This chapter is told from Grace's pov
Guess what?! I finished another story. Actually two more stories but last night I finished "Dancing in the rain" which always had very long chapters to work on and I always felt a bit pressured to make that story as good as possible while the chapters took weeks to finish. I've had fun writing it but I still am so happy it's over. I also finished my O. C- fanfiction "The little girl" so that's nine stories left, among them two that will be finished soon.
Pictures of everything in Grace's graduation gift is up on my Instagram "Linneagbfanfiction"
I hadn't been downstairs and into the kitchen for many minutes before I went back to bed. Whether it was a side effect from the chemo or it was just from stress my head was pounding and the only thing that helped just slightly was to turn the lights off so it was dark in my room and then lie down and close my eyes.
"Grace?" What felt like a second later someone was shaking my shoulder. "Grace? Come on little sister. Why are you sleeping in broad daylight?"
"What?" I turned and looked up to Brandon who was standing right next to me, and then Tara and Lori right behind him. "What are you doing here?" I pushed myself up on my elbows and then my hands to push myself up towards the headboard.
"Well hello to you too." Brandon smirked and sat down on the side of my bed. "We brought your graduating gift since we forgot all about it on graduation day. And it's almost noon so we thought you'd be awake by now."
Well, maybe you would too after getting in your body what I just got…
I shook my head, I would need a better (or not so rude) way to tell them about what was going on. Hopefully that wouldn't be today. But still Brandon was more concentrated on the big, purple trolley bag that Lori was holding.
"And yes, I and these two now can't wait anymore." He laid the bag in front of him and between him and me. "We were going to give you this on graduation but there were still things to sort out. So now… open it…"
Opening the big part of the bag and not the side pockets or the front the first thing I saw was a grey denim- like backpack with another several side and front pockets.
"Well, look inside of it."
I did open the backpack first and found four books of the titles "Everything you need to know before college", "Grow the f*ck up", "college hacks" and "100 things everyone should know how to do". And before anything else I gave "Grow the f*ck up a quick riffle- well a book with that title and a picture of a teddy bear on the front ought to be interesting.
Quietly, as if I did it too fast or loud it would all disappear and turn for the worst once again, I laid the books to the side and took a pack of different colored pens from the side pocket of the backpack.
While I took it and then a pink, knitted blanket from the big bag I thanked and nodded as I should have. But clearer than them in front of me was the scenario on the inside of my eyelids about what I should say and how they would react to everything that was going on.
"It looks beautiful." I said about the pale pink blanket. And running one hand over the soft fabric I thought to myself that at least this one would come to good use whether I went to college or not. But before I had the time to say anything my brother had started again.
"So as you can see your gift from myself, Tara and Lori is a whole, big bag of things to bring with you for college. Because together we have thought out things that we thought were necessary and also asked some friends and…" He picked up a small, yellow item from the bag. He handed it to me and I saw it was a small power bank for my phone. "I wish those had been around when I went to school. And besides, we tried to find things that weren't too boring. Here." He obviously thought I'd been doing it too slowly and picked up a plastic cup with a straw. And while the cup was see- through a yellow flower was painted on it with my name in matching, yellow print.
I guess yellow flowers would always remind me of my dad. And Tara, Brandon and Lori knew all about that.
I breathed in and turned away from the bag, but I didn't have the time to speak this time neither…
"And here…" Brandon looked down in the big bag again. "I'm not going to pick them all up. But there is a lifetime supply of Oreos in here. But I don't know with you because I've never met anyone who loves Oreos as much as you do. They might last you only a week or so…"
I let my arms fall lax towards my sides and into my lap.
There was something about saying that I'd have a lifetime supply…
"Brandon…" When I interrupted my brother he did have a brain in his hands. Holding up two halves it was split in and made book support. "…Lori… Tara… Look! There's something I have to tell you guys." Silently some of the most important people in my life looked frowning back at me, and brainstorming for the best way to say this I realized I just had to say it right out or I'd never get through this. "I have cancer."
Brandon had picked up something that had laid in the bag. Ironically enough one of an organ of the body but in the shape of a brain and not liver. It was split in half and could support books or paper sheets in between them.
I waited for any of them to say anything and Brandon especially would have quite some fan at that book stand.
"So…" I continued when the silence was to thick. "I won't be going to college. Not this fall at least."
Maybe not ever.
"No." Brandon threw the brain bookstand to his side and towards my bed. "No, of course you don't have Cancer. You can't have cancer. You're young and you're going to college. You're…" He held up the books and a box of Oreos. "You're going to college."
The silence returned and I just shook my head when he could just as well have punched me in the gut over and over…
"Not right now I am… But when… if I do ever go I'll have all of these things, they're not going anywhere. And the blanket and the cup and the Oreos I could use now and I think… Well. They're all great things and maybe if I can't use all of them right now thank you so much for all of them…"
A part of me wanted to break down and cry and beg them to stay by my side through all of this. That this maybe I wouldn't get through but especially not without my family by my side, people I had known and loved as long as I could remember.
But I didn't, and second after second ticking by the silence in between us was ear- crushing in the way it had been after the night had died…
"Well…" Tara seemed more hesitant than ever and dug in the back of the bag for something I hadn't spotted yet and picked out a photo frame I hadn't yet seen yet. That she turned and showed me the picture before I could take it. "Happy graduation and early happy birthday Auntie Grace."
The white frame held a black and white sonogram picture, as those usually looked with the blurry but obvious frame of a baby still inside…
"Oh Tara…" I could feel my chin dropping. "…I… Tara, are you pregnant?"
Well the answer was quite obvious wasn't it?
It was also obvious that this was a moment when we should have been nothing but happy and smiling and hugging and nothing else.
I'm so happy for you two
But I just couldn't say it. Not even with the framed photo I could feel happy.
How was I supposed to be happy and caring and everything that should have been for this photo and the still very slight bump visible under Tara's shirt when I might not even be here to see my little niece of nephew in real life.
I shook my head making a failed attempt to shake those latest thoughts away…
Then I looked down on the photo again and could feel my heart melting. How could I ever have known I would love anyone so much as I did in right that second.
"Well…" Tara started again and she looked as in loss of words as I felt. "…I'm four months into the pregnancy and keeping it secret to anyone so we could keep it for this gift hasn't been easy… Some women grow huge during their pregnancy and from a few weeks into it there is no way of hiding it so… It quite suited… anyway…" Tara wrapped her fingers around Brandon's while holding the other palm on her belly. "…It's a girl."
I looked down on the photo again and once again it was as if my heart just melted and I felt the strongest, purest love…
But no, I couldn't be happy. Not in the middle of all of this.
I hoped I would be, I hoped I would even be there to see my niece apart from on a photo. But I didn't even know if I would be and for the first time that thought really struck me without giving me a chance to shake it off.
And while I fought them away tears were closer than ever of knowing that I might not be here…
Random fact
An important person of my life told me she was pregnant like that a few years ago with putting the framed sonogram photo up and… well. That was how it happened and at first I just didn't know how to react and then I looked at the photo and here I didn't even know how to describe it but I promise you it felt as if my heart just melted. And I never knew how much I could love someone before I saw that photo.
