━━━ 08. te quiero


|chapter eight:: te quiero|


I sighed softly as I felt my phone vibrate for almost the hundredth time today, only to check and see another text from Nic, "Are you going to respond to him?"


I looked up from my phone to glance over at Ander, who was staring down at my phone, "It can wait."


"Did he do something?"


I shook my head, "No, he didn't." He raised a brow at me, so I huffed, "Don't worry about it, it's nothing." And it wasn't, or at least I think so. Nic and I were never serious because I didn't want that and he knew, but lately, I've been thinking that he wants more.


"Don't you like him?" Ander wondered and I shrugged, "Why are you with him?"


I meet his eyes before looking down at my phone, "It's easy being with him, I guess." He slowly nodded, and I glanced over to see him hiding his emotions, which would probably show hurt if he let it, "We were easy too, Ander."


"Yeah, until everything wasn't." He sighed, watching the nurse come up to us. Today, we were going to see if all this chemo was worth it and I felt like I was more hopeful. I was starting to notice him not care about the whole process, but instead, he was becoming less optimistic of it all, close to accepting death. I just hope it doesn't come to that.


"Ander," The nurse called, "The doctor is ready to see you now."


Ander nodded at the woman before getting up and glancing over at me as I got up too, "Thank you, for coming."


"Of course," I shrugged, "I find it better than sitting in class and watching civil war videos." At that Azucena looked over at us, so I toss up my hands, "Not saying that the civil war wasn't a interesting time period."


"Is it also better than texting NiccolΓ³ back?" He asked, with a light chuckle before briefly looking at his shoes as we followed the nurse ahead, "You should talk to him."


"I will," I assured, "Don't worry about it."


"I'm not, it's just that I seen that you're happy with him," He explained, "And I want that for you, I want you to be happy."


I nodded, "He's been asking me to go with him to Stanford."


He looked over at me with a raised brow, trying to mask the hurt I only saw for a mere few seconds, "And what did you tell him?"


I bit my lip, "Nothing yet, hence why I'm getting all these calls from him." I didn't want to tell Ander about Nic's offer because I haven't even told Guzman. At first, I thought Nic was joking but recently he told me that he convinced his father to put in a good word for me as well without telling me. He claimed it was a surprise.


Ander didn't respond, only giving me a brief nod before we walked into the doctor's office. He told me how he's never fond of these moments, feeling like each time he went in was like he couldn't choose between whether to give up or follow the repetitive optimistic methods of 'stay strong'. When we sat down, you could tell nothing positive was going to leave his doctor's mouth as he sat there, almost resembling Ander's bleak expression.


"I don't have good news" He began like it wasn't obvious, "The results of your bone marrow biopsy and the CT scan are not what we were expecting." He then handed Ander a folder with his results on top, but I could only acknowledge Ander as he looked as if his last slither of hope escaped him once he looked at it, "The ratio of lymphoblasts is still much higher than 30%."


"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked and Ander looked over at me, briefly meeting my eyes that held deep worry.


"For the time being, we'll have to continue with chemo and increase the intensity." The doctor responded, but looked at Azucena as he did.


"For how long?"


"We can't determine that yet." He explained as Ander placed the papers on the man's desk, causing me to realize that he was awfully quiet, "Until we get results."


"What if we don't?" Ander finally asked and I furrowed my brows at him. Does he want to stop taking chemo?


"Let's not imagine the worst." Was the only thing the doctor had said before a goodbye as we left his office. Once again, Ander was silent, but so we're we as we got in the car. I looked at him as he stared out the window. We were supposed to graduate together. We were supposed to be smiling and be thankful that in three days we're going to be tossing our caps up in the air. We had plans to backpack through Europe this summer before we go off to college, having it be our time. Our dream schools were only four hours away from each other, but Ander was certain that he would drive every weekend to come see me even if he didn't have a car. And for a moment I forgot about it until now and I feel like it's left his mind a long time ago. This isn't the time for any of this- not now or ever.


I sighed, "Ander, I-" Before I could continue, our phones both got sent a notification and when I pulled out my phone, it was a invitation to Carla's party with her new boyfriend, Yurey. I rolled my eyes at it, she always had perfect timing.


"Are you going?" He asked, and I looked up from my phone to meet his eyes, "I know you're no longer the party type, but it is our second to last one before graduation."


"Are you going?" I retorted, but watched his demeanor changed quickly. I knew he wasn't. He couldn't. "We can stay in and watch movies again."


"Adriana," He sighed, "Don't waste your last moments of high school being cooped up in the house with me. It's not worth it."


"It is worth it, Ander," I objected, "All these good moments I had with you lately are just things I wished we had when we were-"


"Together?" He asked, and I briefly looked down, "I will always miss us and how we were, Adriana, but be honest with yourself and me. We can't just be friend again and we can't be together again like nothing happened." He's saying it like the roles were switched because he knows that I am. I'm beginning to pretend like we never had our bumps, our tears and our break up.


"Ander-"


"Here," He cut me off, digging in his pocket only to pull out my necklace. I wanted to cry at the sight of it, only thinking that, he held onto it. He's been keeping it in his pocket this whole time, "It was comforting to wear this bracelet, like you said, and even after us breaking up, I just couldn't take it off. Though, after this whole mess, I began to carry your necklace around as some sort of reassurance, but.." He trailed handing me the necklace, placing it in my palms before gently balling my hands into a fist and putting his hands over them. He felt warm and it felt relaxing because a part of me missed his touch. "Te quiero, hermosa. Always."


I looked at him longingly, confused of it all as Azucena stopped the car in front of my house. I didn't get it, none of it. Was this a goodbye?

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