Unexpected

Chapter 13

It was silent. Silent as it could get, not even the sound of a cricket was heard. This silence scares me. This silence is what keeps me up at night. Tears tickle my eyes as I glance at Emery, he was dead silent. It wasn’t even like he was breathing or couldn’t breathe. I was scared, scared Emery is going to look in my eyes and give me that same pity look my parents gave me. I needed Emery to talk or at least say anything. Anything is better than silence. 

“What do you mean ill?” Emery hisses. 

My stomach drops and my heart starts racing. My palms start sweating and I wipe them on my sweats. “You never realized? Not once?” I question, Emery shakes his head at me with questioning eyes. I sigh and stretch my left leg out and with shaky hands I roll up my pants until it gets to my knee cup. Emery stares at my knee with wide and surprising eyes. 

For minutes we stayed like this, me showing off my prosthetic leg, Emery staring wide eyes at it, and silence. I didn’t know what to say and obviously Emery didn’t know what to say, so I came out with the ‘god news’. 

“I’m not ill anymore for awhile I was. Actually for a hell of a long time I was,” I tell him. “I had osteosarcoma and they had to cut off my leg but after that I got better. A lot better, my bone cancer is gone completely gone. Gone as in never coming back again, the doctors caught it before it got worst but not before they had to cut off my leg,” I explain.

Emery finally snaps out of it and looks at me in the eyes. “That’s why you didn’t want me watching you cheer… You didn’t want me seeing your prosthetic leg, right?” I nod, he was right. And that’s exactly why I don’t let the guys watch me cheer as well. I guess I’m embarrassed more than anything. Then Emery nearly breaks out into tears, I slid closer to him. “when did this happen?” he practically screamed. 

“A little over 2 years ago,” I mumble. 

Emery looks at me, his eyes glistening with tears. “That’s when you stopped calling the least.” 

I nod. “I was in the hospital a lot and then rehab.” Emery stares into my eyes and I almost feel like braking down into tears. 

The pity. He has the pity in his eyes, the I should’ve answered your calls. He stared at me and was blaming himself, he was blaming himself for not being there. I hated the pity look, I didn’t need the pity look. I am healthy, I am alive. I don’t need someone giving me the pity look when I survived, how I am living. I would understand if someone gave my parents the pity look if I did die but he didn’t need to give me the pity look for being alive. Many others die from cancer, thousands! Millions! I feel you shouldn’t give someone who survived the pity look when they fought and fought and fought until they damn won the battle! Why would you want to give someone a pity look when they won. You need to give the pity look to someone who lost. 

Call me crazy or call me selfish but its what I believe in. I also hate when people treat me differently because I have a fake leg, trust me I’m the same Cedes just with a different leg. 

“Its all my fault.” 

I laugh and look over at Emery. “Emery… It isn’t your fault my bones sucked.” 

Emery sighs and looks at all the houses on my street, each house having no lights on. “It feels like my fault,” he mumbles. 

I lean my head on Emery’s shoulder. “Well it isn’t, I promise you.”