Eventually Augustus drifted off to sleep but I was unable- aside from my crappy lungs generally being crappy, especially with my anxiety and heavy breathing after waking up, there was still a great deal of anxiousness on my part surrounding my vision of the nightmare.

After lying next to a now ever so slightly snoring Augustus for a while I checked my oxygen tank – I would soon need a chance and at any rate, I shouldn't sleep without a BiPaP. I took one last look at my sleeping over, he looked so peaceful, I tried to put any thoughts of what might be going on inside his body aside and kissed him on the forehead before getting out of bed and quietly getting dressed. I snuck into my room to find my mother sitting in the old chair, fast asleep – she had obviously been waiting for me to return. She looked…peaceful. At any rate I didn't want to wake her so I grabbed a blanket from a small cupboard and gently placed it over her, she stirred a little but did not wake.

I myself then crawled into bed, connected myself to the BiPap and revelled in not having to worry about breathing. It may sound weird, but when you have such crappy, cancer riddled lungs, you have to think about breathing…it isn't that I'm not able to focus on other things of course, but I have to always be mindful of my lungs, my drowning lungs. Drowning was an apt description for my night really- aside from the physical aspect of the fluid in my lungs, I was drowning in the emotion of the horrible nightmare, the prospect of losing Augustus and also drowning in the emotion of love I felt for him. Of course I already knew somehow I loved him, but until this afternoon in the Anne Frank house I had tried to keep my distance, to prevent him the pain of my inevitable, premature death. But now, my horrible nightmare, believing so vividly that I had lost him, made me realise that neither of us would be happy by denying our love.

It wasn't even that we had had sex- I mean, physicality is just physicality…but it was so tender and him so loving – all of this, his bringing me the Netherlands, being there for me when my idol turned out to be a douchebag. There was no way I could not love Augustus Waters and even though I am a grenade I know that all existence is temporary, mine perhaps more than his, but as nutless Patrick always makes us say, we are living our best life today. For Augustus and I our best life is to not deny us the pleasure of love.

Slowly as my dragon heaved I drifted off to sleep…

I awoke several hours later- I could tell it was late in the morning by the way the sun shone through the window onto the ancient chair and across the rug. Mother had left the chair and crawled into bed with me at some point- her head was pressed against my collarbone in a vaguely and slightly uncomfortably Augustinian way.

I sort of groaned and pushed against her
"Morning sleepy head" she said

"Cancer makes you sleepy" I said back, still half asleep.

"So does staying out half the night with your boyfriend" She retorted, but in a jocular not an angry way. I just mumbled and didn't properly respond- I didn't want to talk about any of the last night with her really.

"Let's get up- our last day in Amsterdam, have to make the most of it" She said her excitement impossible to hide, the enthusiasm and zeal for my life that cancer had induced in her. "We'll meet Gus for breakfast and head to the museum, I want to hear all about your meeting with Peter Van Houten" She continued. The supremely disappointing meeting with Peter Van Houten seemed like an eternity ago, given what happened subsequently- nonetheless though I obliged her.

"Alright- let's get going"

She helped unhook me from the BiPAP and shortly thereafter we left for breakfast at a café with Augustus.

"So tell me about your meeting Peter Van Houten!" my excited mother asked- Augustus and I shot each other a sly look – before as only Augustus Waters could he jumped into a rapturous imitation of the thoroughly preposterous meeting the afternoon previous. Augustus slumped back in his chair and gave a dead on impression of the bitter, drunk old man and I more or less just played off him, throwing in the lines I had said in my confrontation.

I could tell that my mother was disappointed in some ways, and so was I , but we both took heart that we would not be knocked down by the bitter, twisted, drunk man, so far removed from the Peter Van Houten who had written An Imperial Affliction

As Augustus continued his ridiculous play, doing his perfect impression through his frankly sexy crooked smile, with his hair flung back and the morning sun on his perfect face I couldn't help but laugh, almost until I couldn't breath – admittedly for me that doesn't take too much – it was a deep laugh and as he lulled in his impression I calmed down, only my lungs didn't seem to entirely get the measure – for what seemed a little too long I wasn't able to catch my breath, a slight tightness in my chest – I put it down to the unusually strenuous aerobic activities of the past days and discretely adjusted my oxygen flow – I put it out of my mind.

"Well, ladies, what is our agenda for the day?" Smooth as anything Augustus asked after finishing laughing at his own humour. At this point my mother's boarderline control freak, live-every-moment, side jumped to the fore.

"We simply must go to the Rikjsmuseum" She said

"Why don't you go on and explore the town a bit- I'm feeling a bit light headed and would like to freshen up" I said, mother looked a little disappointed so I quickly added "I'll meet you at the Rikjsmuseum in 3 hours" which would make it 1pm.

"Alright- do you want me to come back to the room with you?" She said – I quickly glanced at Augustus

"No, I'll be fine – please, enjoy yourself – I'll see you in not too long"

"Alright" She said "What will you do Gus?" she added after turning to him

"I'm feeling I should freshen up as well – I'll head to my room and meet you two ladies later" She said before knocking his (real) leg against mine, not overly suggestively, but enough to send an electric bolt down my spine.

Augustus and I walked the short distance back to the hotel together – my lungs didn't seem to have fully recovered from the bout of laughter and I had a slight twinge in my leg, I tried to put them out on my mind- but It meant I wasn't able to fully focus on what Augustus was saying – something about the metaphorical resonance of the sun having come out the day after having had our imagined version of Peter Van Houten smashed.

Noticing my lack of concentration he asked "Are you alright Hazel Grace?"

"Okay" I replied - still focusing on walking – I convinced myself it was getting easier.

"Really?" he enquired with an ounce of concern in his voice

"Just thinking and all this exercise lately hasn't done my lungs a great deal of good" I replied trying to reassure him that nothing was wrong – I hoped it wasn't.

"Oh really, did I tire Hazel Grace out last night?" He shot, slyly.

I rolled my eyes at him "Oh get over yourself" I smiled and chuckled.

When we finally arrived at my room I was breathing quite heavily

"Sit down" Augustus said – I sat on the edge of the bed, trying to catch my breath – it wasn't too bad – I gave myself a slight increase in oxygen flow to assist while he fetched me a glass of water.

"Thanks"

"Are you sure you're alright Hazel Grace, I'm worried" He said, more concern in his voice this time – Augustus and I hadn't spent this much of an extended period together before so he was not totally familiar with the ups and downs of my illness – obviously of course my stint in the ICU had greatly worried him, but I was certainly not in that sort of worry at this moment.

"Did you ever visit me in the ICU?" I suddenly asked, thinking of the dream last night.

"How did you know?" He replied "I hope you don't mind" he trailed off – before the dream I might have minded more.

"I dreamt about it last night…I didn't want you to see me like that"

"Hazel Grace…I…I thought I might never get a chance to see you again, so I snuck in" He said, for the first time I heard his voice quivering ever so slightly as his crooked smile turned flat, a sad looking smile but not a frown.

"I didn't want to be a grenade…like Caroline Mathers"

"Hazel Grace…I'm in love with you and sometimes love means getting hurt and its cliché, but I honestly believe that it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all."

"That is cliché" I smiled back at him.

"Remember when you were a kid" He continued "And you'd find somewhere with a fantastic echo?"

"Yeah"

"Well don't you think the echo chamber is more fun when you've got more than once voice bouncing around in there?"

I smiled, I knew what he meant.

"That's what I feel about you Hazel Grace – all of life is just a shout into the void of oblivion – but as long as I'm going to should I'd like to hear your voice bouncing around with mine" Augustus could be mushy as hell sometimes, but it was very deep as well.

"I love you" I said and he practically bounded onto the bed, knocking me onto my back and he lay beside me and kissed my forehead.

"Care to join me in the echo chamber of eternity?" He asked

"I couldn't dream of a better way to spend the moment in eternity we have" .

Well – I'm very sorry that it's been almost 2 weeks since the first chapter- I've gotten very busy with having to read textbooks and write super boring notes!

I hope you like this chapter though – I'm very appreciative of all the reviews of chapter one and I hope I get more from this one too! I particularly want to thank those of you who review without signing in because I personally reply to the signed reviews to thank them.

I hope I've captured Hazel better in this chapter- I found that I relate to Gus much more as a character and feel that I can capture him a lot more – perhaps I will write another fan fiction from the PoV of Gus.

Anyway guys- let me know what you think and feel free to message me here or on twitter if you like (liam_barry89)

DFTBA.