Author's Note: FINALLY. I cannot even begin to express how sorry I am for the ridiculous wait between updates; it's been close to a year, and I am truly amazed and humbled that people are still following this. Thank you so much, you have no idea how much it means to me, and it was you guys and your persistance that drove me to get this written.
I strongly advise that you reread the story before this update as it has been so long and you might find it hard to follow – I had to reread several times, and I wrote the thing ffs – but just in case you (understandably) cannot be bothered, I have included a recap of events below to refresh your memories.
I really hope you guys enjoy this chapter, as I know it has been long awaited and I really hope it doesn't disappoint. I would really appreciate it if you guys could let me know what you thought of it, what you want to see more of, your thoughts on how it should end – I'm still undecided, but I'm aiming for realism, if that tells you anything – in a review or PM. Thank you.
I will try and have the next chapter up as soon as possible, although it will probably be a few weeks as I am currently working five jobs, but there is no way the wait will be as long as this one has been.
So, once again, I am REALLY FREAKING SORRY and I hope you enjoy this update.
RECAP:
Naomi was diagnosed with Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia when she was two years old, and relapsed at the ages of seven and twelve.
At seventeen, Naomi finds bruises all over her body that she thinks signifies another relapse; she hides this from everybody, so scared is she of having to undergo treatment for cancer again.
In an attempt to forget about the implications of the bruises and to turn the problem into one she can make sense of, Naomi slips back into bad habits and cuts herself wherever there are bruises.
Not wanting Emily to see her damaged body, Naomi refuses sex and hurts Emily's feelings, as the redhead thinks that Naomi is shutting down and hiding things from her again.
Whilst Emily confesses her worries that Naomi is hiding something from her – which she suspects has something to do with abuse – to Katie, Effy has figured out what is going on and tries to convince Naomi to seek medical attention.
When Gina discovers evidence of Naomi's self harm, Naomi is forced into showing her mother the bruises; the next day, Gina, Effy and Naomi go to the hospital where tests confirm that Naomi's leuekmia is back, and Jenna – who works at the hospital as a nurse – overhears the diagnosis.
Meanwhile, Emily runs into Naomi – who has gone for a walk to clear her head after the medical tests – not far from the hospital, and sees that Naomi has cut herself. Overcome with guilt that she could be the cause of Naomi's depression, Emily runs away from her.
Despite the doctors' best efforts, Naomi refuses to have treatment for the cancer, and she calls Emily from the hospital to tell her goodbye. When Emily overhears Jenna talking to Naomi through the phone line, she figures out that Naomi must be in hospital, and rushes there to find out what is wrong.
Naomi tells Emily about the cancer just before she starts haemorrhaging and nearly dies.
At this point, Effy texts all their friends and tells them about Naomi's leukemia, and the gang rush to the hospital to see her.
Naomi survives the haemorrhage, and when Emily learns that she doesn't want treatment, the redhead manages to convince her girlfriend otherwise; Naomi finally agrees to try and fight the cancer.
The others arrive at the hospital and gather in Naomi's hospital room, ready to help her fight the leukemia.
"You want to pump me full of arsenic?"
At this point in time, Naomi is seriously regretting agreeing to treatment. She knew it would be dangerous – 'cures' for cancer always are – but arsenic is poison. It's lethal. By this reckoning, Naomi really does not want it injected into her veins. Call her crazy, but she's pretty adamant that that idea can fuck right off.
Arizona nods firmly, seemingly not disheartened by Naomi's reaction. "Yes. The use of arsenic trioxide in leukemia patients has proven to induce remission at a higher rate and for a longer period of time than the use of standard chemotherapy alone. It works by destroying the cancer cells, or making them mature into fully functioning cells."
Naomi opens and closes her mouth, frowning. "But it's poison. It's – it kills people."
"It kills cancer, too."
"Well, yes, but – "
"Naomi," interrupts Arizona, perching on the end of her bed and resting a hand on her knee. "I wouldn't suggest this if I didn't think it would help. If I thought it would make things worse, rather than better." She sighs, casts her blue eyes to Naomi's somewhat horrified face. "I'm sorry, but we don't have any other options. A bone marrow transplant is out of the question and you have developed a resistance to ATRA therapy. This is all we've got."
Naomi feels her eyes start to water at the thought that this is her only hope, the only chance she has left to be able to live. The burning feeling in her skin from all of her friends' anxious gazes means that the tears can't fall, so Naomi sniffs slightly, blinks until her vision clears. "Well, then. Arsenic it is."
"This'll work though, right?" Cook asks, hands buried deep in his pockets as he shifts nervously from foot to foot. "It'll knock the cancer right out?"
"The treatment has a high success rate with putting the cancer into remission. It'll take some time, but I'm pretty confident it's going to work."
"And when it's in remission, it's gone for good, yeah? Naomikins'll be right as rain again."
Arizona hesitates. "This isn't a definite permanent cure – scientists are still searching for that. But yes, there is a chance that this could be the last time Naomi ever has cancer."
It is only the brilliant smiles that split the faces of her friends and girlfriend that keep Naomi from calling Arizona out on the fact that she's pretty much talking bullshit. It's far more likely that she will be attacked by relapses until the day she dies, which – even if this arsenic shit works – is lurking somewhere on the horizon, a bleeding blackness that threatens to block out the sun. But then Emily kisses her temple, a shaky sigh of relief tickling her skin, and Naomi thinks that if she gets to spend even just one more year with this girl she'll have had a pretty fucking brilliant life.
Arizona goes through the usual list of pre-treatment questions – is she on any medication, how is she feeling (Naomi rolls her eyes, because she'd lost nearly half her blood supply just hours earlier for fuck's sake, she feels like microwaved shit) – and Naomi rattles off answers that taste familiar on her tongue and make her throat hurt with the memories they carry, the sound of them enough to make the years fade away until she's twelve years old again and facing a horror she feels she'll never get past. Emily notices, hears the fractures in her voice and starts stroking her fingers along the skin of her arm, careful not to aggravate the bruises and cuts, and it calms her enough to answer Arizona without choking on what she's saying.
But then Arizona's trying to suppress a smile, running a hand across her mouth and looking at Naomi with laughter in her eyes. "Is there any chance you could be pregnant?"
Naomi has to fight – hard – to not start laughing, bites her lip to keep the sound inside, only succeeding because she knows it would really fucking hurt. Her friends and mum clearly do not possess the same restraint and are cracking up all over the place – Cook's shaking so hard with laughter Naomi worries he'll stop breathing or something – whilst Emily blushes violently beside her, tugging on the neck of her baggy scrubs to try and hide her face. Naomi opens her mouth to say something twattish about how Emily's good but not that good when the girl in question elbows her lightly in the side, and Naomi decides to save her some embarrassment. "No," she replies through a smile. "Definitely not."
"That'd be a bloody neat trick, Ems."
"Fuck off, Katie."
"Why'd you even ask? Naomi can't be preggo, because Emily doesn't have a pork sword, stupid."
"Panda!" Emily screeches, and Naomi can't help but cackle then, cursing as pain rockets up her ribs and spreads throughout her body, but still utterly unable to stop convulsing with laughter. Arizona notes how distressed she is and makes an attempt to clear the room.
"I'm sorry, I know you were all really worried about Naomi and wanted to make sure she was okay, but there really shouldn't be this many of you in here. It's supposed to be two visitors, maximum, and the treatment Naomi is about to undergo is very draining. She's going to be pretty wiped out at the end of it."
Freddie's eyes harden, and his protest is only one of many. "We're not leaving."
Arizona sighs. "You can go to the waiting room if you'd like until the treatment is finished, but even then we'll be keeping Naomi overnight for a couple of days because of the haemorrhage she sustained earlier. You can't all stay with her, and she won't be feeling up for company anyway."
"It's okay, guys, you can go," Naomi interrupts before squabbling can occur. "I won't be here for too long – I'll be an outpatient for the rest of the arsenic cocktails, so I'll be able to go home and maybe even go to college. I'll see you when I get out." Smirking, she adds, "And if you really can't stay away from my glorious self for such a long period of time, come back tomorrow during visiting hours."
Katie snorts. "A little full of yourself, aren't you Campbell."
"Rightfully so, Katiekins."
Cook lets out a bark of laughter, walks over to ruffle Naomi's hair and plant a sloppy kiss on her cheek. "Too right, Blondie. I'll see you tomorrow, yeah?"
"Looking forward to it," Naomi says dryly, rolling her eyes and shoving him off her.
It's pretty much a given that the two people that are going to be staying with Naomi are Emily and Gina, and as everyone else bids her farewell and good luck Naomi feels lighter than she has in weeks; it's the way Effy touches her hand gently, careful to avoid the IV. It's Panda's beaming smile and violently enthusiastic wave goodbye. It's Freddie's lopsided grin and smiling eyes. The way Thomas crosses himself and promises to pray for her. The ease with which JJ looks into her eyes and swears blind that she's going to be fine. Katie's fantastic glare when Naomi blows her a kiss and winks. The nod Cook sends her way on his way out of the door, more earnest than Naomi's ever seen him. The way Gina is still by her side even though Naomi's father is long gone because he just wasn't strong enough.
It's Emily, and the way she's holding Naomi so tight there is simply no letting go.
Emily listens to the side effects of the drugs they're going to pump into her girlfriend with a feeling that can only be described as abject horror.
There's the nausea and the vomiting that she was expecting, of course, and the hair loss. And, she supposes, headaches and fever and fatigue don't really surprise her all that much, either. But the bruising, and the swelling of the face and hands and feet, and the anxiety and shortness of breath, and the insomnia and the diarrhoea, and the weight gain and dry skin.
The chest pain. The heart problems. Depression.
Death.
Those side effects? Those, she was not expecting.
And the worse part is, Naomi just sits there and listens to Arizona with this glazed look in her eyes like it's nothing, like she's not going to be suffering horribly for the next two hours – longer than that, even, because this is just today, day one of the cancer treatment that stretches so far into the future that Emily starts to feel violently ill, and suddenly drained of energy. Anxiety blankets her with a suffocating blackness that steals the breath from her lungs, and her heart beats against her sternum so sharply her chest feels close to splintering.
It is this, more than anything, that assures Emily that her and Naomi are going to fight this together.
"Mum? What are you doing here?"
Jenna's head snaps up from her spot at the nurse's station and she has to do a double take when she sees her husband and only son ambling towards her, looking more lost and anxious than she's ever seen them.
"I'm working, sweetheart," she answers, stepping out from behind the desk and starting a little when James throws his arms around her waist. "What are you doing here?"
When James only shakes his head and burrows deeper into her arms, Jenna looks to Rob for answers. "Katie got a text message, from that Stonem girl. Said somethin' about Naomi bein' in hospital." He takes a deep breath, runs a hand through his hair before scrubbing it over his face, and looks more than a little bit heartbroken as he adds, "Katie says it's cancer, Jen."
Despite the fact that Jenna already knows this, her eyes start stinging with salt once again at the revelation, but she refuses to blink the tears away for fear that the backs of her eyelids will burn with the memory of Naomi bleeding out before her, Emily breaking apart as she watches her girlfriend succumb to death. "I know," she replies, shakily, and when Rob's brow creases, she elaborates. "I was working when she was brought in. She's had a haemorrhage, Rob – I don't know if she's – "
It's James' tears soaking through her scrubs that cuts her off before she can voice her fear that Naomi is dead. Emily was wrong in her assumption that this is what Jenna wants. She would never wish death on anybody, especially someone that means so much to Emily; and Jenna doesn't hate Naomi, she just hates what she stands for, hates the life that Emily's going to have to live because of how much she loves her. She wants to spare Emily the pain of being persecuted, and the only way she knows to do this is to keep her away from Naomi – it used to be the single most important thing in Jenna's life.
Now, she thinks, she'd do just about anything to make sure they never have to be apart.
Suddenly, she's fumbling for a phone, chattering away to Rob and James about how Dr. Robbins will know what is going on, and she'll page her right away for answers; she's punching in the numbers of Arizona's pager number with trembling fingers and James still stuck to her like glue when she hears Katie's voice from behind her, and she drops the phone and has to force herself not to beg her eldest daughter to tell her that Naomi is okay.
"Katie!" she calls, disentangling herself from James and clutching his hand instead as she makes her way towards the large group of teenagers drifting aimlessly through the hospital, Rob following along behind her.
Katie looks up, shock raising her eyebows and widening her eyes before they narrow slightly, and her mouth sets in a straight line; sensing a confrontation, her friends back off, settling in a row of chairs lining the wall. "Mum. What do you want?"
"What happened to Naomi? Is she okay? Where's Emsy?"
"Why the fuck do you care?" Katie sneers, and Jenna prays that the universe will not be so callous as to rob her of two daughters in one day.
"Of course I care, Katie, I never wanted her to die for God's sake! And Christ knows what that would do to Emily." Her daughter is still glaring at her, arms crossed defiantly over her chest, but James' hand is clammy in her own, so she soldiers on. "Look, if you don't want to tell me, at least have the decency to let your dad and James know. They've been worried sick."
Katie's eyes soften, and she relaxes by degrees, flashing a gentle smile towards her brother and father. "Naomi's doing okay. There's some crazily perky doctor on rollerblades starting her on some kind of arsenic shit right now."
"Emily's still with her?"
"Yeah. I don't think we're going to be seeing very much of her for the next couple of months." A pause, then, "And I'm – well. I'll probably stick around, too, just to make sure Campbell doesn't do anything arse-like."
James ponders this for a moment as he wipes his cheeks clean. "Naomi has a nice arse."
"James!"
"That's enough of that, son."
"Yeah, you fucking perv," Katie snorts, shoving him with a vaguely disgusted smirk.
Recovering some semblance of seriousness, the littlest Fitch asks, "Naomi's not going to die, is she?"
"Of course not, James," Jenna assures him, hurriedly, smoothing his hair back from his forehead, "don't be ridiculous. Naomi's going to be just fine."
The words crackle like static through the air, hollow and hovering on the wrong side of conviction, and the shreds of optimism lighting the eyes and faces of the occupants in the waiting room dies out with the slow fusion of hope into irrevocable, rippling unease.
The second that the drugs drip out of the IV bag and into her body, Naomi feels sick. The chemicals burn slowly to the crease of her elbow, and it feels like someone has boiled her blood and her veins are on fire. The pain scorches a path to her shoulder before splitting like a snake's tongue to her head and her heart, and dizziness wrenches the world upside down and all around, and it's all Naomi can do to crush Emily's fingers against her own and fight to stay conscious.
"All done," announces Arizona, stepping back from Naomi's IV pole and snapping off her gloves.
Naomi barks out a bitter laugh before pressing her head between her knees. "Hardly."
Arizona sighs. "Naomi – " She's interrupted by an incessant beeping from her lab coat that Naomi has spent enough time in hospital to recognise as her pager going off, signalling some medical emergency or another. "I have to take this, but I'll be back to check on you later, okay?"
As Arizona's retreating footsteps slowly fade away, Emily says, completely out of the blue, "I like her."
"Well, you're both in and out of luck."
"What do you mean?"
"Arizona's a gold star lesbian, Em, but she's got a pretty hot girlfriend, and she's never really struck me as a player."
Emily laughs throatily, fixing a mock exasperated look on her face when Naomi turns her head in Emily's direction. "Fuck's sake. Why are all the shaggable ones taken?"
"If I wasn't concerned that doing so would irritate the needle stuck in my hand, I'd be slapping you upside the head right about now, Ems."
Gina frowns from the foot of the bed. "Are you in pain, love?"
"Nothing too horrendous," Naomi lies.
"How long does this take, anyway?" Emily asks, folding her legs beneath her on the hardbacked plastic chair, looking curiously at the drugs circulating through Naomi's bloodstream. "And how often will you have them?"
"It depends on how I react to it – for now, they'll give it over the course of an hour or two, every day until a bone marrow aspiration shows the cancer cells are in remission. From there…well, consolidation therapy begins three to six weeks after remission and lasts about five weeks, and there'll probably be chemo for a couple of years to make sure it's really gone."
Emily nods, squeezes Naomi's hand and starts chattering away about what they could do in the month or so that Naomi doesn't have to be hospitalised. Naomi watches the play of dying sunlight on Emily's skin, and feels herself smiling as the unrelenting nausea churning her stomach quells slightly and inexplicable warmth takes it's place; Emily is still here. Emily is still making plans. Emily is still in love with her. And Naomi's head feels close to splitting wide open from the white hot pain slicing through her skull, and she aches deep in her bones as if they have been flushed through with ice, but Naomi manages a smile. Because Emily is still here.
The sound of yet more beeping breaks into Naomi's reverie, and Gina throws her an apologetic glance as she fishes a phone out of her handbag. Glancing at the screen, she says, "Oh, it's Kieran, love. He's probably worried sick about us, just abandoning ship like that." Her mother looks torn, worn out eyes creasing at the corners. "Will you be alright if I find a payphone and give him a ring? No fucking credit on this thing."
Naomi's smile tightens uneasily, familiar tendrils of dread curdling in her stomach. "Yeah. Go ahead."
"You sure? I can always call him later, after the treatment's done – "
"I don't need a fucking babysitter, mum," Naomi snaps, fear translating into anger as it always does. When Gina's face screws up the tiniest bit and she sighs shakily before nodding and shuffling out of the room, Naomi wishes – not for the first time – that being an enormous bitch wasn't her default setting.
"Okay, what's wrong?"
Naomi just glares at Emily, because seriously?
The redhead colours a little, but holds Naomi's eyes, clarifying, "I mean, why are you being a prick to your mum? She's just worrying about you." There's a pause, before, "That's all any of us are doing, Naoms."
Naomi sighs, turns on her side in the bed to face Emily more fully, and decides to fuck everything and just be honest instead of callous – honesty would make a good, solid default setting, she thinks. "I like Kieran."
Emily's eyebrows quirk, and the tiniest of smiles curves across her face. "Well, Naoms, you are both in and out of luck – I heard that Kieran totally wants to shag you, but he's kind of shacking up with your mum, and he's never really struck me as a player."
This time around, Naomi makes a valiant effort to slap Emily upside the head, but her girlfriend just laughs and catches her hand between her own, kisses each knuckle gently. "Okay. So you like Kieran."
"Yes." Naomi hesitates, shifts slightly until her eyeline is somewhere near Emily's clavicle, and continues softly, "I mean, he's a twat, obviously. And a fucking disaster, even by his own admission, but he's – he makes her happy, you know? She's a fucking cow sometimes, Em, but she deserves to be happy, and she's been alone for so long – ever since…"
"Ever since your dad left," Emily completes, and Naomi doesn't even have to see the look on her face to know that Emily understands; Naomi's known that Emily just gets her in a way that no one else ever has since the first time they went to the lake, because she did need someone to want her, and that someone has never been anyone other than Emily.
"Look, Naoms," Emily begins, crouching in her chair until their faces are pressed together and Naomi's eyes flicker upwards and meet hers, "Kieran isn't your dad. He's not going to fuck off at the first sign of trouble – if he was that kind of guy, he'd have run screaming from Roundview long ago."
Naomi laughs at that, and Emily tries not to analyse why the rush of air against her cheek has her feeling so damn euphoric. Instead, she kisses Naomi, just once, almost as a prompt, because Emily knows she's not done speaking.
"I just wish I knew why he left. Why suddenly, I wasn't worth sticking around for. I know he sounds like an absolute prick, but he isn't – when he was here, he was brilliant. He didn't miss a single treatment, and he shaved all of his hair off whenever mine fell out, including his eyebrows, and made sure we had matching hats and headscarves to wear when I finally left the hospital.
"He was supposed to be here. I miss him being here. And you and Kieran and everybody else can all swear until you're blue in the face that you're going to be here, but that's what my dad said, and it was only true until it wasn't anymore."
Naomi's eyes fall closed with exhaustion, a side effect of the drugs that are keeping her alive, and the fragile flutter of her eyelashes against Emily's cheek is what makes her resolve crumble into dust. Naomi is angry and hurt and broken, and she's full of poison and on the verge of losing her hair and her skin is bleached of colour, and she's sick and tired and dying by degrees but none of that makes a blind fucking bit of difference to just how much Emily loves her, and the fact that Naomi doesn't understand this makes Emily ache so viscerally she feels as if she's the one with arsenic burning through her body. Because this girl – this beautiful, life-changing girl – is Emily's past, present and future, no fucking doubt about it, and no amount of chemotherapy and hospital appointments and relapses is ever going to slow the way Emily's heart threatens to burst with just how much she loves Naomi.
What confounds Emily the most, though, is how Naomi is the one scared of suffering losses when she is the one who could die and leave Emily all alone.
Emily is ranting all of this at Naomi between chest splintering sobs before she can even begin to think of stopping herself, and when all the words are gone and she's nothing but an empty, dried out husk, Naomi kisses her, so softly and gently that Emily nearly starts crying all over again.
Instead, she presses her forehead against her girlfriend's and breathes the honeysuckle scent of her into her lungs, and it soothes the aching sadness in her chest with every inhale. "I'm not going anywhere, Naoms," Emily promises, and Naomi can taste the sincerity of the words as they flutter against her lips. The slow erosion of this fear of abandonment that weaves and snakes its way between Naomi's ribs to tear at her heart is full of a gentleness that is so inherently Emily that Naomi can't help but believe her, purely because not doing so would break them both irrevocably.
"Okay, Emily," Naomi says, nearly crying with relief as she feels emotional wounds that are years in the making slowly stitching themselves closed with the redhead's words. She is not fixed, she's still dying, and she's hurt and scared beyond belief but she's not alone. She has Emily.
Naomi isn't sure why this epiphany tenses her stomach to the point of pain, or why pressure pushes at her throat until it feels thick and swollen, like she's on the brink of asphyxiation. It isn't until she feels the slow climb of something acidic crawling up her aesophagus that she realises what is happening, and she lurches desperately into a sitting position and fumbles for the pink emesis basin at the foot of her bed just as the wretching begins.
Each shuddering convulsion of her stomach muscles forces more vomit between her lips, and Naomi is almost choking on her own tongue. The burn of the acid scalds her throat red raw, and every violent cough feels like it's tearing her muscles in two, turning her inside out and making it impossible to catch her breath. Naomi can't even remember the last time she ate anything, but her stomach refuses to empty, and thick, acrid waste relentlessly spills from her mouth for minutes on end.
Naomi feels Emily's hands at her temples, smoothing her hair away from her face. She collects the platinum strands in one loose fist and splays the other hand against Naomi's back, running her fingertips up and down the length of her spine, soothing the muscles between her ribs that contract painfully with every convulsion; Emily's voice is a whisper of comforting sound in Naomi's ear, and her lips press fleeting kisses to the blonde's flushed skin to punctuate every softly uttered assurance.
When it's finally over, Naomi slumps backwards against Emily and feels like crying from exhaustion. The immense effort of vomiting for a solid two minutes has exacerbated the pain tearing along every nerve ending in her body at least tenfold; her abdomen hurts so bad that her body tries curling into the foetus position almost on instinct, and the rolling nausea that is welling into waves and waiting to send her sprawling to her knees to cough up her insides only adds insult to injury. It would be tolerable, maybe, if sharp bursts of pain didn't frisson inside her head with every miniscule movement, and her bones didn't ache as if saturated in ice water and her skin wasn't on fire, the slickness of sweat doing very little to quell the flames. And the worst of it is, Naomi is so utterly drained of energy, exhausted beyond the realms of comprehension, but the agony spearing through her makes sleeping an implausible possibility.
She is just about aware enough to register the slow slide of Emily's arms as they wrap about her waist, settling on her stomach and stroking softly. It does nothing to alleviate the pain, but it makes Naomi feel better somehow, and she has never been more grateful for Emily's presence than at this very moment – it occurs to her that she should probably feel embarrassed about being this vulnerable and exposed and, quite frankly, disgusting in front of Emily, but the redhead doesn't appear to mind, and when a nurse comes in the room to clean up the soiled basin on what must have been Emily's request, it lends Naomi a little more belief in her girlfriend's conviction that she is always going to be here.
Inexplicably, it is that that makes everything hurt a little less.
"Do you want to try and sleep?" Emily's voice is carefully not loud, and caresses the shell of Naomi's ear so pleasantly she almost cries.
She shakes her head in reply, cursing loudly when pain rockets through her skull with splintering intensity, and vows to never move any part of her body ever, ever again. "No. I won't be able to." And then, remembering her renewed sense of honesty, "Everything hurts too much."
"Can Arizona give you something for that? Morphine, maybe?"
"I don't do well with morphine. It makes me feel horrendously ill, and I don't think I could stand more of that right now. I'll ask her for some anti-nausea meds when she checks in – maybe then I'll be able to hack it."
Naomi's voice is fractured and broken, and Emily can almost feel the rawness in her own throat. Shakily, she asks, "Is there anything I can do?"
"Just sit with me, take my mind off of it. All I can think about is how much more of this shit is still to come. It's barely started and already I can't wait for it to be over."
There is still an hour or so of this treatment left to go, and in the interest of comfort, Emily carefully scoots backwards until her back is flush against the pillows covering the headboard, and gently settles Naomi between her legs before wrapping her arms around her again. "Okay, Naoms. Just think about how great things will be when this is over."
Naomi sighs, and somehow finds the energy to flinch when pain roars up her throat. "That's years off, Emily. It's kind of hard to envisage."
"I'll help you," Emily decides, determined to distract her girlfriend from her torment. "Ten years from now, all of this will be a distant memory. We'll be in Mexico, probably, spending lazy Sunday afternoons wearing sombreros and drinking margharitas, doing absolutely fuck all besides each other."
Naomi snorts at this, and the pain it brings is worth the smile she can hear in Emily's voice. "That sounds pretty perfect, Ems."
"Right? And even if the monotony gets to us, we're pretty much guaranteed a change of pace at some point. Cook can only last so long on his own before he'll need you to bail him out of jail."
Naomi is pretty sure her ribs just split open from laughing so hard, and she still can't quite breathe properly when she says, "Sod the fucker. I'm not trading in Mexican sex for dealing with his childish misdemeanors."
Mock sternly, Emily replies, "But Naomi, who else could he turn to? Freddie will be too busy stalking Effy, and JJ won't have the time to sort it out, being a world famous magician and all."
"What prosperous futures you see for us all, Emily," Naomi manages through a smirk, relishing the husky laughter that tickles her ear in response. Threading her fingers through Emily's, Naomi adds, "I reckon Freds and Eff will be married. They'll have a house with a picket fence and unreasonably attractive two point five kids."
"I can't really picture Effy agreeing to children. Not even if Freddie has them himself."
"I think she might surprise you."
Emily ponders this for a second, before her smile grows cheeky. "What about my darling sister Katie? What do you think she'll be doing?"
"Prostitution."
"Naomi!" Emily scolds, fighting to control her mirth both to show solidarity to her twin and to avoid jostling her girlfriend.
"What?" The blonde laughs, risking the flare of white hot pain in her skull to tilt her head upwards and catch Emily's amused yet indignant expression. "I can see her now, standing on a street corner with her leopard print skirt blowing in the wind…"
"You're evil."
"Fine. She'll be a highly coveted fashion designer with shitloads more money than sense – and okay, I won't make the joke, calm down – and some half-wit idiot footballer for a boyfriend, who fucks her off enough of the time that she'll have her own room in our Mexican holiday home to escape to should she need a break."
"That's better," Emily smiles, giving her a gentle squeeze. "So, that just leaves Thomas and Panda."
"Oh, well. They'll definitely be married. Obviously, Panda will be a Harvard graduate at some high end job bringing home the bacon, and Thomas – well, to be honest, I'm almost positive he'll have secured a position in sainthood."
Emily chuckles, hooks her chin over Naomi's shoulder to press a kiss to her cheek. "See? The future's not so hard to imagine after all."
"I guess not," Naomi sighs, closing her eyes and leaning into Emily's embrace, fighting hard to keep the pain at bay.
It's the subtle way in which Emily grips her that little bit tighter and curls her hand around her wrist in such a way that her fingers flutter over her pulse point that gives her away. Naomi knows that Emily imagines a life so much bigger for them than she can bring herself to see at the moment, so preoccupied is she with pain and cancer and the prospect of death, but Emily is not as naïve as people perceive her to be. She believes that Naomi will survive this, but she understands the reality that she might not, and the palpability of Emily's fear of suffering a loss she may never recover from prompts Naomi into scrutinising the horizon for what they could one day be.
"We'll be married, too, you know. Once we're tired of Mexico and travelling the world, and feel like settling down. It'll probably be a small wedding, just the others and our families, and Katie and Eff will be bridesmaids – don't worry, I'll make sure Effy's not hiding any bricks in her bouquet – and maybe JJ and Cook can share best man.
"We'll buy a house, in London, probably, so you'll have your pick of schools for teaching positions and I'll be close enough to Downing Street to assassinate the PM if need be. It'll have to have a spare room so Cook can hide out from the police, and one for Katie for when she needs a break from fame. And, you know, there'll be other bedrooms, too. For our two point five kids.
"We'll adopt, probably, although I suppose we could snag some sperm from somewhere and do it naturally – you can be the incubator, Em, although if we end up with twins we're picking our favourite and leaving the other in a wicker basket in the reeds…I'm joking, of course. Having two little babies that look just like you sounds pretty fucking perfect if I'm honest.
"We'll cry when the kids leave home, but only for the first few days before we realise we can have sex wherever and whenever we want, and we'll just walk around the house naked all the time doing fuck all but each other, like you said. And there will probably be grandkids at some point, and we'll cry about how old we are and try to drink vodka from the bottle and smoke spliff like we used to just to prove we're still as young as we are now, but when that nearly kills us we'll face reality and grow old together like we were always meant to.
"And we'll still love each other just as much as we do now."
Emily's tears are slick on Naomi's clavicle, and her chest is close to bursting with the conflicting sensations of just how fucking badly she wants every single goddamn second of the life Naomi sees for them, and the mindnumbing horror and desolation that she might never get to experience a moment of it.
Naomi shifts herself until they are face to face, and all she can see are tortured yet hopeful mahogany eyes. "I'm not going anywhere, either, Emily, if I can help it."
It's not a promise, it's not a sure thing, and their lives could crumble to dust around them before they ever even properly start, but Naomi is fighting to stay alive to give them a chance at a life together that has barely started; it's the beginning of what could be a beautiful future, and whether they have one year or eighty, Emily knows they will steal perfect moments inbetween all the pain and heartbreak that will make every single second of sickness and horror worth it.
What it comes down to in the end is that Emily can't help but believe her, purely because not doing so would break them both.
Irrevocably.