Yeah, I was a seventeen-year-old kid and my best friend was my mother. I’d have bet a lot of other jerks would feel the same way had they almost lost their mothers twice to painful cancer battles.

Pain.

My chest.

It felt as if a semi-truck was pressing down on me, blocking my airwaves from allowing air to flow through my lungs. I couldn’t breathe. Mom was crying.

I couldn’t breathe, and Mom was crying.

I wanted to cry, too.

I felt the tears sitting at the backs of my eyes as I swallowed hard and tried to be the strong one. I had to be the strong one; that’s what being the man of the house means—it means being solid even when you feel as if your heart is being liquified into a puddle of pain.

“Did you hear that, Connor?” Mom said, her shaky hands in a prayer position.

I looked up to meet her eyes, and for a second, I thought I saw a flash of hope. Her lips were curved up as the tears kept falling. My stare shot to Dr. Bern, and I sat back in my chair the minute I locked my eyes with his.

He had the same splashes of hope in his stare as Mom had—and he was smiling. I hadn’t even known Dr. Bern knew how to curve his mouth in that direction. Everything I’d received from him in the past had been doom and gloom, and now, he was freaking smiling.

“I’m sorry, can you repeat that?” I muttered, feeling too cautious to dive into the land of hope before I heard the words leave the doctor’s mouth.

He removed his glasses before leaning forward on his desk, giving me that smile I hadn’t known existed, and said, “We got it all, Connor. Your mother is in remission.”

I collapsed back into my chair, feeling every good emotion crash into my chest all at once. An overwhelming experience of bliss overtook every single part of me.

The cancer was gone, Mom was okay, and after the worst years of my life, I was finally able to breathe again.

“Mom?”

“Yes, Connor?”

“I’m taking you to fucking Disney World.”

“Language, Connor.”

“Sorry, Mom.”

1

Aaliyah

Present day

“All right, that’s a wrap on the depressed, emo girl vibes. Aaliyah. Look at you. You look awful from head to toe. You’ve been eating like shit to the point that even your ankles are getting fat,” Sofia said, shaking her head in complete disgust. Nothing like a roommate telling you how shitty you looked to make you feel better about yourself.

I grumbled in response.

She rolled her eyes. “See? This is what happens when you lay around for weeks, crying over a dude that cheated on you. You’re literally mourning a cheater. That’s embarrassing. Now, get your ass up. It’s Halloween. We’re getting drunk.”

That was the conversation that got me off the couch and into a Little Red Riding Hood costume. Sofia and I weren’t really even friends. We’d been living together for a few months, and we were complete opposites. She was a party girl, while I’d rather be home reading comic books. Over the past few weeks, I hadn’t been able to read as clearly, though, due to the tears wetting the pages.

Sofia pitied me. I knew, because she said the words, “Damn. I really pity your sad ass.” She was very straightforward that way.

That night she dragged me out for a girls’ night before she ditched me within ten minutes of finding some guy to make out with in a bathroom stall.

I shouldn’t have expected anything else from her. She was pretty much a stranger to me, and still my closest friend.

Talk about a sad life story, Aaliyah.

After uncomfortably standing around, feeling oddly alone in a very crowded room, I’d stepped outside of Oscar’s Bar for some fresh air. I tried to call Sofia, who hadn’t been answering her phone for the past twenty or so minutes. The infamous Sofia disappearing act. I probably wouldn’t see her for a few days, but she’d randomly reappear at the apartment with a pack of cigarettes, a stockpile of crazy stories, and a request for twenty bucks to buy lottery tickets.

The October breeze brushed against my skin as I witnessed Thor deck Captain America square in his chiseled jaw. If that wasn’t some kind of civil war, I didn’t know what was.

I watched the whole situation unfold before my eyes. I always felt awkward going outside alone for air because I had nothing to keep me distracted. I never stood on the streets of New York with my cell phone in my face when I was alone because I didn’t like the idea of some random psychopath coming up and killing me.

That was where my mind always went, at least. If I were on my phone at night, I’d be murdered—end of story. I knew I suffered from an overactive imagination, but I couldn’t help it. Probably too many episodes of Criminal Minds to blame for that.