Annie's POV
"Connor." I say when he opens his front door I've been pounding on. "Annie." He replies in the same gravely tone. I smile and pushed him past him. "Shouldn't you be throwing a tantrum elsewhere?" He asks with a half smirk.
"I'm sorry about yesterday. And I also need to see Josh."
"We all want something we can't easily get." He tells me matter of factly. I blinked, confused. Connor rolled his eyes but before he looked away, I caught a glimpse of sadness behind his hazel irises.
"I just want to see Josh. It's not an impossibly hard wish to fulfil." I snapped back but he doesn't even blink. "No, you don't. You want to see him in hopes that your presence will heal him. It won't, Annie." Connor flops down onto the couch. What is with Connor today? He isn't himself at all.
"No..." I said slowly, standing in front of him. "I really want to see how he's doing." Connor ignores me, instead he turned the TV on and began to scan through the channel like I wasn't just talking to him a second ago. "Connor."
"Connor!" I snatched the remote control. "Gosh, why are you being such a prick today? What is the matter with you?" I shouted in exasperation. He propped his feet up on the arm rest of the couch and motioned for me sit next to him.
"Don't you think Josh has had it good? Eventhough he is the one battling for his life, I'm pretty sure that's a bit more exciting than being me. I'm like the toy you play with when your favourite robot is in repair. Once Josh got sick, everything began to revolve around him. I'm just thrown over the shoulder, expected to live being second prority and not once has anybody asked me how I feel about this, about him, about anything! Josh being the eldest, he's already doted on by everyone. Now he has you to worry for him. Who do I have, huh? My friends aren't even my friends anymore and since it's summer break, they'd probably thought I ceased existing." He paused, pulling his head back to lay on the arm rest and shut his eyes.
"You don't know how hard this is for me. Nobody does because they expect me to stand strong, stay afloat. But I'm not what they think I am." He almost whispers, soft enough for only my ears, even when no one is in the room. He opens his eyes. "I'm sorry I took it out on you, Annie. You're the closes thing I have to a friend." He sighs.
I could've told him I'd be here for him, that he could always talk to me or we could go through this together. But I don't. Instead, I leaned down and wrapped my arms around him. "Courage." I tell him before I let go.
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2 weeks later...
Josh's POV
I flinched as the needle stabbed into the inner part of my left wrist. Well, not literally stabbed but pierced. Yes, pierced is better. "What's that for?" I looked up at the nurse who was administering another dose of something into the second needle. She says something inaudible, muffled behind her surgeon mask. I just nod. A knock from the door pulled my attention away from the other needle being inserted to my body. My father is peeping through the crack with a wide grin.
"You didn't bring me Mockingjay." I say, accusingly. He only ever grins when he forgets something he knew he should've remembered. "Nope. But I brought you something better." Then Annie steps out from behind him. "H-Hey, Josh." She says, a bit of uncertainty in her tone. "Annie!" I exclaimed, a rush of happiness and, surprisingly, longing coursed through my body. I'm pretty sure it wasn't the effects of the interjection. She runs toward me and wrapped me in a bear hug. "I'm already dying. You here to finish me off, sweetheart?" I quoted Peeta Mellark. She smiles because it's her favourite line in The Hunger Games."Mhhmm, too bad I haven't got my arrows, which I was supposed to get for my birthday 2 years ago. I wonder why..." Her lips pulled into a sly smile.
"Hey." Another voice greets me. I looked past Annie's shoulder and I see Connor huddled by the door. "Dude, you're here!" I motioned for him to join the hug. He crosses the room and gives me an awkward one handed hug.
"What brings you two here? The ice cream? Because it tastes totally..." he stopped in a coughing fit before saying, "...rad." Connor ignores my comment and sits by the window. "What's with him?" I whisper to Annie. She sighs and pulled out her phone, her hand flew to type out what she can't say out loud on her keypad. After a few minutes, she passed it to me.
"He's really down cuz every1 is ignoring him. He thinks he's some old toy that no1 wants NEmore. IDK what 2 do 2 make him feel better. Do u think we should tell ur parents?"
I give her a slight nod. She nods too, catching my answer in my eye. "You guys can stop acting like you're in the FBI, you know." Connor says, his tone absolutely bored. I clear my throat to talk but it hurt and suddenly I'm coughing harder than I did before.
"Do...do you want some water?" Annie offers, panic in her eyes. "Calm... down. It's... nothing." I smile. She sits next to me again, still uncertain. "You...know... you look...better when... you're not frowning." I say. She manages a soft smile before it falters into a frown again.
"Tell me how's everyone." I ask. "They're fine. My parents just got to know last week. Your mom is ... uh..." I looked to Connor but he is still staring out the window. "She's fine too."
"How are you, Josh? Getting any..." She choked before she could say better. Her eyes scanned my face, my neck and my torso before landing on my hand that grasped her's. A soft gasp escaped her lips as she sees me clearly this time. I'm not getting better. If anything, I was only getting worse. She tightened her grip on my hand and lifted her eyes to meet mine.
"Yeah, I guess." I answer, breaking eye contact. She nods slowly. "Why is it so red?" Annie pointed to my neck. "Radiation." I touched it, flinching a little as my finger grazed the peeling skin. "D-Does it hurt?" She asks. "Not really." I mumbled. The atmosphere in the room tensed.Connor stopped looking out the window but he was still seated by it, not saying a thing.
"Say something." Annie pleads. "Like what?" I ask. "Anything! Just... don't just... lay there." Her eyes glazed. I swallowed hard. I could tell Annie was going to cry so I shifted and put my arm round her waist. "I'm fine. Do you want to do something? I'm actually getting tired of the comfort." I forced a laugh. The doctor had specifically said to not strain myself but a day out with Annie wouldn't hurt.
"Yeah!" She grins. "Then I've got just the place to go." I swing my legs on to the floor and pulled myself up. I've only cancer in the throat, nothing elsewhere hurt as much as it did there so I stood up easily. "Where are we going? Don't you want to tell your dad first?" She stops me. I glanced over at Connor who is getting off of his chair, staring expectingly at me. "I'm not invited, huh?" He groans, sitting down again.
"You can come along if you want, Connor. We're just off to the movies." I say, regretting having to ruin the surprise. "No." He mumbles, glaring at me from the corner of his eyes. There is definitely something wrong with Connor. He was never this upset over anything. Except maybe once, when I drank all the chocolate milk and he had to pour plain milk over his cereal for a whole week.
Annie whispered for me to leave him as he is, to let him calm down. "Come on." She says as she pulls me out of the room. "So, where to, Romeo?" She smiles. Her eyes widen when she realises what she'd just say. "I...uh... I mean." Her cheeks blushed bright pink. "To the stars." I winked.
We took a bus to McKinney Avenue where The Magnolia stands. Inside, there were movie-goers bustling about with their popcorn in hand, waiting in line to get into the theatre. I haven't been to a cinema in so long. The last was withAnnie and Connor a couple of weeks afterher birthday. "Looks like it's going to be pretty crowded today. What do you want to watch?" I ask her. She scans through the list of movies and her fingers stops at Les Miserables.
"Les Miserables? The musical?" I looked at her, confused. Annie was never the type who particularly enjoyed musicals, I did."Yeah. Anne Hathaway is like my all time favourite." She flashes me a sheepish grin. "Well, Les Miserables it is. It's like you could read my mind, Annie. Did you pick it because I enjoyed musicals or..." I looked down at her. Her eyes shied away from mine.
Annie hurried to get the tickets while I got the popcorn. We entered the theatre before the lights went out. "You know... you can tell me anything, Josh." Annie leans close, whispering in my ears. The commercials started to play, we had time to kill before the movie actually began. "What do you want me to say?" I reply.
"I don't know. In the bus, you looked pretty occupied. What's in your head?"
I blushed in the darkness because in the bus, I had been thinking about Annie. I don't know why I did but my mind wandered off to the future. For us. Would I live long enough to see who she marries? Or will she leave town after high school? Those where the things I haven't really got down to with Annie.
"Josh... Josh!" She shakes me back to reality. 'Huh? What?" I turned to her. She pouted and shook her head, annoyed that I wasn't paying attention. The movie started to play and Annie sunk lower into her seat, eyes glued to the screen. I sighed. We watched the movie in silence.
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A/N: Hello, readers! :D Here is a long chapter for making you all wait for so long. I hope you enjoyed reading it. I know it got a little draggy at the end. I guess I got carried away. Anyway, I just want to let you all know that school is starting on the 2nd of January 2013 for me. Don't worry, I will try to find time to complete this story. My other story, Looking From The Moon, will be on hiatus until I've finished The Boy I Used To Know. The one shots will keep going. :) Tell me what you think. Vote, comment and all the good stuff.
Cheers, AdelynnLSJ