Seven Months

C/W: Terminal illness

I can’t keep my eyes from drifting to the oxygen tank. I tried not to look at it, tried not to say anything, we’ve already had that conversation. Abby doesn’t need to be reminded of it every ten minutes for the next seven months, though we all hope she’ll last longer than that. Then again, wouldn’t it be cruel to drag this on?

We sat on the swings behind Abby’s house. It’s a child’s swing set, the seats are made of plastic and barely big enough to sit on but we sit here anyway. Abby sits on the swing next to me, looking up at the clear blackening sky.

The oxygen tank was about the same size as a large fire extinguisher, shoved into a cloth bag with wheels and a handle like a suitcase. My eyes trailed up the tank, up the long plastic tube running to her nose that helps her breathe, and to her eyes. They used to be so full of life. She used to be so full of life. Her skin is paler than I’ve ever seen before, her once bright blue eyes dulled to greyish-blueish. She’s wearing a stocking cap to hide her balding head and what’s left of her thinning brown hair falls down her shoulders. We were all warned that she would start… changing as she began chemo. But it’s not just the way she looks, it's how she acts.

I was told that chemo would save her life, I never thought that it would take my best friend away from me.

We’ve been sitting here for a long time. Abby got back from the hospital yesterday. The doctors had declared ‘No Visitors’ so this is the first time that I’ve seen her in weeks. We used to see each other every day. She’d walk three blocks to my house to get a lift from my Dad to school every morning. We’d have classes together, three out of seven, and after we both went to art club. Abby loved painting.

Her paintings are beautiful, every stroke of her brush was a way of life for her. She would put everything she had into the painting. Blotches of paint became people and landscapes with such intricate detail that it looked like they would leap off the page and say hello. I don’t think she’s even stepped foot into her studio since she came back.

My Abby would have gone straight to her studio. My Abby would have made her parents bring her paints and a canvas while she was at the hospital. This Abby didn’t.

“You're looking at the tank again,” Abby says, drawing my attention back to reality. I hadn’t realized that I was. “It’s okay. I know, it’s… weird.” There’s another long pause in which the only sound is the wind.

“Can I tell you a secret?” she asks softly. Her hair fell in front of her face, obscuring my view. She poked at the ground with the toe of her boot.

“What is it?” I ask.

“I’m… I’m scared, Jay.” She says the words so quietly that I almost hadn’t heard them over the wind. I look at her but her face is hidden behind her hair, her boot’s toe digging into the dirt. “I can’t tell my parents, they’re already scared enough. They don’t think I’m going to make it.”

My grip tightens on the chains that hold my swing. Just as quiet, I murmur, “It’s okay to be scared, Abby. I’m terrified.” A brisk wind cut through my clothing and, for a moment, Abby’s hair was whisked away and I saw her eyes, dulling, blueish-greyish, and tearing up. Her hair fell back into place when the wind died.

“The doctors say that I only have seven months,” she whispers. I already knew that, her parents told me on the phone before I came over. Mrs. Barron caught me up on everything… well, she said everything that she could before she had to pass the phone to Mr. Barron.

The doctors gave Abby seven months to live before her lungs give out.

She can’t play sports. She can’t take long walks. She’s not coming back to school. The days of Abby eating breakfast over at my house, car karaoke, science projects, and art club. It’s all gone.

Just… gone.

“Jay, are we still friends?”

I look at her, shocked. After a long pause, I find my voice. “How could you even ask that?” I say with more anger than I’d intended to. She looks up at me now and a single tear carves its path down her cheek.

“I’m broken, Jay,” she says, her voice never rising above a whisper. “How can you still be friends with the dying girl?” The way she said the dying girl made me think that someone had called her that.

“You're not broken,” I insist with the same intensity. “Your Abigail Barron, the most talented artist I’ve ever seen, and I went with you to that Leanardo de Vinny museum.”

“Leonardo da Vinci,” she corrected with a soft smile.

I shrug it off. “Not the point. You're amazing, Abby. You’re my best friend. You're not broken. You're too strong to break that easily.”

She sniffled, rubbing away another tear and brushing her hair back out of her face. “You think so?”

I softened my voice. “I know so, Abby.” I reached over and wrapped a hand around her shoulders, pulling our swings together. “Your strong, stronger than cancer could ever hope to be.”

She nods. Abby blinked rapidly then closed her eyes for a few seconds. When she opened them, her eyes had brightened. A bit of that life had returned to her.

“I want to go to my studio,” she says decisively, sounding more and more like the Abby I know. I smile at her.

“Then let's go.” I pick up the heavy air tank and carry it inside. Abby wheels it around the house and I carry it up the stairs to the attic above the garage. Everything was exactly as we had left it last month. On the right, the wooden easel stands next to a table with an array of paint bottles and brushes spread over it. To my left is an old ratty couch where we’ve spent entire days on our phones until she got a random idea and would spend the next six hours, no matter the time, painting. The room was drafty with a slanted roof and a string of twinkly lights dangling down by the easel. I set the air tank down. Before Abby could start towards her paints, I stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.

“Hey, you're going to be okay. We’re all here for you. You're going to make it through this, Abby.” She smiles at me, a true, genuine Abby grin. I force a smile of my own. She turns and heads towards her paints. I could almost see the gears in her head turning as she began planning what to put on the canvas.

I take a seat on the couch, wishing for all the world that the words Abby needed to hear most to keep her going were the truth.