A couple of days after the egging incident, my dad had gone to work and my mom had left to take Graham to school and run some errands, so I was left home alone. This was a typical morning in my house, but I decided that I was tired of typical. I threw on some jeans and a t-shirt, slipped on my shoes, and grabbed my cane. I had become accustomed to using it, so I decided that I was going to go for a walk around the neighborhood. I just wanted to be get out of the house on my own for once.

I had driven through that neighborhood countless times, so I had no doubt that I could take my walk and be back before my mom knew I had left. I guided myself off the porch, down the driveway, and to the sidewalk. The concrete scraped beneath my shoes with every step I took. I couldn't see the sun, but I could feel it falling on my skin. I could tell when I was approaching a tree by the sound of chirping birds, and somewhere behind me, there was a dog barking relentlessly. Occasionally a car would pass, interrupting the sounds of nature.

I couldn't ignore the fact that the people in those cars were most definitely staring at me. The notion of being someone's version of a worse life crept up on me again. Surely seeing a young boy walking down the street with sunglasses and a cane led people to the At least I'm not blind thoughts. That's what humans do, compare themselves to others in an effort to convince themselves that their lives are worth living. But what does that say about the people who have the "worse" lives?

People seem to have this idea that being disabled will lead to a sort of perpetual unhappiness. Sure, there were times when my disability made me unhappy. Hell, there were times when my ability made me downright angry. But this didn't mean that I was incapable of leading a happy life. That's why I didn't want to be someone's version of a worse life. Because that makes it seem as if my life carries less value, but that is a terrible misconception.

I had done a lot of thinking about the value of life on my walk. So much thinking that I hadn't paid enough attention to the route I had taken. I tried to listen for the barking dog, hoping that I could follow that sound back toward my house, but the barking had ceased. This led me to conclude that I was lost. I briefly considered calling my mom, but I knew she would never allow me to leave the house by myself again. I didn't want to lose that privilege before I had even gained it. Then I considered knocking on the door of the nearest house, but my parents had friends in this neighborhood. If I knocked on one of their doors, my parents would learn of my little expedition.

Then I had another idea. I pulled my phone from my pocket and told it to, "Call Augustus Waters."

When he answered with a mumble, I said, "Did I wake you up?"

"You could call me at four in the afternoon and you would wake me up. Seems like all I do is sleep. I need to be awake more often."

"How are you feeling?" I asked.

"At the moment, I'm feeling optimistic," he said.

Optimistic was good enough for me to mention my predicament.

"How about dragging your optimistic ass out of bed and doing me a favor?"

"What's that?" Gus asked.

"I decided to go for a walk this morning, and, well, I seem to be lost."

I could hear him laughing on the other end. "Your mom let you out of the house by yourself?"

"Not exactly," I said. "She doesn't know."

"Oh, shit. I can already hear the news report. 'A search party has formed with the hopes of finding a blind young man who disappeared from his house this morning.'"

"I'd like to avoid becoming the news topic of the day, if at all possible," I said. "Think you could come find me?"

"Yeah, man." He was trying his hardest not to laugh into the phone. "I don't mean to sound like an After School Special, but just, like, stay where you are. Hug a tree or something. I'll be there soon."

After he hung up, I used my cane to find the edge of the sidewalk, then I sat on the curb. I knew there was a possibility that someone would see me sitting there and attempt to ask me if I was okay. Fortunately, I never heard anyone approaching.

After about ten minutes I could hear my phone in my pocket. "Augustus Waters is calling."

When I answered he said, "I'm in your neighborhood. Do you happen to have any idea of where you are?"

I tried to remember the turns I had taken, but I couldn't. "Hold on a sec," I said as I scrambled to my feet and started walking along the edge of the sidewalk with my cane in front of me. I only had to walk about five feet before my cane ran into something. At the risk of being arrested for groping someone's mailbox, I laid my cane on the ground and ran my hands over it until I found the numbers. I traced them with my fingers as I said, "1… 6… 1… I don't know what street I'm on, but I'm in front of a house numbered 161."

"That's something, at least," Gus said. "I'll be there soon."

It wasn't long before I could hear the irregular acceleration that was typical of Augustus Waters. It was distant at first, but it grew closer and closer until finally I heard his brakes screeching in front of me.

He got out and helped me to the passenger's side door. Once we were both in the car he said, "You're five streets away from you house. Where exactly was your destination?"

"I just wanted to get out of the house," I said.

"Sucks being stuck in the house all the time, doesn't it?" he asked. "But if you get yourself lost again, I'm going to have you fitted with one of those tracking chips." I couldn't appreciate his laughter because I could hear the pain behind it, and all I could think about was the cancer that was eating away at his chest.

When we got to my house he came in to play Inception. We were halfway through our third attempt of the first level when he excused himself to the bathroom. My heightened hearing exposed the fact that he was in there puking his guts out. I thought about calling his mom, but I decided against it because I knew she would be like my mom and never allow him to leave his house again.

So I went to the kitchen, got him a glass of ice water, and took it back to my room to wait for him. By the time he came out of the bathroom, most of the ice had melted.

"You all right, dude?" I asked as I extended the cup in his direction.

"Thanks," he said, taking it from me. "I'm grand."

"You're lying," I said.

"It appears that my anti-nausea meds have decided to be worthless today."

"I shouldn't have made you come get me," I said.

"You didn't make me do anything," he said. "I wanted to help out my friend. I'm not going to let a little case of cancer stop me." He said this as if he was battling nothing more than a cold. And I might as well have made him. I presented him with a situation in which someone needed rescuing. Of course he was going to jump at that opportunity to be a hero.

"Should we call someone to come get you?" I asked.

"No," he said without pause. "Don't tell anyone. Not my parents. Not Hazel Grace. This never happened."

A little over a week later, Augustus's went to the ER at Memorial where they decided that he needed to be admitted for overnight observation. I knew because his mom had called my mom. When I asked her what was wrong with him she told me that his mom said he was having chest pains, and the doctors thought his heart was working too hard.

This terrified me. One of the side-effects of the type of chemo he was undergoing was heart damage. No one seems to realize that chemo itself has the potential to kill. Being a member of Support Group for as long as I had, I'd heard plenty of stories of kids battling cancer only to have this chemo claim their lives, and I was afraid this was how Augustus's story would end.

When I asked if I could visit him, my mom said his family didn't want him to have any visitors. Frankly, that pissed me off. I know it shouldn't have. I understood that his family was also worried that this would be the end, so of course they didn't want people interrupting what could potentially be there last moments with him. But what about my last moments? I couldn't even remember the last thing he had said to me. He was my best friend. He made cancer jokes with me. He sabotaged every video game we ever played. He took me to egg my ex-girlfriend's car. He didn't hesitate to pick me up when I was lost in my own neighborhood. And it was possible that we would never do anything together ever again.