I had convinced myself mid-shower that Ryder would have passed by the time I got to the hospital. It was early, just after ten, and Ryan nor Mom had mentioned anything, so I'd tried my best to rid the thought from my mind.

Stepping into the waiting room, my heart sunk when I caught sight of Ryan asleep across two chairs, neck bent in an incredibly uncomfortable position and his crossed arms twitching every few seconds over his chest. Crossing the room to him, I draped the small blanket I'd stuffed into my duffel bag over him and gently brushed his hair from his eyes. Luckily his sleep deprivation had finally caught up with him and he didn't budge at the gentle gesture.

Seeing him like this made me feel things I didn't know I was capable of feeling. My chest physically hurt seeing the way his eyes were sunken into his cheeks, the chapped lips that had been bitten raw with anxiety. I wanted to hold him and take all the pain and absorb it so he wouldn't have to feel it. He had already been through this once and unfortunately was the last to see his mother alive before she'd flatlined.

I'd disliked Ryan Blake for years, had always been infuriated with how much he and his irritating little brother got off on making me angry or upset. But somehow, over the last couple months, he'd managed to wormed his way under my skin and to my heart in a way nobody else had ever managed to do.

"Zo," I recognized my mother's voice and straightened slightly, feeling warmth spread through my cheeks. A small part of me had wondered if she'd read my mind and knew what I'd just admitted to myself a few seconds ago. When I finally turned to look at her, fully dressed in her purple scrubs, I saw the concern lining every inch of her expression, "I think you should come talk to him. Let Ryan get some sleep."

I opened my mouth to protest, but quickly shut it.

It didn't matter if I wasn't ready to do this, to see Ryder. If Mom was only giving him forty-eight hours, there was a good chance this would be the only time I had with him. I nodded slowly after a moment and allowed her to lead me down a long, disinfectant smelling hallway. A few of her coworkers nodded in greeting at me. Mom finally stopped and turned to face me after what seemed like hours of walking.

"He won't be able to talk. His lungs. . . the tube is the only thing keeping him breathing right now." Mom explained, and though she tried to keep her best professional face on as she spoke, I could see the cracks in it, the tears that welled in her eyes, the way her bottom lip trembled at the thought of watching the life slip from Ryder at any given second.

"Okay." I breathed.

She gently opened the door and walked in, speaking to Ryder directly despite him barely being visible under the tubes and wires. "Hey, Ryder! Zoey finally came to see you."

He didn't budge. The frail, lifeless lump he was under the ugly hospital blanket didn't move at all.

I curled my hand into a fist and squeezed my eyes shut before I nodded toward my mother as an indication I was ready for her to step out for a few minutes.

Once the door had slowly clicked shut behind her, I took in the table beside Ryder's hospital bed. There was a balloon with a bear holding a Get Well Soon heart, and an envelope with Cade's name scribbled across the top corner of it. He'd already been here at some point over the last twenty-four hours. He'd been here before me.

Though it shouldn't have mattered, I felt a pang of guilt in my chest. I should have just come last night, even after Ryan had insisted I didn't. I should have been able to see him when he was still coherent and aware. The boy before me was exactly what Ryder had feared he'd become-a shell of a boy with none of him left.

"You know, I was talking to my Mom about Mary a few weeks ago." I said into the quiet room, lowering myself into the chair at the foot of the bed. "She said your Mom never stopped fighting, even in her lowest moments, she pushed through. She said that even when she took her last breath that she knew your mom hadn't stopped fighting but was just taking a break for a little while. I know that you inherited that strength from her, Ryder. I've seen it in you as you fought against all of this."

I rubbed my sweaty palms against my jeans and blinked the tears from my eyes. "And I know you made my promise that I'd be strong through all of this, to hold it together, but it's taking every ounce of self-control I have not to fall apart right now. I don't know how you expect me to be here for Ryan when I can barely comprehend all of this."

"I spent years, and I mean years, turning and walking in the other direction any time I heard or saw you. I wanted nothing to do with you, Ryder." I smiled down at my trembling hands. "The crazy, adrenaline junkie with no acceptance of his actions. You were bad news in every definition of the word. At least I thought you were. You were just a lost kid trying to find himself, and I'm so sorry you never got the chance to."

I extended my arms and wrapped my hands around his. "I'm honored that you allowed me to get to see the little bit of the real you that I did. It wasn't under the best circumstances, of course, but I had spent so many years hating you, Ryder, that when I started to feel all this crap for you and your brother, it took a long time for me to accept that I loved you both. I suppose maybe deep down I had all along, but I wasn't going to admit that to myself, and surely not you two."

I squeezed his hand, not able to fight the tears any longer. I bit down hard into my bottom lip and bowed my head, shoulders falling forward as a strangled sob escaped me.

"I'm so sorry. I'm so fucking sorry, Ryder."

*

My own exhaustion must have overwhelmed me, because at some point I dozed off in that room waiting to hear the monitor go off. I was stirred awake by a gentle hand brushing against my shoulder and caught sight of the back of Ryan's black shirt when my eyes fluttered open.

"Hey, little man." Ryan's voice was hoarse, so raspy it sounded painful. "I know you can still hear us. Nothing, not even this cancer shit is going to take you out of this world without a fight. I know I never mention her, but I want you to know that Mom would have been happy to see the man you've become. I know I was hard on you, and a hypocrite, but it was only because I didn't want you to turn into a fuck up like me. And you didn't, you got into UCLA, you little shit."

Ryan leaned over his brother's hospital bed, touching his palm to the top of his brother's hand. "The truth is I have no idea what my life is going to be without you, man. I'm sorry for all the mean things I've said or done. I was so involved with myself after Mom died that I never saw how hurt and broken you were. I should have done more to try and piece you back together. You were a great kid though, Ryder, even with all the dumb shit you pulled. Even though you were too much like me for my liking, you are, and will always be a better man than I ever will be. Thank you for being my brother, man. I don't know what. . . I don't what I would have done without you."

The tension in Ryan's shoulders slacked and they fell forward as the last words escaped in a choked sob. "But you can go now, I don't want you to suffer anymore. I love you, kid."

*

Ryan didn't say a word to me back out in the waiting room. I laid across his lap for the first couple hours, then shifted so my head wasn't against his shoulder when Cade got here. I knew that he was aware I'd heard his intimate conversation with Ryder, but he didn't mention it, nor did he try and ask me what I'd been doing in there and why I didn't wake him before to let him know I was there.

At some point Mr. Blake got there too, but he was as emotionless as the doctors that were updating him on Ryder. Ryan stared blankly ahead for so long I was sure he'd long since left the present and was lost inside his head. I wanted to try and bring him back, but I wasn't sure I had the strength in me to comfort him in the way he needed to right now.

It was just after midnight when the doctor walked over and shook Mr. Blake out of a light sleep. Ryan and Cade had dozed off again, and my friends, who'd showed up after ten, were both asleep against one another opposite of me.

I saw it on the doctor's face before I saw my mother standing a few feet behind him crying. She wasn't even trying to contain the tears as she usually did, they soaked both cheeks and one of her coworkers was having to hold her to keep her upright. I could feel the dread creeping into my chest and immediately jerked away from Ryan suddenly and forced myself to my feet.

My mother dealt with these unfortunate circumstances on the daily and never had I seen her like this. She was inconsolable, even when Mr. Blake, who she'd despised for the last ten years walked over and pulled her into his arms, she didn't push away.

"Zoey." It was Max, eyes flickering from me to my mother, uncertainty in his eyes as he stared me down, "Come here."

He'd spent his entire life at my side-he knew what my next move would be before I did.

I started to shake my head and staggered away from the waiting room altogether, my heart racing, palms sweaty, the world seemingly shifting on its axis the moment I raced for the front doors of the hospital. I hardly made it out before I started dry heaving-I wasn't sure if not eating the last couple days was a good or bad thing at this point. That paired with my sleep deprivation and anxiety was causing everything around me to spin.

"Summers." I didn't bother to try and look up from the concrete shifting beneath me. Only one person called me that-and he was the last person I wanted to be around right now. I'd promised his little brother I'd be strong, that I wouldn't fall apart. But I was doing the very opposite of that.

"Zoey." Ryan tried again, this time his voice a little closer. "It's okay."

It seemed as though the last two months of coming to terms with everything rather than avoid reality as I did had done Ryan good. Because I didn't hear anything in his voice, it was lacking any emotional at all. I wasn't sure if it was the shock of everything that came over me or possibly that I'd allow myself to grow too attached knowing very well how this would end, but I whirled on Ryan, vision still blurred, and slammed both of my closed fists against his chest.

"It's not fair! This wasn't supposed to happen!" I shouted. "He wasn't supposed to just. . . just die! He was going to get help, he—"

"Zoey, baby," he whispered, extending a hand to touch my cheek. "you need to breathe."

I did the very opposite of that. I continued to slap my hands against his chest. It didn't phase him in the slightest. He remained tensed in front of me, his expression slowly crumbling as he watched me lose control of my emotions entirely.

"He's not dead." I eventually croaked, shaking my head in denial. "He's not dead, Ryan."

Ryan sat there for a moment before he heaved out an exhausted sigh and wrapped his arms around me until I was cradled like a child against his chest. He kept his lips pressed to the top of my head, one of his hands in my hair, and the other intertwined with mine over my chest.

"He's gone, Zoey." he eventually managed to get out. "But he's no longer in pain. He's not. . . he's at peace. He's with Mom."

I wanted desperately to be able to comfort him the way he was me, but I could hardly get a full breath out. I wanted to believe his words, I wanted to imagine Ryder with Mary watching down on us from wherever they were. But I couldn't. All I could think about was the lifeless lump under all those wires with a breathing tube jammed down his throat. All I saw was the once happy, carefree adrenaline seeking boy slowly dwindling into nothing the last few months.

I had promised him, but more importantly myself, that when the time came I'd be ready. That I would have accepted this all and went through my grief long before everyone else.

"He's in a better place." Ryan whispered, but his voice finally caught in his throat and his grasp around me tightened.

As shitty as it was, the only thing I thought in that very second was that I never should agreed to that stupid list in the first place.