The last thing I took out of my room was Noelle’s book.
Everything else was either packed, loaded, or sitting in a pile that Pops had labeled do not touch unless you want to explain it to Pops. The Chemo Calendar had come down Sunday morning. I’d sat in my wheelchair in front of the empty patch of wall for a long time after Noelle helped me peel away the last piece of tape. Then she’d taken the calendar from me, tucked it into the back of the leather book she’d made, and shut the cover like she was putting something precious away. Now the book rested on my lap in the front passenger seat of Dad’s Suburban, and I couldn’t make myself open it.
Bernard barked from his travel harness in the back, furious that the entire neighborhood hadn’t come out to witness his departure.
Dad had arranged enough pillows around my left leg to make the passenger seat look like a questionable furniture arrangement. My wheelchair was secured in the cargo area, my crutches were within reach, and a small cooler held my medications and everything else my doctors had insisted we keep close. Stetson had claimed one of the rear seats, although he’d gotten back out at least six times to say goodbye to Noelle.
Dad had planned an overnight stop so I could rest without pretending I was fine. The study had accepted me after the August screening, and the Texas team had my arrival assessment on the calendar.
The leaving part was a disaster, and no amount of planning could make that easier. Noelle stood beside my open passenger door, clutching her sleeves in both fists. Her eyes were already red, which was impressive considering she’d cried at the sleepover, at breakfast, and again when Stetson carried her overnight bag back across the yard. Maekynzie stood next to her with a color-coded schedule tucked under one arm. Emory had brought his guitar. Tinsley stood slightly apart from the rest of them, arms crossed over her black hoodie, looking like she might fight the state of Texas if it came any closer.
Noelle leaned into the Suburban and hugged me around the shoulders. She was careful of my leg, which somehow made me want to cry more. “You have to call me when you stop tonight,” she said into my hair. “Not a text. An actual call. I need to see your face so I know you haven’t been replaced by some girl who says y’all.”
“I’ve been to Texas before in geography class. I think I’ll survive the vocabulary.” My voice cracked on survive, and I hated that she’d heard it.
She pulled back just far enough to look at me, her eyebrows drawing together before she decided to pretend she hadn’t noticed. “Don’t make jokes when I’m trying to be dramatic.”
“That’s usually when they’re funniest.”
Noelle laughed, then covered her mouth because she was crying again. She touched the leather book on my lap. My name was stamped in crooked gold letters on the cover, and the ribbon she’d tied around it had already come undone twice. “Read it when you’re ready,” she said. “Not because you feel like you have to right now.”
I nodded, running my thumb over the gold lettering. If I opened it now, Dad would have to move our hotel reservation to sometime next week.
Maekynzie stepped forward as soon as Noelle moved. She slid the laminated visit schedule into the pocket of my door and tapped the first date with her fingernail. “October fourteenth. That’s the plan. My mom’s checking the travel details again this week, and Noelle’s mom is helping. Nothing is official until everybody’s booked, but I am being extremely annoying about it.”
“Extremely?” I asked.
“Professionally.” She looked down at the schedule, straightening an edge that didn’t need straightening. “I’m not going to disappear on you again, Sloane.”
I reached for her hand. “You don’t have to be there in person for every single thing. You know that, right?”
“I know.” She squeezed my fingers. “I’m still going to try.”
Emory cleared his throat so loudly Bernard barked again from the back seat. He had his guitar strapped across his chest and an expression that suggested he’d been waiting for a spotlight to fall out of the sky. “Before anybody leaves, Static Honey has a world premiere.”
“Is this the avocado song?” I asked.
“It is a deeply moving tribute to friendship and also, yes, there’s an avocado. Please respect the arts.”
He settled onto the low retaining wall at the edge of our driveway and played the song he’d been working on since the sleepover. It was ridiculous. He really had found a way to rhyme Colorado with avocado, and somehow he’d squeezed a sunflower into the chorus, too. Maekynzie laughed through the first verse. Noelle started crying again during the second.
When Emory finished, I applauded so hard my bracelets knocked together. “It’s terrible,” I told him.
“I know. You’re welcome.”
“I love it.”
That wiped the grin off his face for a second. He leaned into the open door and hugged me, awkwardly, with his guitar still between us. “You’d better,” he said. “I used every good rhyme I know.” He shook his head and stepped aside, but I caught him smiling as he adjusted the strap across his shoulder.
Tinsley waited until everybody else had stepped back. She came to the open passenger door, looked at the stack of pillows around my leg, and raised an eyebrow. “Subtle. You look like you’re being shipped with the furniture.”
“Fragile cargo,” I said. “Very expensive.”
“Then somebody should’ve put a sticker on your forehead.” She leaned in to hug me, careful of my leg but not gentle enough to let me pretend this was a casual goodbye. When she pulled back, she straightened the collar of my sweatshirt and glanced toward Noelle, who was wiping her eyes again. “Call me sometimes. Not just when something goes wrong.”
I caught her hand before she could retreat. “I will. Even when all I have to report is that Stetson’s being annoying.”
“Especially then. I need evidence.” Her fingers tightened around mine once. “And don’t let them convince you Texas has better friends.”
“Nobody could.”
“Correct answer.” Her gaze dropped to my lap, where the corner of the folded note from Saturday poked out of Noelle’s book. “And I meant what I wrote. Don’t make me say it out loud.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
She stepped away before either of us could turn it into a speech, joining Maekynzie at the edge of the driveway. Their shoulders touched, and Tinsley stayed there while I tried to memorize the sight of them together.
Across the driveway, Stetson had his arms around Noelle. She’d already said goodbye to him twice, but there was no legal limit. He kissed the top of her head and murmured something that made her give a watery laugh. Then he looked over at me and pointed two fingers toward his eyes and back at mine.
I pointed one finger at him. The wrong one.
Dad caught it as he walked around the front of the Suburban. “Fiorellina.”
“It’s my birthday.”
“That doesn’t make it better.”
“Seventeen should come with privileges.”
“You got the window seat,” he said, as if that settled everything.
Chandler came to my door last. He’d already checked Dash’s harness twice and had a leash looped around his wrist. He hooked a thumb into the pocket of his gray hoodie, his cerulean eyes moving over the pillows propping up my leg before settling on mine. There was a dark smudge on his sleeve that I was pretty sure belonged to Dash.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Ask me after the first rest stop.”
“Fair.” He leaned down and kissed my forehead. “If you need anything, call.”
“We’re going to the same place, you know.”
“And yet you’ll still find a reason to complain about me.”
“Probably before the first rest stop.”
“That’s my girl.”
His grin faded a little as he looked past me at the half-empty house. The front windows reflected the morning sky. I’d spent so long wishing I could get out of that downstairs room, and now that I was leaving, I wanted one more night with everybody asleep on the floor.
Chandler touched the edge of Noelle’s book. “She did good.”
“She really did.”
He took a small white object from his hoodie pocket and set it in my free hand. A miniature volleyball, about the size of an orange. Black writing curved around the plastic in his familiar, slightly slanted handwriting.
Future Laguna Madre starter.
Underneath, smaller: Whether you play again or not. Still you.
I turned it over slowly. “Chandler.”
“Before you say anything, I know the first line is optimistic.” He crouched beside the open door so we were eye level. “I also know nobody can promise you a spot on a team. Or that your leg will let you play again. I just wanted you to have something that wasn’t about hospitals.”
I looked down at the words. I’d spent years braiding my hair before tournaments, and now I barely had enough hair to make a cowlick. I didn’t know what my leg would let me do a year from now, or whether I’d ever take another running approach to the net.
“Thank you,” I said.
“Happy birthday.”
From the back seat, Stetson lowered his window. “Did he give you something? Because all I got was a sports drink with a bow on it.”
Chandler glanced over his shoulder. “It had a bow.”
“A tiny bow,” Stetson called back. “Which is why I’m keeping it. But I’m still filing a complaint.”
I laughed, and Chandler looked pleased with himself. He tucked the volleyball into the cup holder where I could see it, then stepped aside while Dad came around to close my door. Before it shut, I reached out and caught Chandler’s hand for a second.
“See you at the first stop,” I said.
“Try not to miss me too much.”
“Already failing.”
He squeezed my fingers once and headed back toward his dad. Uncle Jake said something that made Chandler laugh, then turned to finish putting away the last of their things.
Pops went back to check the front door one last time, then locked it, tested the handle, and came down the porch steps.
Pops opened the rear passenger door, where Bernard immediately tried to climb into his lap before he’d even sat down. Pops laughed, guided him back into his secured spot, and climbed in beside Stetson.
“Everybody buckled?” he asked.
“Yes, Pops,” Stetson said, making it sound like a personal insult.
“Good. And happy birthday, smart-mouth.”
“Thank you. I accept cash.”
Dad climbed into the driver’s seat and fastened his belt. He checked the mirrors, adjusted the air-conditioning, then looked over at me. “Ready?”
I looked past him toward the sidewalk, where my friends had gathered for one last goodbye. No. I wasn’t ready to leave Noelle on the sidewalk with her hands over her mouth, or Maekynzie with her schedule, or Emory holding his guitar like it might help, or Tinsley standing straight and still because she’d decided she was done crying in front of people.
I wasn’t ready to watch our house disappear. I wasn’t ready for Texas, the new doctors, or whatever the trial might ask of me once we got there. But none of those answers were going to show up because I sat in our driveway long enough.
“Yeah,” I said. “Let’s go.”
Dad eased the Suburban out of the driveway. Noelle waved with both hands while Maekynzie clutched her notebook and Emory lifted his guitar in a ridiculous salute. Tinsley raised one hand and held it there until we turned the corner.
We hadn’t even made it out of Sierra Vista when Stetson leaned forward between the front seats. “So, are we stopping for breakfast?”
I turned to look at him. “We’ve been driving forty seconds.”
“And I’m hungry.”
“You ate two breakfast sandwiches.”
“Growing boy.”
Pops reached into the snack bag beside him and tossed Stetson a granola bar. Stetson caught it, inspected the wrapper, and looked at Pops like he’d been robbed. “This is not breakfast.”
“Then don’t eat it,” Pops said.
Stetson tore open the wrapper.
“Happy birthday,” I told him.
“Best one ever,” he said around a mouthful.
Pops reached forward and handed me a bottle of water, then squeezed my shoulder before settling back into his seat. Everybody was acting exactly like themselves.
Once we were out of the neighborhood, I finally opened Noelle’s book. The leather was soft and brown. Noelle had filled it with photographs and pieces of our year: the Winter Formal, me in the lilac wig with stars and peonies; a strip of photo-booth pictures from July, the four of us crowded around my short hair; a pressed peony petal in a clear sleeve; Stetson’s last Sierra Vista soccer program; Bernard and Dash asleep together on our back deck.
On the inside cover, Noelle had written: So you always have it. So you always know we came.
I traced the words with my thumb, then turned the page. There were pictures I’d forgotten we’d taken, including one of Maekynzie and Emory arguing over a bag of chips and another of Tinsley giving the camera a look that could’ve ended friendships.
I stopped at a photo of all of us crowded around the deck table in June. Chandler had one arm draped over the back of my chair, Stetson was making a face behind Noelle, and Pops had caught Bernard in the middle of trying to steal something off the table. Nobody was looking at the camera except me, which seemed about right for our group.
There were so many ordinary moments in the book. Some were blurry. A few had terrible lighting. One featured nothing but Bernard’s nose because he’d gotten too close to the camera. I loved that Noelle had kept those, too.
I turned to the last page. Maekynzie’s Chemo Calendar was folded into a pocket there, every box filled, every name in a different color. I eased it out just enough to see the handwriting, careful not to tear the edges where the tape had been.
There were appointments, medications, school assignments, and notes about who was coming over. Some squares had been crossed out and rewritten when plans changed. A few were crowded with so many names that Maekynzie had started writing sideways.
I’d spent so much of the year thinking about what I was taking from everybody. Looking at those boxes, I could see the afternoons they’d chosen to spend with me, even when all we did was sit around watching television or argue about homework.
My bracelets clicked against the leather as I closed the book. I touched the little sun charm among them and thought of Lylah. That morning I’d moved her list from beneath my pillow into the back cover, separate from the calendar. I took it out and unfolded it carefully.
Normal Things Sick Girls Don’t Get to Do
One through eight were crossed off. Dad and Pops claimed they loved the lilac, but Lylah had written Wigs count herself, so number one had counted the night of the formal. Number six had taken longer. Chandler beat me to it in February, and I didn’t cross it off until the night he came back and I said it first anyway. Number nine still waited: Make a wish somewhere you’re not allowed to. And number ten, on its own page: Let someone carry you.
I’d thought about crossing off number ten at the hospital, when I finally called Chandler and asked him to come. Then again at the kitchen island, when I told my family I needed them in Texas. But neither moment had felt like the whole thing. I’d still been learning how to ask without apologizing afterward.
I looked at Dad, concentrating on the road. Pops was behind him, opening a bag of chips for Stetson while Bernard watched with intense interest. I thought about Uncle Jake making calls about jobs before we’d even asked him to come. About Chandler researching soccer teams because he wanted to keep playing, even if that meant starting over somewhere new.
They’d all made their own decisions. I hadn’t forced them, and they hadn’t asked me to apologize for needing them.
I took a pen from the pocket of Noelle’s book and drew a single line through number ten.
Dad glanced over briefly. “What was that?”
“Lylah’s list.”
“Which one?”
I showed him the page, holding it where he could see the words when it was safe to glance over. He read them at the next stoplight, then reached across the console and squeezed my hand before the light turned green. He didn’t say anything about it, and I was glad.
Only number nine was left. I didn’t know where I’d make that wish. Somewhere in Texas, maybe. Somewhere I hadn’t found yet. This time, leaving a box unchecked didn’t feel like failing. I could take number nine with me.
I missed her. The raw-chicken guy had gone home the week after her funeral, and she still owed me a vending-machine brownie. She would’ve said the show was rigged. Instead of finishing that argument with her, I touched the sun charm on my bracelet and tucked the book safely beside me.
The road curved south, and the sun broke through the clouds over the plains. My phone buzzed with a picture from Chandler: Dash strapped safely into his spot, looking betrayed by the existence of travel harnesses. A second message followed.
Chandler: He says happy birthday. Also he wants your snacks.
I typed back with one hand.
Me: tell him to get his own family.
Chandler: Too late.
I smiled at the screen until Dad asked what was funny. I told him it was nothing, which was a lie, but a nice one.
A minute later, another message appeared.
Chandler: Seriously though. You okay?
I looked at it for a moment. Six months ago, I would’ve told him I was fine without thinking twice.
Me: scared. a little sad. stetson’s already annoying me.
The typing bubble appeared, disappeared, then came back.
Chandler: Sounds about right.
Chandler: I’m scared too. We’ll figure it out when we get there.
I read that one twice before answering.
Me: deal
I took the little volleyball out of the cup holder, rested it against Noelle’s book in my lap, and watched the Colorado landscape move past my window. Behind us were the people who’d promised to call. Around me were the people who’d promised to come. Nobody had asked me to pay them back for either one.
Dad turned up the music, just enough for me to recognize the song. In the back seat, Pops started singing along, badly, while Stetson complained that it was too early for whatever this was supposed to be. Bernard barked once in agreement.
“You’re both impossible,” Dad said, glancing in the rearview mirror.
“Thank you,” Pops replied, not missing a word of the song.
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
“I chose to take it as one.”
Stetson groaned and pulled his hoodie over his head. I laughed, then shifted carefully against my pillows when my leg reminded me that sitting in one position for too long was a terrible idea.
Dad noticed immediately. “Need to stop?”
“Not yet.” I adjusted the pillow beneath my knee and settled back. “I’ll tell you.”
He glanced at me, then nodded. He didn’t ask again or tell me what he thought I should do. He just turned the music down a little and kept driving.
I looked out at the road ahead. In two days, we’d reach Bayview Shore. I’d meet the doctors who might be able to help me. We’d unpack in houses that didn’t smell like home yet, and I’d have to learn where everything was, including which cabinet Pops decided should hold the coffee mugs.
I watched the road stretch ahead of us while Pops sang the wrong words to another song and Stetson threatened to confiscate his phone. Dad laughed, Bernard settled down for a nap, and I let myself get comfortable.
For once, I didn’t have to be the one figuring out how to get everybody where they needed to go.
I just had to let them take me.