13
Abigail
Ihate saying the word hate, but I hate more that my heart pounds as I watch Spencer climb into his car and stare at me through his windshield. I hate that he pushes on a pair of sunglasses, but the whole time I stand in place, he stares and holds me captive. I hate that my body is all tingly –everywhere– because of the things he said to me.
I hate that I can’t let go of my desperate desire for a prince, a promise a sick girl made to herself while she mentally married her Barbies and Kens in a stark hospital room as a way to pass the time.
I was born twelve weeks premature and weighed barely more than a pound. They said I wouldn’t survive, and that my family to say their goodbyes, but my parents tried so hard for me, there was no way they were going to let go so easily. There are a billion photos in our family albums of me with my mom – skin to skin contact. Of me and my dad. Even of me and Troy – who was barely six at the time, but wanted his turn with his chest and mine touching.
I was nurtured minute by minute, hour by hour, for more than a hundred days in the NICU before we went home and my family tried to find their new normal.
I was always a small child, and whether it was because of my prematurity or not, my immune system never truly developed. In and out of care, monthly IVIG treatments, skin conditions, mild allergies, my poor family walked on eggshells my whole life.
I was the long-sought-after daughter, the final piece to the Rosa puzzle after five sons, but for all their trouble, my family was gifted with a sick kid.
But it was as if the universe wasn’t satisfied with our struggle, because we got the final diagnosis when I was fifteen.
Hospitals, chemotherapy, wigs, bone marrow transplants. My brothers voluntarily underwent painful procedures that meant their own hospital stays and forfeited football seasons, because their baby sister needed more; more blood, more bone marrow, more medicine, more attention,more, more, more.
I know why they’re protective of me. And I know that, after all of their sacrifices, for that deadly diagnosis to hit when we thought life should be getting easier hurt them.
Breast cancer in a teen; rare. Breast cancer without family history; rare.
I had barely even developed them yet, considering my prematurity and stunted growth, but there I was with my teeny tiny boobs that were trying to kill me. Surgery. Scars. Medicine. Ulcers in my mouth, vomiting around the clock, chemotherapy, hair loss, wigs.
More, more, more.
It was a never-ending hell, and a lonely existence when my family had to go back to school and work; they had no choice. They had to go.
So the only thing I could control during those days of bland walls and blood tests, of endless vomiting and endless boredom, was my romantic heart and optimistic imagination. I would dream about the man that would love me for me. He would love me even though we’d spend the rest of our lives worried about a relapse. He’d love me, even if I don’t have the kind of body most men would desire.
He’d love me, even through my deepest, darkest shame.
There are some things I can never offer my future prince, so I try to save what I can. To gift him with my innocence, and pray he won’t toss me aside when he finds out the rest.
But then Spencer Serrano comes along and tries to steal that too.
I was resolute in my decisions before him, but now he makes me doubt. He makes me wonder. And he tempts me to throw my hands up and accept what he’s offering.
I’m already spoiled, so it’s not like things could get any worse for me.
“Oh. My. God!” Nadia bursts from the back of the store with wide eyes and fiery red cheeks. “Are you serious right now? Is this real life? You andhim?”
“No! Not me and him.”
I turn back to the front window and gulp whenhepurses his lips and gives the tiniest nod.
It’s like he can read my mind. He knows I’m wavering, tempted, and so unbelievably conflicted. But then he starts the engine and backs out into the street. He idles for a moment, which isn’t a big deal, since this town is small enough, his idling won’t hold any traffic up. His side windows are tinted much too dark for me to see him, but his truck remains in place for a minute, and warmth burns against my skin.
I know he’s watching. I know he’s doing things to my body with his eyes. But then he accelerates away with a loud roar, and sends my heart speeding that much faster.
“He’s… he’s…”Holy crap.“I don’t know what he is.”
“Iknow.” Nadia slowly makes her way through the shop and stops right beside me. She stares out into the street just like I do, but where I wear a scowl, she grins. “He’s into you. That’s what he is.”
“He’s crude and more sexually active than a stray mutt. I mean, yeah, he kind of wants me, but it’s only because I said no. I’m a challenge he feels he must conquer.”
“I’d let him conquer me.” Hip thrusting, she leers at me. “I’d let that man conquer the shit outta me.”