You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
whispered conversation that ensued. My dad say<strong>in</strong>g, “It kills me,” and my mom say<strong>in</strong>g, “That’s exactly what she doesn’t need to hear,” and my<br />
dad say<strong>in</strong>g, “I’m sorry but—” and my mom say<strong>in</strong>g, “Are you not grateful?” And him say<strong>in</strong>g, “God, of c<strong>our</strong>se I’m grateful.” I kept try<strong>in</strong>g to get<br />
<strong>in</strong>to this story but I couldn’t stop hear<strong>in</strong>g <strong>the</strong>m.<br />
So I turned on my computer to listen to some music, and with Augustus’s favorite band, The Hectic Glow, as my sound track, I went<br />
back to Carol<strong>in</strong>e Ma<strong>the</strong>rs’s tribute pages, read<strong>in</strong>g about how heroic her fight was, and how much she was missed, and how she was <strong>in</strong> a better<br />
place, and how she would live forever <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong>ir memories, and how everyone who knew her—everyone—was laid low by her leav<strong>in</strong>g.<br />
Maybe I was supposed to hate Carol<strong>in</strong>e Ma<strong>the</strong>rs or someth<strong>in</strong>g because she’d been with Augustus, but I didn’t. I couldn’t see her very<br />
clearly amid all <strong>the</strong> tributes, but <strong>the</strong>re didn’t seem to be much to hate—she seemed to be mostly a professional sick person, like me, which<br />
made me worry that when I died <strong>the</strong>y’d have noth<strong>in</strong>g to say about me except that I fought heroically, as if <strong>the</strong> only th<strong>in</strong>g I’d ever done was<br />
Have Cancer.<br />
Anyway, eventually I started read<strong>in</strong>g Carol<strong>in</strong>e Ma<strong>the</strong>rs’s little notes, which were mostly actually written by her parents, because I guess<br />
her bra<strong>in</strong> cancer was of <strong>the</strong> variety that makes you not you before it makes you not alive.<br />
So it was all like, Carol<strong>in</strong>e cont<strong>in</strong>ues to have behavioral problems. She’s struggl<strong>in</strong>g a lot with anger and frustration over not be<strong>in</strong>g able to<br />
speak (we are frustrated about <strong>the</strong>se th<strong>in</strong>gs, too, of c<strong>our</strong>se, but we have more socially acceptable ways of deal<strong>in</strong>g with <strong>our</strong> anger). Gus has<br />
taken to call<strong>in</strong>g Carol<strong>in</strong>e HULK SMASH, which resonates with <strong>the</strong> doctors. There’s noth<strong>in</strong>g easy about this for any of us, but you take y<strong>our</strong><br />
humor where you can get it. Hop<strong>in</strong>g to go home on Thursday. We’ll let you know . . .<br />
She didn’t go home on Thursday, needless to say.<br />
So of c<strong>our</strong>se I tensed up when he touched me. To be with him was to hurt him—<strong>in</strong>evitably. And that’s what I’d felt as he reached for me: I’d<br />
felt as though I were committ<strong>in</strong>g an act of violence aga<strong>in</strong>st him, because I was.<br />
I decided to text him. I wanted to avoid a whole conversation about it.<br />
Hi, so okay, I don’t know if you’ll understand this but I can’t kiss you or anyth<strong>in</strong>g. Not that you’d necessarily want to, but I can’t.<br />
When I try to look at you like that, all I see is what I’m go<strong>in</strong>g to put you through. Maybe that doesn’t make sense to you.<br />
Anyway, sorry.<br />
He responded a few m<strong>in</strong>utes later.<br />
Okay.<br />
I wrote back.<br />
Okay.<br />
He responded:<br />
Oh, my God, stop flirt<strong>in</strong>g with me!<br />
I just said:<br />
Okay.<br />
My phone buzzed moments later.<br />
I was kidd<strong>in</strong>g, Hazel Grace. I understand. (But we both know that okay is a very flirty word. Okay is BURSTING with sensuality.)<br />
I was very tempted to respond Okay aga<strong>in</strong>, but I pictured him at my funeral, and that helped me text properly.<br />
Sorry.<br />
* * *<br />
I tried to go to sleep with my headphones still on, but <strong>the</strong>n after a while my mom and dad came <strong>in</strong>, and my mom grabbed Bluie from <strong>the</strong><br />
shelf and hugged him to her stomach, and my dad sat down <strong>in</strong> my desk chair, and without cry<strong>in</strong>g he said, “You are not a grenade, not to us.<br />
Th<strong>in</strong>k<strong>in</strong>g about you dy<strong>in</strong>g makes us sad, Hazel, but you are not a grenade. You are amaz<strong>in</strong>g. You can’t know, sweetie, because you’ve never<br />
had a baby become a brilliant young reader with a side <strong>in</strong>terest <strong>in</strong> horrible television shows, but <strong>the</strong> joy you br<strong>in</strong>g us is so much greater than<br />
<strong>the</strong> sadness we feel about y<strong>our</strong> illness.”<br />
“Okay,” I said.<br />
“Really,” my dad said. “I wouldn’t bullshit you about this. If you were more trouble than you’re worth, we’d just toss you out on <strong>the</strong><br />
streets.”<br />
“We’re not sentimental people,” Mom added, deadpan. “We’d leave you at an orphanage with a note p<strong>in</strong>ned to y<strong>our</strong> pajamas.”<br />
I laughed.<br />
“You don’t have to go to Support Group,” Mom added. “You don’t have to do anyth<strong>in</strong>g. Except go to school.” She handed me <strong>the</strong> bear.<br />
“I th<strong>in</strong>k Bluie can sleep on <strong>the</strong> shelf tonight,” I said. “Let me rem<strong>in</strong>d you that I am more than thirty-three half years old.”<br />
“Keep him tonight,” she said.<br />
“Mom,” I said.<br />
“He’s lonely,” she said.