*Disclaimer: I do not own TFiOS or anything like that. It's John Green's story, and Fox's movie (both are awesome, btw), and not mine in any way. DFTBA, and hope you enjoy :)
Any quotes or scenes from the novel belong to John and Penguin and not me.
Chapter 2: The Killing Thing
He would put the killing thing between his teeth, but wouldn't give it the power to kill him.
It's what he decided the day after he got his diagnosis. He begged a pack of cigarettes off of a guy at school, and became a smokeless smoker.
All he knew was that his life was spinning out of control, he was going to lose a leg, and he was walking around a cemetery instead of doing his homework, looking for his own grave site.
That's why, whenever he could, he pulled a cigarette from his pack and clenched it between his teeth. He couldn't control the cancer, but he could control this tiny strip of chemicals by not giving it any authority over him.
When he loses his pack (or it's taken from him), he panics. He stumbles out of bed and to the car in the middle of the night, trying to reclaim a tiny bit of his life as that godforsaken g-tube burns in his side.
Ultimately, he calls his girlfriend for rescue. When she reaches him, he's sobbing and covered in vomit and full of self-loathing because this is not the way his story should be ending.
He lets the sounds of sirens and her quiet, loving, worried voice wash over him as he lays there in darkness that's mixed with the harsh luminosity of the gas station parking lot lights.
After all those months going up on that roller coaster, anticipating his life and enjoying the ride, he is falling falling twisting turning out of control again, hurtling towards a certain unknown with no brakes or safety restraints.
He just wanted the cigarettes to give him back some strength and control in his life. Instead, he's loaded into an ambulance as his girlfriend cries with him.