Page 9 of Things I Wish I Said

Chapter six

RYLEIGH

The familiar hum of the hospital surrounds me as I settle into the bed, already itching to leave despite the next forty-eight hours looming over me. The nurse has already done my bloodwork, and the doctor made her appearance and placed my order. Now, I’m just waiting on today’s dose of poison.

Mom lays another blanket over me, knowing how cold I get during treatment with the hospital’s arctic air-conditioning on full blast. Already, she’s fretting and fluttering around me like a mama bird, and already, I’m tired of it.

“That’s good, Mom.”

She steps away from my bed, wringing her hands out in front of herself.

She’s always nervous on treatment days, but today even more so, and I know why. Somehow this one feels like the most important because it’s the last. After, I’ll have scans in a couple weeks and my fate will be laid out for us. Good news or bad.

I try not to think about it too much, but my mortality is all I have to focus on these days, so it’s a little tough not to.

My mom opens her mouth as if she might say something, but snaps it shut at the light knock on the door. A second later, Nurse Anna bustles into the room with my IV bag and chart in hand, grinning ear to ear like we’re at a discotheque and not the oncology wing of the hospital.

“This is it,” she says as she gets to work, setting up my drip. “Last session, and you’re home free. I bet you can’t wait to get out of here, huh?”

“No. Quite the opposite, actually,” I deadpan. “In fact, I think I’ll come back weekly so I can have some of those mystery nuggets the cafeteria calls chicken.”

St. Francis Hospital is a beautiful facility, but they’re not known for their food.

Nurse Anna laughs. “Still the jokester, I see.”

“Always.” Mom sighs.

“But who knows? I might be back yet.” My smile falters, betraying the false bravado I’m so good at wearing. “If this doesn’t work, anything’s possible.”

“Hush now.” Nurse Anna reaches out and clasps my hand in hers, careful not to mess with my IV. “Not another word, darling girl. I won’t have that kind of negative talk in here. You’re going to crush cancer, leave, and never come back. One day, you’ll think back on this and barely remember me.”

I nod, a shaky smile the best I can manage.

That’s the thing about cancer. No one ever wants to acknowledge what happens if the treatments don’t work.

Everything is all “take one step at a time” or “we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” but I’m not built that way and never have been.

I’ve always looked to the future, while reaching for the stars and planning the way my life would go.

Not discussing what comes next, whether I beat this fucking thing or not, feels a little like the elephant in the room.

It’s glaringly obvious that it’s a possibility, yet we ignore it.

Like if we don’t recognize my treatment could fail, the chance of failure doesn’t exist.

But I can’t will cancer away with my fucking mind. If I could, I would’ve done it already, so this has to work.

After Nurse Anna adjusts the flow of the IV, she picks my clipboard up and marks something down in my chart. “What are you doing once you get out of here? Anything fun planned?”

I lift a shoulder. “Does sitting at home in my pajamas count as fun?”

She scoffs. “You’re young, and it’s summer. You should go out, have fun. Soak up some vitamin D.”

She’s right. It is what I should be doing. And I would if circumstances were different. Instead, I’m here, and the only friends I have already left for college where they’re preparing for their freshman soccer season.

I’d be lying if I said I haven’t been fucking lonely since school finished. Everyone’s moving on to bigger and better things while I’m just . . . stuck.

The thought hovers over me like a storm cloud, darkening my thoughts, and Mom must notice because she smiles and asks Nurse Anna a question about her children, effectively changing the subject. We’ve been around the block enough times to know she has two, one of whom’s just had a baby.

After a few minutes of chitchat, Nurse Anna sighs and turns to me with kind eyes. “You all set?”

“Yep. I’m good.”

“Well, settle in, we’ll be back to check in on you later.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” I mumble under my breath as she leaves the room.

The second she’s gone, I catch Mom’s eye, and she glares.

“What?”

She stands and crosses the room, placing a kiss on my forehead. “Do you have to be so incorrigible?”

“Yes?” I grin.

“I’m going to grab a coffee from the cafeteria. Do you need anything before I leave?”

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you about something,” I say, because it’s now or never.

“Oh?” She sits back down in the vinyl hospital chair, and I almost feel bad keeping her here. “What did you want to talk about?”

Nerves tangle in my chest. There’s no good way of telling her I have a “boyfriend,” but maybe if I give her time to digest the news now, then when she meets him in a few days, she’ll be more receptive to the idea.

“I met this guy at a Community Healing meeting a few weeks back, and we’ve been talking . . . a lot.” I pause to let that sink in .

Mom flops back in her chair, her mouth a round O.

Based on her expression, dropping a bomb would’ve been less shocking, though I don’t blame her for being suspicious.

I hate those meetings, and she knows it.

Everyone’s always whining and crying, carrying on about their hopes and fears when it’s so much easier to just power through.

And somehow, it’s always the people with super curable forms of cancer that are the worst. It’s irritating and insulting to the ones who are terminal.

I went to approximately one meeting with Mom before I refused to go back unless I could go alone. Now, when Mom thinks I’m at the meetings, I’m really at the soccer fields, staring out at the wide expanse of green and imagining myself blazing down the turf, kicking a ball, and scoring a goal.

“You’ve been talking to a boy, and you’re just mentioning it now?” Mom glances around us, pointedly indicating that there’s a better place to bring it up than here.

I shrug. “It was nothing serious at first.”

“And now? Is it serious now?” She gapes, and if I didn’t feel so bad about lying to her, I’d laugh. Her expression is so comical.

“We have a lot in common. He’s an athlete and totally driven,” I say, having no idea if the latter is true. “Plus, he’s sweet and crazy hot.”

Totally not trouble like he claims.

“Hot,” Mom repeats like she doesn’t know the meaning of the word .

“Yeah.” I laugh. “I don’t know. It’s probably stupid to think he’s seriously interested in me,” I say, preying on my mom’s loathing of my self-deprecation, “but I think I might like him.”

“Why would it be stupid?” Mom frowns. “Just because you’re going through a hard time, doesn’t mean you’re not worthy. You’re incredible, Ryleigh. Any boy would be lucky to have you.”

“I guess.” I bite my lip, really playing it up.

“I’m serious.” Mom’s tone is firm. “I, for one, am thrilled at the news.”

My brows rise. “You are?”

“You’re home too much without soccer. Christy and Nadine are gone, off to college already, so without school, you have nothing to keep you busy.

Nurse Anna was right, you know. It’s summer.

The risk of infection or getting sick is lower now.

You need to get out more, have some fun, and what’s better than a cute boy for motivation?

” She smiles, and I almost feel guilty for playing on her emotions, because, God, is she predictable.

“Not cute, remember. Hot.”

Her brows rise. “How hot?”

I chuckle as I try to think of a comparison, but words fail me. “Um, he’s like a hotter version of Michael Trevino, circa Vampire Diaries , but with these crazy-pretty blue-gray eyes and richly tanned skin, which makes me wonder about his nationality.”

“Wait. Which one is Michael Trevino?”

“Tyler. ”

“Oh, yes!” Mom hums. “Sounds delicious.”

“Mom.” I squeal and cover my eyes. “Ew, gross!”

Mom laughs. “So when do I get to meet this Vampire Diaries look-alike?”

“I don’t know. Soon,” I promise.

Don’t push, Ry. Don’t push . . .

“And I was just thinking that maybe if you liked him, he could take me to the ESPYs.”

Mom’s smile fades, and I know I’ve screwed up.

I’ve pushed too soon, especially after dropping the boyfriend bomb, but I just want this award so damn bad, and she seemed so excited about the boyfriend thing I couldn’t seem to help myself.

“Even if you do a have a boyfriend—”

“If?” I choke out. “You think I’d lie about having a boyfriend?” I scoff. “I already have cancer, Mom. Just how pathetic do you think I am?”

Super pathetic, apparently, since lying is exactly what I’m doing.

She casts me a wry look. “I didn’t mean it like that, and I don’t think you’re pathetic, but I’m also not letting my eighteen-year-old daughter take off on a trip across the country while she’s sick, with some boy I don’t even know.”

“So get to know him.” I roll my eyes like it’s no big deal. “I told you I’d bring him by soon.”

“Ryleigh, the award ceremony is in Los Angeles.” She shakes her head, and I panic .

“So?”

“So that’s more than two thousand miles away.”

“You said you were thrilled at—”

“I know what I said,” she snaps. Bowing her head, she grips the arms of her chair. “But you’re asking too much.”

“Mom, please. I totally understand why you can’t take me, but this means everything to me.

Soccer, this award, is the one good thing I’ve done in my life that’s been truly incredible.

” I flex my hands before curling them into fists.

“It’s everything, the one mark I can leave on the world before I’m gone.

It’s a chance to be Ryleigh Sinclair again?The Missile?rather than Ryleigh Sinclair, the poor kid who got cancer.

I hate being that girl. Let me have this one thing, and I’ll never ask for anything else. ”

“You were an amazing athlete, Ryleigh, and incredible at soccer, but it doesn’t define you. It’s not all you are, yet you’re acting like it is.”

I scoff.

She’s wrong.

Soccer did define me, and if it weren’t for my cancer, it still would.

It was everything, and now it’s gone, and I want it back. But if I can’t have it, at least I can have this. I have no fucking clue what it feels like to be me without it, and I have little desire to find out, if it’s anything like the last few months.

I say nothing, staring at the wall ahead, hoping she might acquiesce .

The rhythmic rise and fall of Mom’s chest grows shallow in the silence, and I wonder if she might cry. I hope not. I want Mom to give in, but I don’t want to hurt her.

Eventually, she lifts her head, and her eyes glisten with tears as they meet mine. “I’m not making any promises.”

Hope soars in my chest. “But . . .?”

“But if I get to know him, I might consider it. No promises. No guarantees. It’s a maybe at best, especially since I’ve never even heard of this kid before now.”

Mom eyes me skeptically, and I understand why. It’s not like I have a social life, so a boyfriend out of the blue is quite suspect, and I have a feeling she’s banking on the fact that I’m lying.

“Thanks, Mom,” I say, knowing when it’s time to quit.

“Sure, baby.” Mom rises to her feet looking more tired than when she entered this room today, and I feel a pang of guilt. “I’m grabbing that coffee now. You want anything from the cafeteria?”

I look at her like she’s crazy, and she laughs, patting me on the arm. “Be right back.”

“Take your time,” I call out.

Once she’s gone, I lay my head back on the pillow and stare at the wall, my thoughts drifting once again to my future, or lack thereof.

Once I found out I had cancer, it’s like my life stopped.

Time continued to pass, but my future disappeared.

Now, my senior year of high school is over, and summer is here.

I should be preparing for travel with the U-19 women’s team and prepping for college.

Instead, I’m sitting in a hospital bed getting fed the latest dose of poison in the hope it destroys the ticking time bomb inside my chest.

I have no idea what the future holds or if I even have one.

All I have is today, and if I’m lucky, tomorrow, and the next day.

But I can also have the Gatorade award. It’s the one thing I want for myself that’s still within reach, the only proof of who I used to be—that I wasn’t always sick or broken.

I grab my cell phone off the side table and click it open, fingers hovering over Grayson’s name in my contacts.

I still don’t understand why an eighteen-year-old athlete, headed to a Division 1 school in the fall, would want to help grant my wish. When I asked him about it, he was vague at best, but I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth when he’s my best chance at getting what I want.

I have six weeks to convince my mother we’re crazy about each other.

Six weeks for him to earn her trust feels like a large feat, but it’s not going to happen sitting on my ass in chemo. If this is to work, we need to know more about each other and feel comfortable enough so Mom can’t sniff out the lie.

A reason to say no is all she needs.

I open a new text message, debating whether to text him, then decide screw it, and begin to type.