one hints at this somber version.
Without halting his mechanical page turning, Augustus asks disinterestedly, "Hazel Grace, why don't you go put on the sundress?" This is the first time in a week Augustus has spoken to Hazel without being spoken to first.
Hazel tries to speak up but her rusty vocal chords fail. She gives her throat a hearty clearing before trying again. "What?"
"That sundress. You should wear it."
"Why?"
"Makes you look immortal." Hazel has become too used to these overly-Augustan responses to even question him anymore. Regardless of however Augustus says it, she always admired how his soul is able to latch onto every syllable. And for the first time in God knows how many days Augustus looks at Hazel. Beneath his sunken eyes and dispassionate face, Hazel sees her Augustus. Pre-tour Augustus.
Hazel pushes herself up from the floor and fetches the duffle bag from Augustus's side of the living room. Since running away from the Tour, this duffle bag is the only thing that's felt like a home. The Hazel and Augustus of old would have given the duffle bag a name and an entire backstory. They would have looked into each other's eyes every time they call the duffle bag by name, knowing that they are the only two people who can share in something so ridiculous. Hazel pulls out the requested dress and a folded letter falls from it. Nothing serious. Just their death pact. All part of a loving joke given the terminal nature of their cancer at the time. Hazel even went through the effort to type up something official-looking. Neither of them actually took to signing it in fear of stirring up an even more fatal hex than cancer.
Hazel buries the letter back in the bag. She strips down and slips on the dress in front of Augustus, keeping an eye on him to see if his stray. She loses that contest to a picture of a Peruvian alpaca herder. And then to a disquietingly long chug of champagne.
Hazel takes up part of the window next to Augustus so that he might catch a whiff of the familiar dress and, hopefully, the part of him he left in Amsterdam. Hazel leans against the pane and surveys the world beneath her, trying to remind herself that every one of those people, those weird little specs, have their problems too. But it never helps.
Augustus lightly drops his head against the glass and it is more than enough to trigger every drop of adrenaline through Hazel's system. Her hands lock, heartbeat notches up and, for but half a moment, thought she was destined for the pavement. In that half moment, she accepted death. It felt nothing like what everyone says on the Motivational Tour.
Augustus speaks as if he is trying to remember his lines, "Nobody gives a shit about blossoms anymore, Hazel Grace." Augustus takes another long pull of the champagne.
Coming down from her high, Hazel offers, "No?"
Augustus continues from his script, "We don't survive by the seasons anymore. We survive on 24-hour stores, never-ending cheeseburgers. Shit is all year-round. We don't ever lack anything." Augustus lifts his attention from his magazine to Hazel's sundress. His eyes take a moment to feast upon the pattern before moving on to her bare legs.
Augustus caresses her calf with his fingertips and continues, "The blossoms no longer carry any symbolism. New life and fertility doesn't mean anything. Blossoms have been reduced to only looking pretty." Hazel closes her eyes in an attempt to slow down and appreciate this rarity. She's not sure of when Augustus will touch her next. She looks down at him who longingly looks up at Hazel, as if waiting for the answer.
"I'm a blossom," Augustus says. "A wilted little cancer blossom who is only admired out of sympathy. Like the blossoms, I'll be gone before spring ends."
"You don't know that," Hazel demands.
Augustus remains frustratingly casual and returns to the page but keeps his fingertips light on her skin. "Hazel, I know what cancer feels like. It's back. It feels hungry."
"Then we need to get you home!" Hazel protests.
"You said you wanted this for me too. No more doctors. No more chemo. I just need to be Augustus before I die."
"I take it back then. Okay? I take it back." Hazel searches for her next point. "What about your parents? What about me?"
Ten pages later he offers his Augustan response, "Look at this one." Hazel keeps a cold face as she glances over her shoulder down at the picture in his lap. It is portrait snapshot of a young Teddy Boy John Lennon who couldn't be older than seventeen. There's nothing exceptionally striking about the picture, aside from John's incomparable photogenic essence. Augustus continues, "He' doesn't have a clue what the future holds for him. He doesn't even know he'll be immortal."
Hazel takes a few extra seconds to get her fill of John's soft eyes before posing, "Yes he does."
Augustus looks back up at Hazel as she is lost in the image. He's always loved the way Hazel looks when deep in thought. And now, with the late afternoon Pacific sun haloing her head, she looks timeless. The rays gush through Hazel's sundress and reveal the true form from which the dress hangs. It's during these fleeting glimpses of happiness when Augustus considers going home and doing the whole hospital thing again. Hazel catches the smile stuck on Augustus as he stares up at her.
"What?" she says lightly.
"Nothing."
