And Here's To You - Chapter 1

“Do you remember that one softball game when you got a black eye?” Cameron was asking me.

I was nine. I was playing third base and paying more attention to my dad in the dugout than I was the ball that had been hit straight towards me, resulting in a delayed game and a very swollen eye for two weeks. “Yeah, what of it?”

“I remember you coming home in an eye patch. I thought it was weird because it was your brother obsessed with pirates, not you. When my mom told me you got hurt I thought you were only wearing the eye patch to make him feel better.”

I rolled my eyes and started to laugh. I was using Cameron’s chest as a pillow while I picked at the weeds growing around where we were lying down. It was a hot summer day with the sun beating down and not a cloud in the sky.

Cameron had always been my best friend. We grew up as next-door neighbors and our families went to the same church, so Cameron and his two sisters naturally befriended my brother and me. Cameron and I were the same age. There were three years between him and his older sister, and then three years between her and his oldest sister. My brother was two years younger than me, but the five of us all grew up as friends despite the age differences.

Cameron propped up on his elbows and looked down at me. “Are you sure you didn’t have a thing for pirates back then? Your little brother might have just been an excuse.”

“Cameron!” I gasped in fake exasperation. This entire afternoon we had been lying in the park reminiscing our childhood. I suppose he was getting me back for bringing up the time his two older sisters made him wear a dress over to our house.

He ran a hand through my hair and settled back lying down. “Elaina, don’t you ever wish we were that young again and things were that easy? We didn’t have to worry about things like divorce or sickness or solving world hunger…”

I let his words trail off as they wandered into my mind. So much had changed in the seventeen years we’ve known each other. We had seen each other grow into and out of the awkward stages of being an adolescent teenager, including the growth spurts, incomprehensive hormonal outbursts, and of course the heartaches and heartbreaks that came with growing up. Having just graduated high school, we were finally off to the land of adulthood and—hopefully—change for the better.

 Two years ago, Cameron’s oldest sister Lilly was diagnosed with liver cancer. It was caught early on and she was treated right away. We thought they were in the clear up until about a month ago when she relapsed and the doctor found the cancer had spread through her lymph nodes. She had been in her last year of law school and had to withdraw due to the amount of time she was in the hospital. It had put a huge strain on his family, making their house a breeding ground for stress, tension, and arguments on a daily basis.

My house, unfortunately, wasn’t much better. My parents had separated a couple months back and they were currently seeing a therapist who encouraged getting all issues out in the open to establish communication. My father interpreted this as a green light to let my mother know every single thing he has found wrong in their marriage of 22 years.

Both of us had jobs and tried to stay as busy as possible, but today neither of us was working and had no plans. By 11:00am our houses were unbearable and we found refuge in the town park, where we had been for the past four hours.

Our friendship was certainly an interesting one. I had grown up thinking his was the brother that was slightly less annoying than the one I shared blood with. Seeing him grow up definitely opened my eyes to how attractive his became once his voice got deeper, he wasn’t stumbling over his long legs, and his face filled out with a straight jaw line and cheekbones to die for. He had always worn his dark blond hair longer than his mother willed, and his eyes had always been the deepest shade of blue I’d seen. But knowing that he could recite every embarrassing moment that I’ve ever experienced, I never felt the need to ogle over him like every other girl in our graduating class.

He never acted like he had a crush on me either, and probably for the same reasons. I grew up playing sports outside so my hair was always sun bleached and I had a constant tan. I always felt average, with my hair straight just past my shoulders and nothing notably unique except my eyes which were a very light green and stood out when I wore makeup.

I never expected anything to happen between us. Then again, I never expected to know someone on the brink of death or how my parents could go 22 years of marriage and only now start having problems. But once all hell started to break loose, we both held on to the one thing that was constant:

Each other.

I looked up at Cameron and saw he was watching my hands pop the heads off of dandelions unconsciously. His gaze shifted to my eyes when he saw me look up and he smiled. “I’m just waiting for your hands to turn yellow,” he said. “You’ll have to get treated for jaundice.”

“Whatever,” I retort. I pick up a white dandelion and blow the seeds into his face. “At least I won’t start sprouting flowers in my hair.”

He makes a grab for my sides to try and tickle me, but I quickly got to my feet into a defensive stance, prepared to run the minute he advances. He just brushed his hands through his hair to get all the seeds out. “It’s too hot to chase you around the park. Want to go for a swim?”

I nod in agreement. The pool at his house was always a good precursor to how we spent the evenings. His parents would see us go into his room after supper to presumably dry off and go our separate ways, but they never noticed that I never left his room. Almost every night I stay with him. We rarely did more than just hold each other as we drift in and out of sleep, but one thing we learned quickly was that it was easier to keep a grip on reality when you had someone to hold onto it with you.