Until I Met Her

Chapter 24

Mrs Williams' cancer came back and there was nothing that they could do about it.

Nothing...

Eleanor practically begged me to take her to my dad, she wanted to see, to hear it from him and when he told her, when he showed her the X-rays... she didn't want to hear.

She blamed him, she cursed and shouted. He should've seen it coming, why didn't he do more tests, wasn't she doing fine? What didn't he do right. She hurt and she wanted to hurt others too.

It was so bad that my mother was called.

I don't think I've ever seen Eleanor so mad. As a matter of fact, I don't think I've ever seen a person so heart broken.

I've never felt so useless.

Eleanor didn't want to accept that Mrs Williams didn't want to have treatment. She was done and tired of it, more so when she was told that the possibilities of her coming out the other end were very slim. She wanted to have whatever that was left with her family, enjoy her time left.

Eleanor went from staying at mine every other day, to permanently staying with me. Mrs Williams wanted to spend time together but Eleanor couldn't stay over at hers. She didn't want to explain why, she just—she said she couldn't.

As days went by, Eleanor, instead of sadder, started to grow angrier. It was like everything around her was sharp enough to lit up a fire in her. She'd barely speak to me and it was driving me insane. I tried, I kept trying but she wouldn't bulge.

I sat in front of her, my leg bouncing so fast that I was making the table shake. Her eyes were frozen, staring directly at her food and nothing else. We were on a date.

"Uni starts in a month," I sigh, reaching for my drink.

"You've gotta do better than last year," She replied, the piece of pizza she's been trying to eat for the past 10 minutes is still there, untouched. "You can do it, you just have to go more and actually give in your essays on time."

"Yes, mum," I smiled. "Do you want to go home?" She shook her head. "Well, do you want to go eat something else?"

"I want you to stop babying me." I frowned.

"I'm not—"

"Yes, Tyler, you are." With a groan, she gave up on her pizza and rested her back against her chair.

"Well, maybe I wouldn't have to baby you if you—"

"If I what?"

"If you'd stop trying to push me away." I looked away, blinking away my tears. "I'm here, Eleanor, and I'm not going anywhere, you need to know that, I don't care how rude you get about my stupid eggs or how much time you spend in the bathroom when you know I need to pee, I don't care how much you try, I'm not fucking moving."

Eleanor snorted against her will. Yes, over the past few weeks, Eleanor has managed to insult my cooking. My eggs were weird, not properly cooked, then I cooked them better and she said they were burnt. She'd spend hours inside the bathroom, bathing, I'd knock and knock and she'd just ignore me, she'd lock herself in and not even give sign of being alive. I think... she did it on purpose. Everything she was doing to make me feel bad, to make me angry... she was doing it on purpose.

"I liked the last breakfast you made," She sniffed, looking away from me.

My cheeks burnt in shame. "Actually... I ordered that from NowEat while you slept."

Eleanor laughed and it was music to my ears. I was yarning for that sound, I hadn't heard it in a while.

"You're an idiot," Her smile was— I don't think there's words in the English dictionary to describe how fucking breath-taking her smile was.