Hero had been in the kitchen helping his parents clean up the remnants of the party when the phone rang. He picked it up after the first ring. "Hello?"

"Hey." Sunny never announced himself on the phone, not that he needed any introduction. Hero would recognize his throaty monotone anywhere. "Is Kel around?"

"Oh, hi Sunny!" Hero pinned the phone between his ear and shoulder as he continued to sweep up confetti. "Sorry, he's asleep right now."

"But it's six."

"Yeah, but this round of chemo really wiped him out." He pushed the debris into the broom pan, giving Sunny pause to respond. He never did. "Sunny?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah—yeah. Okay. I understand," he stammered.

"I can ask him to call you back tomorrow, if you like."

"No need. Just wish him a happy birthday for me."

"Will do!"

Sunny hung up without saying goodbye. Hero pulled the phone away and stared at it, somewhat amazed that Sunny actually hung up on him. After a few moments of this he shoved the insult to the back of his brain, returned the phone to its receiver, and got back to work.

The little helpers who made up Tummy World were going missing.

At first, Kel and his friends were convinced they were being kidnapped by the creepy monsters that had begun to invade Tummy World—only to eventually discover the monsters were the helpers, having morphed against their will into grotesque caricatures of themselves. Their round, perfect bodies grew baby teeth and extra eyes and clumps of hair. They shambled about, fusing whenever they came into contact, stacking one on top of the next until there were piles of them everywhere, their many eyes pleading for death and refusing to die.

The bile pit erupted more often than it ever had, every five minutes it felt like. Its acid would splash on the four of them, burning so bad that smoke rose from their wounds. Every flower in Basil's crown wilted; the stench of the constantly erupting pit made Aubrey gag; the heart of Tummy World tossed everything back up, even the cooking Hero put all his love into. Still, Kel refused to leave. He'd already been banished from his place of safety, why did he have to leave his happy place, too? It wasn't fair! He told his friends to go on without him if they were so miserable, but they remained by his side, refusing to let him face the acid and monsters by himself.

Past all his gratitude, he really did wish they would abandon him to his fate.

Two days after Kel's birthday, Sunny abruptly announced he would be coming over the first weekend of December.

Basil prepared tirelessly for his return—scrubbing down every corner and crevice of his house, making sure every last one of his plants were as lush as possible, practicing the very best recipes for all of Sunny's favorite foods, and generally acting like a bride preparing to welcome her husband for their first night together. Aubrey ripped on him for still carrying a torch for Sunny after all these years, but beneath her teasing was jealousy, and beneath that a challenge, and further down still was the angry beast whose tentacles hid the heart of Aubrey's worst trauma. They all knew how far Basil would go for Sunny.

Hero and Kel also agreed the two of them shouldn't be left alone, and to that end, it was decided Sunny would be staying at their house. The time of his arrival was fast approaching, and Kel knew he had to cook up a story to explain his weight loss, and not having any hair, and the only-one-leg thing, and the looks of pity, and—

Hero's face fell when Kel asked him for advice on the matter. "I thought he already knew?"

"I was hoping I'd have this beat before he came through. He has better things to worry about, y'know?"

Hero sat down beside him. "You're absolutely worth worrying about."

Kel rolled his eyes. "Don't get soft on me."

"Hey, it's true. And I'm sure Sunny would agree, since I, uh… might've accidentally told him?"

"Hero!"

"I'm sorry—!"

"How?!"

"He called on your birthday, but you were already asleep! I mentioned it was because of the chemo."

Kel held his head in his hands. This was horrible.

"Hey. Look at me."

He pressed the balls of his hands into his eyes, watching at the explosion of pretty colors.

"He was going to find out eventually. It was inevitable."

Kel didn't understand why he was so upset—it served Sunny right, didn't it? To find out from someone other than him?

"I'm sorry," Hero repeated, his voice painfully small. "I should've left it to you to tell him. I would take it back if I could."

When Sunny arrived that Saturday morning, Kel did not ask to be taken down to greet him. Sunny made no comment on his absence, instead making conversation with their parents and playing a short game of peek-a-boo with Sally in the kitchen. Hero kept drifting from the conversation despite himself, eyes always landing on their bedroom door. He kept expecting Kel to barrel out of their room and run downstairs to meet his friend.

After about twenty minutes the small talk stalled. Hero invited Sunny upstairs, leading the way as if he hadn't been inside their home a thousand times before. He knocked on the door. "Kel? Sunny's here."

Hero didn't know what he hated more— the dim lighting from the overcast outside, that it felt like his brother was hiding in his own home, or the dozen infinitesimal ways Sunny's expression shifted when he finally laid eyes on Kel. Sunny had never been the type to throw his words away, but they tumbled out at once when he finally saw his condition up close. "Kel, my god."

"Sunny!" He grinned. "It's been too long! I'd get up to give you a high-five, but it looks like we only have three legs between us."

Sunny crossed the room in big strides and practically threw himself on top of Kel. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I should've been here." He pulled away, still gripping Kel's shoulders. "Can you forgive me?"

"C'mon dude, don't sweat it. You didn't know." Sunny stroked Kel's face with the back of his hand, catching on the hollow gap between his cheekbone and jaw. "At least I'm still super attractive," he winked.

He nodded. "Just as beautiful as ever."

It was the polite sort of fib reserved for the sick and the dying, but there was something about Kel's face then—the way his eyes narrowed, the slight twist in his mouth—that made Hero wish Sunny hadn't so readily agreed. Kel looked at him from over Sunny's shoulder. "Yo, we should go get the others now, right?"

"Are you feeling up to it?"

"No—but what else am I gonna do, stare at the wall all day? Let's go!"

The couple who bought Sunny's old home tore down their treehouse. Kel figured that was probably for the best.

They went off to their old hangout in the park, empty thanks to Aubrey ordering the Hooligans to fuck off for the day. Despite the cold they had a picnic for memory's sake, Hero having made sandwiches for the occasion. Kel remained in his wheelchair while the rest of them sat cross-legged on the ground, and he decided being a foot taller than everyone else was just as weird as being a foot shorter. Sunny sat next to his chair, head right around where his left knee once was.

They hadn't spoken, truly spoken, since Kel's accident on the court in May. "So, how's Harrisburg treating you?" Aubrey asked through her full mouth.

"It's, uh…" he stared down at his food like the answer was lodged between his sourdough. "It's okay. I made some new friends."

"Well shit, why didn't you bring them along?"

"I wanted it to be just us. None of them are itching to come out to the suburbs, anyway."

"That makes sense," Basil said. "City life must be so exciting! Especially compared to Faraway."

Sunny shrugged. "It stops being so special after a while. I barely even notice the sounds of my neighbors fucking next door anymore."

They all stared at him, and Kel really thought Sunny would smirk in that wry way of his and say kidding, but he just continued to eat quietly.

"… anyway, do you have any plans for college?" Hero asked.

"My teachers think I should apply to art school, which I guess could work. I already know what it's like to starve."

"Don't sell yourself short. I'm sure you'd be very successful."

They all knew how much Sunny hated talking about himself, how he despised taking words of encouragement the worst of all. "How have things been with you guys? I mean, really?"

"Mom's really behind on the mortgage," Aubrey admitted. "If we don't get paid up soon, the bank's gonna foreclose."

Basil drew his knees to his chest. "My parents keep threatening to make me go live with them in Europe."

"No way are we letting those jackasses run off with you," Aubrey spat.

"T-thanks."

"I think I want to drop out of med school." Hero said. Kel stopped fiddling with his sandwich.

"Why?" Sunny asked.

"I don't want to do it. I'm not even sure why I applied, other than to make my parents happy."

Sunny turned to Kel, black hair falling from his forehead. "From a scale of one to nuclear, how mad will your mom and dad be?"

"Definitely nuclear! He'll have to run away from home for sure."

"Poor Hero." Aubrey took another bite. "He sure did make a mean sandwich."

"Sometimes, I can even still hear the sound of his voice…" Sunny mused.

"Damn, I'm gonna outlive Hero?" Kel pressed a hand to his chest, still smiling. "Who would've seen that coming?"

Sunny froze. Aubrey bared her teeth. "You're problematic as hell, you know that?"

"What'd I say?"

"You know what you said!"

"Then what would you rather hear?" Kel was trying his very best to keep his tone light. "That I'm gonna outlive you all? That's, like, a mass casualty event, Aubrey. You shouldn't go wishing stuff like that on yourself."

"We can't take you any fucking place, can we?" She turned to Sunny. "I'm sorry, Sunshine. Ignore him. Hopefully his tongue gets amputated next."

Kel made himself laugh so hard his chest hurt, all the air squeezed out of him. He dissolved into a coughing fit.

Basil hadn't taken his eyes off Hero. "So, um, anyway, med school?"

"Yeah, it's not for me."

Kel figured he shouldn't push his luck. He turned to his sandwich. Hero had made him his favorite: salami and swiss cheese with bacon, lettuce, and tomato. It was full-sized, mostly for show since they both knew he'd be lucky to finish and keep down even a quarter of it. He wasn't very hungry, but he still took a bite, his upper teeth tearing down through the Italian bread and folds of salad, crunching through the bacon, and—

Kel froze. The crack had been slight, even lighter than a knuckle pop. He pulled away with a small mouth-full and chewed cautiously, praying to whatever god that would listen that he was wrong about what just happened. He swallowed and ran his tongue over his front teeth. He felt a gap, a jagged edge. Something that had once been there was no longer there.

Aubrey and Basil were talking about their upcoming American history test, with Sunny loudly warning them not to fall for the department of education's 'fascist propaganda'. Hero reached into their red picnic basket and pulled out a tray of cookies. "Guess what I made!" His smile immediately fell when he saw Kel's face. "What's wrong?"

Kel wished a black hole would open up beneath him.

"You good…?" Aubrey asked when he didn't immediately respond. Sunny turned and got up on his knees, boldly searching Kel's face. Kel lowered his head and nodded.

"You sure? 'Cause you look like you just swallowed glass."

He wished Sunny would sit back down, that the rest of them would go back to talking and afford him the grace of invisibility. No such luck. Kel smiled rotely, hiding his mouth behind the flat of his palm. "Guess what just happened!"

He didn't think it'd be obvious enough for all of their faces to change at once. Hero crawled over. "Let me see."

Kel lowered his hand and bared his teeth. Hero examined it for a few moments, even dragging Kel's lower lip down to check if any damage had been done to his bottom row as well. "It's okay. It happens."

"Yeah? There are other eighteen-year-olds out there losing teeth?"

If Hero was put off by the edge in his tone, he didn't let it deter him. "Teeth are bones. Given what else you've broken, this is minor."

But this is my face, he wanted to say but didn't. What a stupid thought. He already looked like a warzone.

"It's alright, Kel," Basil said softly. "We'll just tell everyone you lost it in the war."

Now that made him laugh, for real this time. Aubrey scowled and flicked Basil's ear.

When they were kids, Sunny would stay over all the time. If anyone asked they would say he slept on the floor—yet another lie, but at least one he was complicit in. Sunny had a bad back, so once Hero fell asleep Kel would invite him into his bed. They always wound up cuddling, Kel the big spoon curling around Sunny's tiny frame. He remembered liking the way his friend's hair smelled, wanting to know what shampoo he used but never actually asking. He didn't want to ruin the mystery.

They were older now and Kel needed an oxygen tank, so it surprised Sunny when the ritual was repeated that night. Through Hero's snoring, Kel pulled his covers back and waved Sunny forward.

"I'm fine here."

"C'mon, I'm not contagious."

"I know."

"I'm not as delicate as I look. Hey—I get poisoned once a week so I can stop turning into a zombie." Kel smiled at his own joke. "If I can survive that, I can survive you hogging the covers."

He slowly sat up. "Promise you'll tell me if I hurt you?"

"Yeah, I'll just shove you off."

It was strange—the amputation had been the most jarring thing about seeing Kel again, having cut so far up that a small portion of his torso was gone. But now here they were, pressed so closely together that Sunny could feel the dip where Kel's hip once was, and there was nothing disturbing about it. It was a site of radical action, the banishment of something that no longer served. He wanted to touch it. He wanted to run his fingers along the pucker of Kel's scar. He wanted so badly not to want those things.

"You changed your shampoo," Kel mumbled. "Your hair doesn't smell like anything anymore."

"I just use baking soda to wash my hair now. Why, is it bad?"

"Nah, it's just like how you associate a song or a type of food with somebody." Kel blinked several times, yawning. "I miss it."

"That's cute," Sunny said before he could stop himself. "In that case, orange reminds me of you."

"The color or the fruit?"

"Both." He resisted the urge to wrap his arms around Kel's chest. "Orange… and dogs… and basketball."

"Wow, my three favorite things. That's so cool," he gushed.

Dance music also reminded Sunny of Kel—as did the heat of summer, and the sound of laughter. If Kel died, he didn't know how he would ever face those things again. He propped himself up on his elbow to get a better look at his best friend. "I meant it, you know."

"Meant what?"

"You're still just as beautiful as ever. I know you didn't believe me, but I was telling the truth."

"Wow, so Aubrey was right. I really was ugly all along." Kel closed his eyes, speaking to the darkness behind his lids. "Harsh, but I appreciate your honesty."

Sunny took his pointer and thumb to Kel's left eye, gently prying it open. "You never use to be this weird about taking compliments."

"And you never used to be this blunt, but here we are."

Sunny wanted to ask if he could do it then, the thing he had always wanted to do to Kel. When Hero first told him about the chemo, he called up Basil right after and pried the details of Kel's condition out of him. A curious lump named Spooney. An accident on the court. A broken shin and hip in less than a month. Amputation. Osteosarcoma. Stage 4. Sunny's heart dropped to the floor when Basil told him Kel's initial prognosis, but those doctors were wrong, right? It didn't matter that Senema Hospital was ranked worst in the county eight years running, their doctors certainly knew better than the ones in Faraway. Kel was being treated, in the middle of his second round. He was going to get better, because there was no possible way he couldn't.

Sunny held himself back. They still had time. "You're annoyed. How cute."

"You keep calling me cute." The playful edge was back in his tone. "What are you trying to tell me?"

You know exactly what. Sunny laid his head on Kel's chest.

Tummy World had turned upside-down.

Literally. It was raining bile, Kel's deformed helpers yelling and cooing and grunting as the acid hit them. As for Kel and his friends, they screamed and scrambled for shelter, shooting down the capillary tunnels to Lung Peaks.

Sunny had to return to Harrisburg Sunday evening, but he came back the next weekend, and every weekend for the next few weeks. Hero waited until the first weekend of January to celebrate his birthday for that very reason.

They spent the day at the cemetery. That spring would mark the sixth anniversary of Mari's death. Some days Hero hardly thought of Mari at all, but on others it felt like the wound had been ripped open again. On those days, he left blood on everything he touched.

He always thought seeing Sunny near her grave after he admitted what he'd done would send him spiraling, but that wasn't what set him off. It was his brother. Basil had been taking his pictures, one of which was definitely Kel grinning at Mari's headstone. Hero asked if he could keep that one. Basil, thinking nothing of it, handed it over.

Hero wanted to burn that picture, and he would have, but Kel was too happy in it. He looked like a kid again—wild, bubbly, almost healthy. It was the first time the light had actually touched his eyes since October.

So Hero pinned it to his wall instead. To remember.

To celebrate the end of his second chemo round, Aubrey bought Kel a single gift: a can of Orange Joe.

He hadn't wanted to touch the stuff since the nausea got a hold of him, but it was fine now, right? He'd be able to enjoy it and maybe keep it down. Hero popped open the lid for him, slid in a straw, and held it up to his lips.

"You know I still have arms, right?" He took the can and chugged down the sugary, caffeinated goodness he would never, ever outgrow.

When he was younger—three, four, five—he and Hero would take their showers together.

It was their father's cheapskate way of saving water, and their mother's best assurance that Kel wouldn't hurt himself in the tub. Hero would help him lather up, even the places Kel usually forgot about like between his toes and his belly button. Sometimes they'd have a full-blown bubble bath, floating toys and all. Kel liked to play the bad guy in those games, the evil yellow duckie come to destroy Hero's battleships. They were cute, pleasant memories that sometimes played out in his dreams.

Hero having to help him bathe fifteen years later was anything but.

Kel had heard horror stories from other cancer patients about relatives and nurses who scrubbed them down as if they were inanimate objects, refusing to so much as look them in the eye. Hero, if anything, ran too far in the opposite direction—he was too gentle, stared too hard at Kel's face, abruptly pulling back if he saw even the slightest hint of discomfort. Kel sometimes wanted to scream that he wasn't a soufflé, he wasn't blown glass, he wasn't going to collapse in on himself in a cancerous heap. But he already felt bad enough about needing help in the first place, and Hero didn't have to do this. He could have very well left it to some home attendant liable to treat him like a sack of meat.

And anyway, Kel could admit that he liked it when Hero washed his back in particular. His gentle hands felt nice, neatly trimmed fingernails lightly circling his skin with an almost reverent touch.

Eight months and two chemo rounds later, Kel laid up half-awake thinking back on the day his world was flipped over—when he was first diagnosed and told his condition was terminal. He remembered watching his mother hysterically question his medical team while his father stood dumbstruck beside her. He saw it through the lens of an observer, as if he were the patient of the week in some bad hospital drama. It helped that not a single person in the room dared to look at him.

He didn't get it. Six months? But he had a birthday in six months. He was supposed to start applying to colleges in six months. Christmas was in seven months. What about New Year's Eve? Would he get to watch Hero turn twenty-two? Like a child, he still marked the passage of time by birthdays and holidays and the school-year calendar. Any milestones past that—travel, a career, a family of his own—extended so far out into the amorphous no man's land of adulthood that expecting them to actually happen had always felt downright unreasonable.

The car ride home had been painfully quiet. His father kept his glassy eyes glued to the road. His mother kneaded her worn leather purse, nails digging into the pebbled animal hide. His sister slept soundly in her car seat. Hero was still on his way home; their parents had the gall to suggest he finish out the semester, but he told them in no uncertain terms that Kel was more important than some degree he didn't even care to pursue. Kel remembered wishing Hero had been in the car with them—he was tired and wanted somewhere to rest his head, to be told that those doctors absolutely had to be wrong.

He loved the way the setting sun kissed Sally's face, how the light caught on her eyelashes and made them look almost auburn. When she was born Kel vowed he would always be there for her first day of school, to coach her in whatever sport she wanted to pursue, that he would never lie to her or belittle her or take his grief out on her, and...

And Sally had a runny nose, which reminded him of the time Angel cracked some dumb joke that made Aubrey laugh so hard she blew a snot bubble. He chuckled softly under his breath, and his mother's sights shifted from her lap to the rearview mirror. She had on an expression he saw on her a lot during Hero's lost year, when they were all worried he might follow Mari into the ground.

In the chaos that followed her death, Kel acknowledged that Mari now knew something none of them did, had learned the truth behind the greatest secret of all.

But as for Kel, he was still on planet Earth. He had no secrets to tell.

WELCOME TO LUNG PEAKS

The walls are swollen? Or Something else. Four

children march single file. Fleshy walls caress

them from either side. Before the war, Lung

Peaks carried wind gusts powerful enough

to shove mountains forward—but now,

the air is as thick as culled animal fat.

Like summer, but bitter. A smacking

heat so sour it slams lungs flat. Air

slashed by choked veins. Warm

hands grip cold hands. Sweet

sobs kiss soft as dappled

lights at sundown. In

media res: a failed

coup de grâce.

His nails and

tongue wilt

a startling

powder

blue

...

?

"KEL! KEL!"

Someone was gripping his hand, someone was calling his name.

"God, I can't do this again, I can't—"

Kel's eyes were open now, staring up at someone's teary face, messy brown hair and thick eyebrows and pretty-boy doe eyes. Whoever it was, he was so handsome he even made crying look good, and Kel could admit he was a little jealous. A pretty face let you get away with more.

When the Pretty Boy saw Kel's eyes were open, he pushed out the breath he'd been holding so forcefully it sounded like a sob. He kissed his cracked knuckles, wetting them with his tears.

There was something over Kel's mouth and nose, he was surrounded by people in blue uniforms, someone else was sobbing, it sounded like a little kid? He was being lifted off his bed. The Pretty Boy—damnit, Kel knew his name!—stood by his side all the while. "Everything's going to be okay. You're doing great. Just hold on, please" he begged.

The kid's name was S?L?Y, she was really small and cute. He locked eyes with her, briefly; she scrambled to hide behind someone's nightgown, gasping for air over and over again. Whoever was carrying him took him down a long slope. The world faded away for a moment, and when he came back he was outside. It was so cold. Pretty Boy (HRY? something like that?) was there too. A loud horn went off over and over again. He could hardly see anything past the swirl of red and blue lights.

Kel was tired, more than he had ever been. He wanted so badly to drift off to sleep, but his Pretty Boy brother wouldn't let him.

The MRI showed that the masses in his lungs had continued to grow unabated. The mid-sized tumor in his right lung had grown into a massive one, with three others forming in his left.

The damage couldn't be reversed. Nothing more could be done. Six weeks.