♥Chapter 55: ᴡʜᴇʀᴇ ʜᴇ ᴡᴀɴᴛꜱ ᴛᴏ ʟᴇᴀᴠᴇ♥

❆Jake❆

Smiling Depression.

A term used when people hide their depression or sorrows behind a smile to convince other people that they're happy.

She's still smiling at me, and I can finally tell that it's fake.

"Hey."

I hesitantly stand at the doorway before moving inside and closing the door behind me. "Hey."

"Corey annoyed you again?" She asks.

"Something like that."

She chuckles.

My gaze never leaves her and she's still holding up her fake smile. It's hurting and shocking me at the same time that she'd want to hide her real emotions from me.

My Kennedy. She never hides anything from me, never kept a secret from me.

"Are you okay?" I ask her. My throat becomes dry.

She nods. "Yeah."

"Ken..." My voice trails off. Please tell me the truth. "You sure?"

She gives another nod, smiling softly. "A little sleepy but yeah, I'm fine. Also, don't worry about me taking the pills. I took them five minutes ago."

Why are you lying to me? I saw your anger. I saw you punching the shit out of your laptop.

"Toothy said you were watching videos of your parents," I say.

She looks at her laptop. "Yeah, I was. Got a little too emotional so I shut it down right now." She chuckles.

I move ahead and sit on the bed beside her. For the first time, I'm not sure whether to pull her onto my lap but I do it anyway. I rest my cheek on top of her head and wrap my arms around her small body. She lays her head on my chest.

For a moment, we both sit in the same position.

"You know I'm always here for you, right?" I ask.

She nods.

"You can tell me anything, Ken. Everything."

"I know that, Jake." She says.

She does. But she doesn't want to.

Fear rises in me. What if I'm losing Kennedy? Right now, she's hiding her emotions from me. What if she's hiding something else that I don't know of? Why is she hiding from me?

My arms tighten around her with sadness seeping through my chest with the thought that she's slowly slipping away from me.

I don't want to let her go.

Not ever.

Please talk to me, Ken. Open that mouth of yours and rant to me like you always do.

"I love you, Ken."

She doesn't reply.

I look down in confusion and see that she's fallen asleep.

A pang goes through my chest.

Slowly, I lift her in my arms and lower her properly onto the bed, tucking her into the covers.

I press a kiss to her forehead and gaze at her longingly before silently walking out the door.

✯✯✯

✿Kennedy✿

Sometimes the best way to comfort people is to make them believe that you're okay.

If I just keep up the smiles and cheeriness, even though I'm scared and terrified inside, Jake's pain will lighten and ease.

I need to be strong for him, for him to go through this again.

I know the first time he lost his mom; it wasn't easy for him, and it made him want to turn off his emotions and himself from everybody else.

I don't want to put Jake through something like that again.

But I already am.

If only there was some way to stop this...

But there isn't.

I'd put on a thousand fake smiles if it means Jake feels better.

Every day I'm terrified and on the edge of panic. The treatments mess with my head, makes my body weak, puts me through intense pain.

I hate feeling like I'm going to break at any moment.

I hope that doesn't happen.

Not in front of Jake.

Some people might tell me that Jake loves me, and he'll want to hear about my pain.

But I love him too. I don't want to share my pain with him when he's already hurting.

A few more locks of my hair fell today.

It gave me a feeling of fear and sadness before I finally had it in me to stop staring at it and throwing it away in the dustbin. Not before wrapping and hiding it inside a few tissues though.

For the past few days, I'm keeping my hair in a braid, so that even if any strands of my hair falls, it wouldn't be noticeable.

Every night, before bed, I open my braid and let the fallen hair comb out of the rest of my hair. I look at myself in the mirror and notice the exhaustion visible on my face.

A deep sigh comes out of my mouth.

Is this how's it going to be every day?

✯✯✯

"I'm going to make every day the best day of your life," Corey announces.

"Please get off that thing," Toothy mutters defeatedly, her hand on her forehead, resigned.

"I'm the king of the world!" Corey yells.

People passing by give Corey weird looks.

I mean it's understandable for them to do so. It's not every day you see a teenager standing on top of a public wheelie bin in the middle of a crowded street.

"Can we just leave?" Jake asks.

"I'm still waiting for him to fall," I mutter silently to him.

"I heard that." Corey points at me. "Now ears and eyes on me guys. Today I'm gonna give you lessons on how to attract attention. You think I got two million followers only by my pretty face?"

"Absolutely fucking not," Jake mutters.

"Exactly," Corey says. "You see, it takes hard work and dedication to reach where I am right now. You need to sweat yourself out and force yourself to be the best person ever."

"Can we leave?" Jake asks again.

"First, I started my journey on YouTube. You might not believe it, but I got a thousand likes in a single day by posting a video of me screaming my lungs out in the middle of a store."

"Yeah, and you embarrassed me too." Toothy replies flatly.

"People came to see if I was alright or not."

"They came to kick you out." She says.

"This lady lovingly touched my face."

"She slapped you."

"It was a loving gesture." Corey states.

She rolls her eyes.

"Yeah so as I was saying. You need to have the confidence and guts to reach where I am right now."

"On top of a garbage can?" Jake raises an eyebrow.

"Will you keep up with me?" Corey snaps at him.

"Can we leave?" Jake asks for the millionth time.

"Just let me finish—Autumn?" Corey's eyes widen before they widen even further. "Oh shit—"

Corey loses his balance on top of the wheelie bin. The bin tips to the side, bringing him down with it. He lands hard on his back.

"Toothy." He groans out in pain.

"I told you." Toothy states.

"My butt bone." Corey squeezes his eyes.

"I. Told. You." Toothy says.

"Oh my god!" Corey's eyes fly open but he didn't seem in a position to get back up. "Did Autumn see that?"

I look back to see a girl with brown hair and gray eyes on the other side of the street, gazing at Corey with her mouth hanging open. A cup of coffee paused midway to her mouth.

"Yup," Toothy says.

"Oh fuck. Is she still looking at me?"

"Yup."

"How do I make this look cool?"

"Die." Jake states.

"She's coming over here now." Toothy speaks.

"Oh fuck no!" Corey starts panicking. "Toothy! Hide me! Or distract her until my butt and back stops hurting like a motherfucker—Oh heyyy Autumn." Corey grins up at Autumn.

Autumn is standing beside me with a look of concern. "I saw you fall." She plays with the lid of her coffee cup. "Are you alright?"

"I didn't fall," Corey says coolly, still lying on his back. "I just saw a penny and wanted to grab it."

"Oh." She blinks.

"He fell." Toothy states.

"Toothy!" Corey yells. He looks back at Autumn and smiles. "I didn't fall. Anyways, how are you?"

"Are you...going to get up?" She asks.

Corey looks troubled for a moment. "Uh...no."

Autumn looks confused.

"I mean—" Corey starts but gets cut off by Jake.

"He's tryna peek under girl's skirts," Jake says.

"No!" Corey says immediately, frowning at Jake, who's trying to hide his amused smile. Corey looks back at Autumn. "Don't listen to him."

"So...what are you doing?" She asks.

"It's an experiment," Corey replies. "One that I can't tell you about right now."

"Corey likes Autumn, doesn't he?" I silently ask Jake.

He nods. "Yup."

"And does she like him?"

He shrugs, "I don't know."

I look back at Corey who's trying to appear cool and easy in front of Autumn as if he didn't almost break his spine, while falling off the bin.

I giggle secretly behind my hand. "Corey is so stupid." I mean it in a good way though.

Jake's mouth twitches up into a tiny smile.

I'm still looking at Corey when I feel the ground below me spin. My brain goes alert at the feeling, and I jerk up straight.

What the freak was that?

I look around and no one seems to notice. How did nobody notice the earth tilt?

I look back at Corey.

The ground spins again and my head feels light. Everything blurs in front of my eyes. I blink multiple times to clear my vision, but nothing happens.

I look at Jake but can't decipher if he's looking back at me or not.

My hand goes to my head when it starts hurting.

A pain shoots through my chest and I think it's maybe because I haven't used my inhaler for the past few minutes.

Something isn't right.

It never hurt this much.

Another sharp pain shoots through my chest. Brutal pain. It makes me fall to my knees.

"Kennedy!" Jake's hands are on my shoulders.

I'm clutching my chest, hoping the pain will go away. The pain intensifies to the point where I feel my head bursting. A scream leaves my lips.

Everything after that is a flash of fast-forwarding blurs. Jake lifts me and he's running, he's yelling at Corey to start the car, we're speeding, my head feels dizzy and numb with the pain, my eyes are barely open.

Jake keeps saying the words we're there, we're almost there. He tells me to keep my eyes open. He's terrified when I don't.

My back rests against a bed, everyone's running around me. Jake's face looms above me and he's still holding my hand. But I can't feel it anymore. I don't feel anything more. Because I'm not awake anymore.

My eyes open to words of discussion. Words that anyone might not want to hear. Serious...emergency...pulmonary edema. My eyes close again.

Someone's holding my hand when I wake up again. I turn my head to look at Jake. Tears spring to his eyes when he sees me awake.

"Kennedy." Devastation chokes his voice. I'm terrified.

"What happened?"

"Kennedy." He's gripping my hand tighter, and I haven't seen him this torn before.

"Just say it," I say even though I don't want to hear it. I don't want to know what's happening. I don't want to feel the pain.

But I feel it. He's saying the words and I feel it so intense. I'm crying.

I try to block him out, but I hear the words anyway.

'Your days are lessening.'

He's beside me on the bed and he's clinging to me. Tears slip down his eyes.

'You're dying fast, Ken.'

My mouth is on autopilot, repeating the words 'we're going to be okay' even though I don't mean a single word of it. He's shaking his head, crying into my neck.

'We're going to be okay'. 

Even though I already feel severed from the world.

✄ ✄ ✄ ✄

Umm...

Yeah.

How was this chapter?

Words: 1,900

Date of publishing: 16th June 2022