Beautiful Together (14 page)

"What are you laughing about?" he asked, shocked.

"I'm sorry," I said quickly. "I'm in a weird place because of Mason."

"I understand that," he said. "And I already contacted your parents. They told me you had a fight and you left home. You're staying with Arielle Walker?"

I nodded meekly. "My mom went insane and smashed a coffee pot. And then she called me a slut and kicked me out." I fidgeted in the chair, uncomfortable with the fact that this was an actual serious discussion, the very thing I had been trying to evade lately. "It wasn't my fault. I had no choice."

Mr. Brown sighed heavily. "I understand how hard this must be. I mean, to be a kid going through all of this. The world is so foreign to you. So unexplored and new. And now
this
."

I awkwardly nodded along, glad to hear that he was at least starting off sympathetic.

"But I can't let you destroy yourself. You have to graduate. You were on the All-A honor roll every semester until this year. Naomi, you have to finish. You have to do your best."

Despite his honesty, he wasn't really breaking through. I was still numb to his encouragement, doing my best to shut him out—but that changed fast.

"And you
reek
of pot," he said matter-of-factly. "This is a drug-free school zone. I could definitely do something about it."

"But Mr. Brown," I pleaded, "I don't have anything on me. You can't arrest me for just—"

"Stop," he said firmly. There was a moment of what I can only describe as
deadly
silence.

And then he continued. "You want me to believe that there's nothing in Arielle's car when she picks you up every day at lunch? Nothing illegal at all? I'm sure Officer Franklin would
love
to give it a good search."

I felt mortified. Everything had changed so suddenly. The room felt so different. The walls were closing in on me.

"But I'm not like that," he said, aware that his shock and awe campaign had worked flawlessly. "In fact, I spent plenty of days getting high in college, whether you believe me or not. I know it's not a huge deal. It's not going to kill you like alcohol might. But I know it doesn't make you very productive. And I know that first-hand, because I almost failed a class too."

At that moment, I was frozen, unsettled by his acerbic observations.

"I want you to stop smoking before or during school," he said. "After you're off school grounds, I can't stop you. But while you're here, you're totally sober," he said. "That's my request."

"H-how will you even know?" I asked disbelievingly.

"Oh, I'll know," he said, his response hauntingly vague. "And if I catch you blasted off into space again on
my clock
, I can order you to take a drug test, and if you fail, you're expelled. I'm letting it slide for now, Naomi. Consider this a blessing.

"And believe me, I've spent plenty of hours considering how to deal with this, and I think this is the best for all parties. If the school board found out I was being lax on drugs, they'd send me to the firing squad. This is a
big
favor, don't you forget that."

"Did you tell my parents... about this?"

He shook his head. "No. This is
our
secret. I want you to succeed, so I'm doing what it takes to make that happen. I'm putting myself and my reputation on the line. Now you have to put in the work."

"Well, thanks, Mr. Brown," I said. "I mean, it really means a lot to me."

"Don't sweat it," he said. "And hang in there. I know this isn't an easy time for you. Don't think I'm not sympathetic. I do care."

I left his office with my tail between my legs, reprimanded, yet still moving. The rest of the day seemed to pass by slower than a moving glacier. When I finally got home, I started catching up on homework, slowly but surely.

However, I started crying midway through my Calculus assignment, splotching the page with dripping tears. I fell back against the couch and cried my eyes out.

And then I got high.

16

Initially, daytime sobriety was really tough for me. So I remedied it the only way I knew how—by smoking even more when I
wasn't
at school. I probably should have stopped smoking entirely, but I didn't.

However, I actually started to repair the failed aspects of my academic career. I wasn't doing great, but I
was
passing.

It's not like I had much to look forward to—I had allowed all of the college application deadlines to pass without acting—but at the very least, I wanted to see things through with Mr. Brown. He had been the only staff member to come see Mason the night it happened, so I felt like I owed him for that.

About a week later, I went to see Mason late on a Thursday night, intentionally sober, making the long trip on foot to try and clear my head. I decided it was important to test out my feelings after the month-long pot binge. I knew it might wind up being a total disaster, but I didn't care.

Mason was sitting up when I came in, looking worse than ever. His gums were seriously rotting by that point, and he couldn't eat solid food anymore. When my brain finally made sense of the familiar frail image, I started crying instantly.

A nurse peeked in to ask if I was all right. Hoarsely, I dismissed her and collapsed in the chair next to the bed.

"I'm so sorry," Mason said softly, obviously struggling to speak. "I wish you didn't have to go through this."

I sobbed even more after hearing him say that. As usual, he was more concerned about others than himself, even as he slowly died. "Mason, no," I said. "Don't apologize. You can't help it."

"The leukemia doesn't make it any easier," he said. "I'm ruining your life."

His words cut through me and I broke down, the cracks going even deeper. "I feel like it's all my fault, Mason," I said sharply. "That
I
caused all of this."

He looked at me, confused. "How could
this
be your fault?"

"I got kicked out of my house," I said finally. "Like two months ago. I didn't want to bother you with it. I've been staying with Arielle. I got in a huge fight with my mom. She... she said that God was p-punishing us for premarital sex."

Mason frowned. "That's not true," he said. "No way that's true."

I couldn't stop myself from rambling. "But I prayed last summer, Mason. I prayed that God would give me an answer about college because I didn't think I could handle a long-distance relationship. And
this
is what happened. Maybe we didn't have to deal with the college situation because... all
this
."

He grabbed my arm with startling strength, so much that I jumped. "It's a coincidence," he said firmly, his words like bursts of scalding steam. "You didn't cause this. It was just my bad genes. You can't go on thinking that way. It's not healthy. Your mom is
wrong
. How the hell can she know that?"

The floodgates of tears were reopened by that point, and I couldn't stop them. They just kept coming and coming. "I don't know, Mason. But I can't shake the feeling. I can't make it go away. I'm... falling apart," I said desperately. "I see you here and everything just... falls apart. It happens every single time. Nothing is ever okay."

"I'm not going to be around much longer," he said. "I don't want you to have to keep destroying yourself over me. I can't take it either. I hate it."

"I started smoking pot," I muttered, barely hearing him. "With Arielle. I couldn't take the pain anymore. I mean, I'm still smoking it. Mr. Brown almost called the police because he figured it out. I'm sorry." I suddenly felt like I was in a church confessional.

"I don't care," he said. "I mean, it's totally fine if it helps you. But you need to graduate and go to college and live your life, Naomi. You need to try, because I can't."

I kept crying. I felt momentarily empowered, but the feeling didn't last. "I'll try," I said. "I'll try."

He reached down and held my hand, our fingers fitting together less than perfectly since he had grown so thin. "I really don't have much time left," he said again. "Maybe less than a week. I know I can't fight much longer. I'm on so many painkillers I can't think straight most of the time. I hallucinate a lot."

It looked like he was going to cry, but he didn't. "I'm so sorry," I said. "You just have to hold on."

"No, I
don't
," he said. "I don't want to go on like this anymore. I just can't. I lost everything and now I'm at peace with dying. I'm just ready for something new. I've become such a burden. This isn't life—this is death while living."

"You're not a burden," I said, sobbing. "You can't help any of this." His image was blurry, distorted through a translucent shroud of tears.

"You're the first girl I ever loved, and now you can't even look at me without crying. I never wanted this." Mason cleared his throat, which seemed like a tremendous effort for him. "You don't have to keep coming to see me," he said. "I mean it."

"No, Mason, I—"

"Please, Naomi, just go on with your life. Stop letting me drag you down. I mean it, I really do. I want you to thrive. You've given me enough already. You've given me enough for a hundred lifetimes."

I couldn't stop crying. It really felt like goodbye, even if it wasn't. "Please." Still, there was an unmistakable feeling of relief that I didn't want to acknowledge.

"This is
my
request," he said. "Do it for me. You're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen in my life, but you don't even smile anymore. And it's all because of me. Now you need to put yourself back together. I don't want you to come here again. It's what I want."

"You're just putting me before yourself," I said pathetically. "Like you always do. You're just saying that to make it easier."

Mason stared back, his expression powerful and bold despite his weakness. "That's not true," he said coldly. "It
is
what I want. For the first time, I'm telling the truth about what
I
want. You can't destroy yourself anymore for me. You can't."

I shivered uncontrollably as I sat there, even though I wasn't cold. I continued delicately cradling his hand, treating it like it belonged to a newborn. It was equally as fragile, no doubt. Tears had stained my blouse. I couldn't speak, couldn't come up with anything meaningful to say.

"I have one last request though," he said. "Tell Jesse to come here. Tell him I want to talk to him."

"Of course," I said, my words wobbly and uncertain. "I will. Of course." His request reminded me of the uncomfortable encounter with Jesse in the hall, but I still didn't tell him.

It was Thursday night in early April, and potentially the last time I'd ever see Mason alive, depending on how I interpreted his wish.

He hadn't made it easy for me, that was clear—or maybe he had.

We sat in that hospital room in silence for probably twenty minutes, just holding hands, maintaining a bond that felt equally strong and weak at the same time.

I thought long and hard about what he had said, hating myself for agreeing with him. But what else could I do? It's not like he would ever walk out of the hospital again. It's not like he would suddenly get better and graduate high school and become a football star. His life and dreams had fallen into deadly quicksand.

It's not like he gained anything other than misery by living longer, and it had already been eight months of the same. Every day lived was just another day dying. Mason was in constant pain to the point that he couldn't even think straight most of the time.

He hated what he had become. Nobody wanted to be the center of attention for
that
reason.

"And stop blaming yourself for this," he said suddenly. "Your mom is wrong.
Teen sex
is not why I got leukemia."

I nodded, still feeling taciturn. I believed him in that moment, but I didn't know how I'd react once I was alone. It felt like he was right though, that the idea of such drastic punishment was ludicrous. One way or another, I had a lot of thinking to do, and I knew it wouldn't be easy.

"I love you, Naomi," he said. "And I always will."

"I love you too, Mason," I whispered, unable to speak any louder. The connection between our hands was all we had left.

"Just don't forget to tell Jesse. And I'll tell my mom what we talked about. So she doesn't worry or whatever."

I feigned a pathetic, plastic-y smile and nodded again. I still didn't know what I was going to do. I was almost too scared to talk to Jesse, afraid to show any weakness around him.

I stayed with Mason until he passed out from the morphine. As his eyes started to close, he turned to me.

"Goodbye, Naomi," he whispered, his eyes half-closed slits. "I love you."

"Goodbye, Mason," I said, still clutching his hand. "I love you, too." He passed out just before my sobbing resumed.

I stared and cried, trying to imagine him how he used to be. I tried to remember the young, strong man who had won over my heart so easily, the young man who cared more about others than he did himself.

The young man who was being totally destroyed by the detestable, odious, evil cancer inside his bones.

And as I left the hospital room on that mild night in April, in many ways I became an adult, emerging from an extended chrysalis of agony and sorrow.

That was the exact moment it happened.