Without You

I don’t exactly know if Brian took his promise too far because we had a pajama party with the rest of the crew right after our little reunion. Chachi had to go home since she had some stuff to do for the next day so it was just me and the rest of the guys. It was all pretty much fun and games. They did not ask me about the whole becoming non-existent thing like at all. I was only glad they hadn’t because I think I might’ve cried my eyes out with Brian already. Once it was about 3 in the morning, everyone went to their respective rooms. I stayed with Brian because we really had to catch up more.

“So apart from the success of your dance career, what else is Mr. Puspos happy about?” I asked him as I sat on the sofa beside his bed.

“Success? More like a bust,” he said with a sigh.

“Oh come on, with or without the ABDC title, you guys are still gonna be Mos Wanted. I mean isn’t that the whole point of your crew’s name?” I yawned as I looked out the window, wondering what could or would transpire in the morning after. I had started pinching myself ten minutes ago because I really just can’t believe that I’m living in this space in time. This moment right here has been tantamount to all the dreams I’ve had ever since I was a child. But the one thing that sets it apart from the rest is that I get to live it.

Brian just smiled and patted the space beside him on the bed. I motioned over to him and lay my head on the pillow right next to his. I yawned one more time out of weariness.

“Someone seems awfully tired,” Brian said, placing both his hands under his head as he leaned against the headboard.

“It’s been a long day but I still do want to catch up.”

“Ask me anything,” he told me, confidently.

“How’s your love-life doing?” I asked while casually rubbing my eyes.

Brian chuckled a bit before answering my question. I think he might’ve blushed like a sissy girl too. I couldn’t tell since it was pretty dark in the room. The only source of light was the moonlight seeping from the window. “Well, I’m currently with someone right now. Her name is Veva and I really think you guys would get along pretty well.”

Isn’t that what they all say? I thought silently. I mean it wasn’t like I was jealous or mad. I had no right to be either and I wasn’t. I really wasn’t jealous or mad…

“How long have you guys been together?” I asked, staring at the ceiling.

“A while,” he said before turning the tables, “now what about you?”

“Newly single, actually.”

“Newly?” he asked with such curiosity.

“Yeah, just got out of a relationship with this guy I met last year.”

“What happened?” Well, he seemed pretty intrigued. I mean I didn’t think he’d be so interested since he knew about the string of boyfriends I had in high school – not bragging or anything.

“Hmmm…,” I thought, “I guess we sort of just drifted apart.”

“Right,” he rolled his eyes. “Ashley, I’ve known you for the longest time and because of that, I know that whatever relationship you have with any guy doesn’t just end with ‘drifting’. It’s almost impossible to do that with you.”

I semi-blushed at what he said for some reason. I didn’t know what to call it but if I were to play some kind of message-association game in my head, first word that would pop up to describe what he’d just said would be sweet.

“Yea, well maybe things have changed,” I said, looking for an escape route.

“I don’t think so.”

“Fine,” I sighed in defeat. “He wanted me to go on tour with him, like, overseas but I said no and we had a fight and I called it quits before he did.”

“What kind of tour was it?” he asked, checking his phone and smiling at whatever he saw on the screen.

“It was a music tour. You know, like, Vans Warped Tour,” I told him.

“Aren’t those tours usually in America?”

“Yeah, but I was in the UK at that time.”

Brian was too busy to actually respond to me so I shut my eyes and rolled to my side – the one that faced away from him – so I could sleep. I didn’t want to bother him any longer. He seemed so happy with his life right now. I think even without me, he’d bode just fine.

**

I clocked out after a few minutes only to enter into this weird scene where I was staring at myself in the mirror of Brian’s bathroom. But the problem was that the mirror wasn’t reflecting me. I tried to touch the mirror, wondering why it wasn’t showing the images I wanted to see but even I couldn’t see myself. It was as if I was hollow. I mean I knew I was present but apparently I wasn’t physically there. I moved around and found myself walking towards the bedroom. There I saw Brian grow hysterical as he tried to shake me awake. I cringed at the sight of my body lifeless on the bed. I stumbled backwards and found myself sitting on the floor. I felt hot tears stream down my face as I watched him wake me. It took me about a few minutes to realize that I, too, wasn’t breathing.

Could this be it for me? Is this where I actually had to watch myself die and then disappear from the face of the Earth forever?

It was weird that everything was sound-proofed. I seriously couldn’t hear anything. I bit my non-existent, quivering lip as I tried to get up off the ground to try and take Brian off me. It was hopeless. There was really nothing he could do. But as I tried to reach for him, I only found myself fumbling forward instead of grasping his shoulder. I was a complete ghost – a memory of the past.

I could see Brian screaming something but yet I couldn’t hear anything. He stopped for a while and tried to apply CPR. He pounded on my chest to try and reach my heart. I couldn’t exactly feel anything at all. Once he blew some air into my lungs, I started to feel a little woozy. I was spinning around in circles as he continued – or at least I thought I was. Next thing I knew, my vision got cut and I blacked out once again.

I gasped for air as I sat up from my lying position. I woke up in a strange place. It took me time to realize and process that the white walls probably meant that I was in a hospital. I looked around me as my breathing turned heavy. Air was filling my lungs but I wasn’t doing it all on my own. There were several wires and tubes attached to my body. I didn’t quite notice I was actually holding Brian’s hand as I tried to calm myself. I tried to remove my hand from his grasp but even as his head was tucked under his arm as he slept on the ledge of my hospital bed, he still had a tight grip on me. With luck, however, I got my hand out without having to amputate it from my wrist.

I inhaled and exhaled a few more times before I tried to get out of the bed. But as I moved my left leg over the edge, a searing pain shot through the veins in my calf. I screamed bloody murder as I tried to get it back on the bed. I started crying as the pain got even worse. I felt my eyes roll back as some kind of pain started to develop in my lungs. Everything started to hurt. I didn’t exactly know what transpired next. The last thing I did see, however, was the doctor coming in and injecting something in the IV that was hooked onto me. He took the pain away as I fell back asleep.

**

I didn’t know how long I was actually out but, when I regained consciousness once again, I heard a few mumbles go around the room. I squeezed my eyes tight and moved all the limbs – only to check if I was suffering from paralysis — in my body before I opened my eyes. A white ceiling was the first thing I saw. Someone raised the bed so I was in a sitting angle instead of a lying position. Everyone was there. They all stared at me, begging for an explanation. My eyes searched for Brian. When I found him, he was outside with this blonde girl. I was about to try and move out of the bed but the memory of me and that pain in my leg jumped back into my head and made me stop from trying anything stupid.

“I’m sorry, you guys,” I managed to croak out as I looked at all their sad faces. “I didn’t want any of you to see me like this.”

“Why didn’t you tell us, Ash?” JP asked in a hushed tone. He was looking at his shoes.

I seriously wanted to cry. I didn’t know that all of this was about to happen. But before I could answer JP’s question, the doctor came in to check my vitals. Right then, Brian came in with that girl he was talking to.

I focused my sight on my leg so as not to keep any sort of eye contact with him. I didn’t know why I felt weird seeing him with some other girl. It wasn’t exactly a first.

“It seems that you haven’t been taking much of your medication,” the doctor said as he looked at several papers on his clipboard. “What’s the excuse this time?”

I was beyond ashamed as the guys stared at me. There was just so much tension in the room. I knew Brian wanted to make an outburst as the doctor spoke those words but he didn’t. I swallowed hard before I looked up at the doctor who was shaking a full bottle of pills at me.

“I might’ve forgotten to take them a few times,” I told him nonchalantly.

“I don’t think you even opened the bottle,” he told me as he poured water from a pitcher into a paper cup on my bedside table. “Oh and I think it would be best if everyone were to wait outside as we speak,” the doctor ordered.

I kept my head down low as they walked away. Brian stayed though. I looked at him and then nodded in the direction of the door but he didn’t budge.

“I can’t believe you lied to me. I thought you said everything was okay,” he said full of anger.

“I didn’t say it was going to be indefinite,” I told him.

“Well you should’ve said something because I was convinced you were totally fine!”

“Okay, break it up, you two,” Dr. Preston scolded.

I sucked in a breath wondering how many of them I would be able to make – if I was going to be able to count them or not. I really didn’t want the last memory to be me arguing with Brian so I shut up and hoped that it would do me good.

“If anyone is to blame for making Ashley believe she was fine, every inch of that blame should be poured onto me. I thought that her medication would be able to help her but since she didn’t take any, I’m no longer to blame,” Dr. P tried to joke.

I rolled my eyes at him as he chuckled to himself. “However, I have some really bad news for you.”

I looked up at him and waited for him to say something. He was being all dramatic and if we were in some kind of movie, it would be pretty thrilling but since this is reality, it was pretty annoying.

“Ashley, you now have stage 3 lung cancer.”