“I can stay,” I offered. “I know you have your finals coming up.”
“No, it’s fine. I’m okay. I’m good.”
“Sis,” Alyssa whispered, wiping away the tears from her sister’s eyes.
“I’m okay. Really. You two get home. I’ll text you if anything changes.”
I glanced toward the hospital room. “Can I just sit with him for a second?”
She nodded. “Yeah. Definitely. Alyssa, want to come with me to find coffee?”
The two wandered off, and I went into the room and pulled a chair up beside Kellan’s bed. The machines around him kept beeping and humming as I watched his chest rise and fall. Even breathing looked hard for him lately.
“Are you sleeping?” I whispered.
“No,” he replied. “Just sleepy.”
I pushed my thumbs against my eyes to hold back the emotion. “What the hell are you doing in here, Kel? It was my job to end up in places like this, remember? Not yours.”
He gave me a weak smile. “I know, right?”
“You okay?”
One deep inhale. One coughing exhale. “Yeah. I’m okay.” He tilted his head in my direction, and his always kind eyes gave me a slight grin. “I’m killing her,” he whispered, speaking of Erika.
“What? No.”
He turned away, trying to hide the tears falling against his cheeks. “I am. Watching me die is killing her.”
“You’re not dying, Kellan.”
He didn’t reply.
“Hey! Did you hear me? I said, you’re not dying. Say it.”
He looked to the ceiling, then closed his eyes. The tears were still falling down his cheeks. “I’m not dying.”
“Again.”
“I’m not dying.”
“One more time, big brother.”
“I’m not dying!”
“Good. And don’t you fucking forget it. Everyone’s okay. We’re all going to get through this together.” I took his hand into mine and squeezed it lightly, trying to give him some comfort.
“Everything’s okay. You’re right. Sorry, I’m just—”
“Tired?”
“Tired.”
I stayed with him longer than I thought I would. Erika came back to the room, but I asked if I could be the one to stay with Kellan that night. She agreed, and Alyssa decided to stay with her, making sure she wasn’t alone.
I didn’t sleep that night. I stayed up, watching the machines and my brother’s breathing.
When morning came and he opened his eyes, he gave me a halfway grin.
“Go home,” he said.
“No.”
“Go. Go live your life, Logan. Don’t you have someone to be falling in love with?” He asked.
“What do you think I’m doing right now?” I replied as I laid my head on the bed. He smiled my way and shrugged his right shoulder. I smiled his way, and shrugged my left.
***
I wished I could say things with Kellan were getting better, but it appeared that they were only growing tougher. If he wasn’t in the hospital, he spent most of his time in bed. The once-smiling brother of mine was slowly turning into someone who showed hardly any emotion. The gentle Kellan snapped more and more at Erika for anything she did, which made her even more nervous.
It was heartbreaking, because she truly was doing the best she could do.
He never yelled at me, which I wished he would. Erika seemed on the verge of having a breakdown. The fall school year was coming back around, and she seemed overwhelmed with the planning of her classes, along with the fact that she failed her summer class for her master’s degree. Her stress level was high.
“Take her out,” Kellan sighed as I sat him up on the living room sofa. He was getting sick of staring at the walls in the bedroom, growing a bit claustrophobic.
“Take who out?”
He gave me a you-know-who-I’m-talking-about look. “Alyssa. On the coffee table are two tickets to the Opera tonight in Chicago. There’s an overnight hotel stay, too. I think she would like that. Erika and I were going to go for our honeymoon but…” His voice faded as he closed his eyes. “Take her out.”
“I’m not driving all the way down to Chicago and staying overnight when you aren’t doing that well.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No, I’m not. You had chemotherapy yesterday. You always get sick a few days later.”
“I’m fine. Besides, Erika will help me.”
“Kellan.”
“Logan.” Kellan pushed himself up to a sitting position on the couch. “You deserve to be happy.”
“I am happy.”
“No. You’re existing. Going through the motions of life. Which makes sense. Everything you’ve been through, everything you’ve seen, it had to become somewhat of a sick routine that was impossible for you to break away from. But the only time I’ve seen you happy—and I mean really happy—was when you were with Alyssa.”
“Kellan, stop.”
“Remember when you came begging me for money to buy a suit that fit just so you could take her out to a piano recital in Chicago? You beamed with hope. I’d never seen hope from you.”
“With good reason. Hope is a waste of time. Remember how she and I never actually made it to Chicago, because Ricky pissed me off and I fell off the deep end?”
He rolled his eyes. “That’s not who you are anymore. Take her out.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
No.”
“Yes.”
“No!”