Page 56 of A Dragon's Miracle (Fires of Fate)
Ryan
Chemotherapy was a bitch. The first two or three days of taking the drugs, I was fine, but by the morning of day four, I felt like I'd been hit by a truck going well above the speed limit. Everything exhausted me. Leaving the bed? Torture. Climbing the stairs? Wasn't going to happen. And none of that made it easier to get to the bathroom on time when the contents of my stomach thought it was time for emergency evacuation. I was lucky the latter didn't happen too often. For the most part, I was still able to eat and keep the food down, which was a relief.
Finn joked it was the baby eating all of the food before I could throw up.
I was just glad he was still happy enough to be cracking jokes while taking care of me. Cancer aside, I was sure that of all the omegas on the island, I was the luckiest, simply because I had Finn.
I slept a lot these days, but I rarely ever saw him sleep. Whenever I opened my eyes, he was there. Sometimes he would be watching videos with the volume turned low or browsing the internet, but he never left my side.
“You're amazing,” I told him when he brought me dinner in bed at the end of my first week of chemo. He'd made me sweet potato fries with apple sauce to satisfy my odd food cravings.
“Just doing what I can,” he said, handing the tray to me as I sat up.
“This totally beats my last round of chemo.” I stretched my arms over my head because all this time lying on my back was getting to me. “Seriously, thank you. I think I'm through the worst of it. Next week should be better.”
“Yeah?” Finn's face lit up and I smiled too because I knew he wasn't happy to be needed less but just genuinely happy that I was feeling better.
He sat beside me as I started eating. “You're growing a bump,” he said gleefully, looking at my belly.
I laughed. “Yeah, I hear that happens when you're pregnant.”
“Can you feel it move?” Finn asked with something like awe in his voice.
“I don't know. I've been sick so much lately I don't take it as a good sign whenanythingin my belly moves.”
Finn's face fell. “Oh,” he said, and, recovering quickly, he added, “I'm sure it'll be kicking soon!”
“Yeah. Maybe.” I ate some of the fries while Finn kept looking at my mid-section. “It's good to know you enjoy the sight of me getting fat so much.”
Finn laughed and rubbed the back of his neck. “You're not getting fat, you're growing a baby! But... I wouldn't mind if you got fat or whatever. As long as you're alive and happy, I don't care about anything else.” He wore a smile on his face, but he said the voice with such sincerity I couldn't help but feel touched. And I realized this was the perfect moment to bring up something else I'd been thinking about.
“I'm going to lose my hair, you know.”
“Yeah, I know.” He tilted his head as if wondering why I was even mentioning it. He reallywasamazing, and he didn't even realize.
“I don't look great bald,” I clarified, running a hand through my hair.
“You'll always be beautiful to me,” Finn said, leaning in to kiss my cheek. And I totally blamed pregnancy hormones for the tears that stung my eyes.
* * *
Roughly two weeksafter I’d started the chemo, Finn had a surprise for me. When I woke from my afternoon nap, he stood in front of the couch I'd slept on and grinned at me.
“What are you so happy about?” I mumbled.
“You need to come upstairs with me!” He seemed excited.
“Upstairs?” I groaned and sat up.
“Do I have to carry you? Because I will.” He reached a hand out to me. I batted it away playfully.
“It's fine. Just give me a minute to wake up.” Stairs sucked, yeah, but they weren't as bad anymore as they had been a few days ago. Slowly, I stood from the couch and faced the direction of the stairs. “What's this all about?”
“A surprise!” he said. “I had to set it up upstairs so you wouldn't notice. I'm sorry.”
“It's fine,” I repeated.
We left the living room and climbed the stairs together. I thought I heard people in a room down the hall, and that was where Finn was taking me.
