Hey guys! So sorry this chapter took some time. I've been super busy this week. I would just like to say to the guest: I apologize for any spelling errors, grammar mistakes, etc. Of course I always try and take the time to go back and fix them but I sometimes can't fix everything. I'm not perfect and I have never said I was. Everyone makes mistakes. We just have to learn from them!:)
enjoy the chapter:)
~Wallflower95
p.s great fangirl crushes everyone:)
3
The movie played before us. We were sitting in the living room watching V for Vendetta. There was several inches between us. I tried to keep my eyes on the tv even though I'd seen the movie millions of times. I just really want to look at Hazel Grace but of course that'd be super creepy of me so I resisted the urge to look at her. She even put her hand in the middle of the couch. I was so tempted to reach out and take into my own hand but I was afraid I'd scare her away. I really didn't want to do that. An hour into the movie mom and dad brought some enchiladas in for a snack. The credits rolled and I looked at Hazel Grace.
"Pretty great, huh?"
"Pretty great." She agreed.
"I should get home. Class in the morning." She said. I nodded and got up in search of the car keys. I noticed Hazel Grace was looking at one of the Encouragements above the tv.
"I just love this one, don't you?" My mom said. It was a drawing of an angel with the caption Without pain, how could we know joy? When I was little I never did understand that one. I still don't actually.
"Yes. A lovely thought." Hazel Grace said. I found the car keys and we were off. Hazel Grace argued she should drive home since she knew the way there. I couldn't help but think that my driving was a turn off for her. I played a couple of songs by my favorite band, The Hectic Glow. We pulled up to her house and I switched off the radio. I looked at her and she looked at me.
"Hazel Grace, it has been a real pleasure to make your acquaintance."
"Ditto, Mr. Waters." She said.
"May I see you again?" I asked. I tried to keep my voice calm and cool. I didn't want to seem to eager (even thought I was extremely eager to see her again). She smiled at me.
"Sure."
"Tomorrow?" Oh yeah that doesn't sound desperate at all Augustus.
"Patience, grasshopper. You don't want to seem overeager."
"Right, that's why I said tomorrow. I want to see you again tonight but I'm willing to wait all night and much of tomorrow." She rolled her eyes.
"I'm serious."
"You don't even know me." She said. She grabbed the book, The Price of Dawn from the middle console.
"How about I call you when I finish this?"
"But you don't even have my phone number." I pointed out.
"I strongly suspect you wrote it in the book." I smiled, a smile that felt too big for my face.
"And you say we don't know each other."
After school I headed over to Isaac's house for a round of Counterinsurgence. It was a routine of ours. After a long day at school, the best way to cool off some steam is to kill some pixelized bad dudes.
"So, what did you really think of support group?" Isaac asked as he killed a guy with a headshot. I scoffed.
"Dismal." I said.
"You and Hazel seemed to get along." Isaac said. I nodded.
"We watched a movie yesterday. At my place." I said. Isaac laughed.
"Would you like a sign taped to your forehead that says desperate?" I pressed some buttons on my controller and my character shot Isaac's character in the leg.
"Dude..."
"It's not like that." I said. Isaac shrugged his shoulders and grabbed his controller.
"You like her?"
"Yes."
"Well, that's a little premature." Isaac said. I shook my head.
"I don't think it is." Isaac shrugged his shoulders and we continued to be bad asses in the game. Once the game was over I went back home. I wasn't ready for homework yet so I decided to read An Imperial Affliction. Her favorite book. It's about this girl named Anna with leukemia but it's not a cancer story. See, cancer stories are always about the person with cancer starts a foundation in their name and they try to create this legacy for themselves or whatever. But AIA isn't a cancer story. No. Anna decides that being person with cancer who starts a cancer charity is narcissistic so she starts a charity call the Anna Foundation for People with Cancer Who Want to Cue Cholera. It was great. Really honest. I was really liking it. my phone buzzed.
Price of Dawn review: Too many bodies. Not enough adjectives. How's AIA?
I smiled and replied right away.
As I recall, you promised to CALL when you finished the book, not text.
She called.
"Hazel Grace."
"So have you read it?"
"Well I haven't finished it. It's six hundred and fifty one pages long and I've had twenty four hours."
"How far are you?"
"Four fifty-three."
"And?"
"I will withhold judgement until I finish. However, I will say that I'm feeling a bit embarrassed to have given you The Price of Dawn."
"Don't be. I'm already on Requim for Mayhem."
"A sparkling addition to the series. So, okay, is the tulip guy a crook? I'm getting a bad vibe from him."
"No spoilers." She said with a hint of teasing in her voice.
"If he is anything other than a total gentleman, I'm going to gouge his eyes out."
"So you're into it."
"Withholding judgement! When can I see you?"
"Certainly not until you finish An Imperial Affliction."
"Then I'd better hang up and start reading."
"You'd better." And that's what I did.
The next day I was sitting in my room on my bed reading AIA. It was great. So honest and real. You don't find books like this anymore. Things were looking good so far. The Dutch Tulip Man and Anna's mom were about to get married and Anna was starting a new treatment and
"What?!" I read the paragraph over again. I read it again. And again. I grabbed my phone.
Tell me my copy is missing the last twenty pages or something
Hazel Grace, tell me I have not reached the end of this book
OH MY GOD DO THEY GET MARRIED OR NOT OH MY GOD WHAT IS THIS
I guess Anna died and so it just ends? CRUEL. Call me when you can. Hope all's okay.
There was a knock from upstairs.
"Yeah?" I called. Footsteps walked down and Issac appeared. His face was red and tears streamed down his face.
"Hey man." I said getting up.
"What's wrong?" Isaac shook his head.
"Okay. Okay. Uh do you want to play Counterinsurgence?" I asked. He nodded. I put the game in and we started play. He sobbed loudly for a bit and angrily shot at the bad dudes before he talked.
"She broke up with me." He cried.
"Monica?" He nodded, his lower lip protruding.
"Sorry about that man." I said. But Isaac didn't listen. He just play and yelled and cried at the game. My phone buzzed in my pocket. It was her.
"Hazel Grace."
"So welcome to the sweet torture of reading An Imperial-" At that moment Isaac started sobbing violently. I winced as the sound pierced my eardrums.
"Are you okay?" She asked.
"I'm grand. I am however with Isaac who seems to be decompensating." He wailed louder. God my parents are going to kill for all this sound going on. It sounded like someone was being murdered.
"Dude. Dude. Does support group Hazel make this better or worse? Isaac. Focus. On. Me." I said one word at a time to try and get Isaac's attention. He was to focusing on wailing at the tv screen.
"Can you meet us at my house in, say, twenty minutes?" I asked Hazel Grace.
"Sure." And she hung up.
I turned when I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. It was Hazel Grace. She was wearing this past the knee green dress that matched her eyes. It showed of her collar bone that was really sticking out but she looked... incredible.
"Hazel Grace."
"Isaac, Hazel from support group is coming downstairs. Hazel, gentle reminder. Isaac is in the midst of a psychotic episode."
"How are you Hazel?"
"I'm okay. Isaac?" No response. Not even a reaction to Hazel Grace's arrival.
"You look nice. Girls think they're only allowed to wear dress on formal occasions but I like a woman who says, you know, 'I'm going over to see a boy who is having a nervous breakdown, a boy whose connection to the sense of of sight itself is tenuous and gosh dang it I'm going to wear a dress for him'.
"Any yet, Isaac won't so much as glance over at me. Too in love with Monica I suppose." That comment cause Isaac to explode into another fit of sobs. I winced.
"Bit of a touchy subject." I explained.
"Isaac, I don't know about you but I have the vague sense that we're being outflanked." I looked back at Hazel Grace.
"Isaac and Monica are no longer a going concern but he doesn't want to talk about it. He just wants to cry and play Counterinsurgence 2: The Price of Dawn."
"Fair enough."
"Isaac, I feel a growing concern about our position. If you agree, head over to that power station and I'll cover you." Isaac's character zig zagged to the building.
"Anyway, it doesn't hurt to talk to him. If you have any sage words of feminine advice."
"I actually think his response is probably appropriate." A burst of gunfire came from Isaac's character. I nodded at the screen.
"Pain demands to be felt." I looked at Isaac.
"You're sure there's no one behind us?" Seconds later bullets rained down on our characters.
"Oh goddamn it Isaac. I don't mean to criticize you in your moment of weakness but you've allowed us to be outflanked and now there's nothing in between the terrorists and the school." Isaac's character took off running toward the fire, zigging and zagging down a narrow alleyway.
"You could go over the bridge and circle back." Hazel Grace said. I smiled a little as that was a tactic from The Price of Dawn. I sighed.
"Sadly, the bridge is already under insurgent control due to questionable strategizing by my bereft cohort."
"Me? Me?! You're the one who suggested to hole up in the freaking power station." I turned to Isaac and flashed my crooked smile.
"I knew you could talk buddy. Now let's save some fictional school children."
"Why do they want to get into the school?" Hazel Grace asked.
"They want the kids as hostages." Isaac and I leaned towards the screen.
"Get it get it get it get it." I repeated. Something flew across the screen.
"Grenade! Grenade!" Isaac dropped his controller in disappointment.
"If the bastards can't have hostage they just kill them and claim we did it."
"Cover me!" I yelled. Isaac fumbled for the controller and his character started firing bullet after bullet at our enemies. My character raced towards the school. Bullets rained down on me but I didn't fall.
"YOU CAN'T KILL MAX MAYHEM!" My character flew on top of the grenade and it exploded throwing chunks of my character everywhere. Mission failure. But I smiled and leaned back. I reached into my pocket and pulled out my cigarettes.
"Saved the kids." I said, sounding satisfied.
"Temporarily." Hazel Grace said.
"All salvation is temporary. I bought them a minute. Maybe that's the minute that buys them an hour, which is the hour that buys them a year. No one's going to buy them forever, Hazel Grace, but my life bought them a minute and that's not nothing."
"Whoa okay. We're just talking about pixels." I shrugged and looked back at Isaac.
"Another go at the mission, corporal?" Isaac shook his head and leaned over so he could see Hazel Grace.
"She didn't want to do it after." He said.
"She didn't want to dump a blind guy." Hazel Grace said.
"She couldn't handle it. I'm about to lose my eyesight and she can't handle it."
"I'm sorry." Hazel Grace said. Isaac wiped the tears from his eyes.
"It's unacceptable. It's totally unacceptable." He said.
"Well to be fair, I mean she probably can't handle it. Neither can you, but she doesn't have to handle it. You do."
"I kept saying 'always' to her today. 'Always always always' and she just kept talking over me and not saying it back. It was like I was already gone, you know? 'Always' was a promise! How can you break the promise?"
"Sometimes people don't understand the promises they're making when they make them." Hazel Grace said. Isaac shot Hazel Grace a look.
"Right, of course but you keep the promise anyway. That's what love is. Love is keeping the promise anyway. Don't you believe in true love?" Hazel Grace didn't answer.
"Well I believe in true love and I love her. And she promised. She promised me always." He stood up and took a step towards Hazel Grace. I was about to get up in case he took a swing at her but then he just spun around as if he had forgotten what he was going to do.
"Isaac."
"What?"
"You look a little... Pardon my double entrendre, my friend, but there's something a little worrisome in your eyes." And then Isaac started beating the crap out of his gaming chair.
"Here we go." I said.
"Yes. Get it! Kick the shit out of that chair!" Isaac kicked the chair again until it bounced against my bed. Isaac chased after it. I looked over at Hazel Grace.
"I can't stop thinking about that book."
"I know right?"
"He never said what happens to the other characters?"
"No. He moved to Amsterdam which makes me think maybe he is writing a sequel featuring the Dutch Tulip Man, but he hasn't published anything. He's never interviewed. He doesn't seem to be online. I've written him a bunch of letters but he never responds. So... yeah." But I noticed Isaac letting out his frustration on some pillows from my bed.
"Hold on." I mumbled. I walked over to Isaac and took him by the shoulders.
"Dude, pillows don't break. Try something that breaks." Isaac reached for a basketball trophy from the shelf. He looked at me for approval.
"Yes. Yes! Yes! Get it!" The trophy smashed against the floor and pieces flew everywhere. I went back to stand by Hazel Grace.
"I've been looking for a way to tell my father that I actually sort of hate basketball, and I think we found it." Trophy after trophy smashed to the ground until there was non left. Isaac fell to the ground in the midst of broken trophies.
"Feel better?" I asked him.
"No." Isaac mumbled.
"That's the thing about pain," I looked at Hazel Grace when I said this.
"It demands to be felt."
And there you have it. Stay tuned for some updates this weekend guys. I'm going to try for Here I Lie, Anna's Infinity and Doctor Who maybe tomorrow and then Fault in His Stars and Convergent later on.
Please comment and review! Thanks:)
~Wallflower95