Page 82 of Things I Wish I Said
I shake my head. “Never.”
“Come on. Please!” She clasps her hands in front of her chest, pleading. “This was once your life’s dream. I’m just helping you bring it to fruition.”
“Oh, is that all?” I roll my eyes, racking my brain for some of the jokes I used to tell, which isn’t too hard since I rehearsed them so many times I could recite them in my sleep.
I exhale, glancing at her out of the corner of my eye. “My best one went something like this . . . Hey, everyone!” I mock wave. “A day in the life of an eight-year-old is tough work. First, I went to the park this morning. You know, kids and parks go together like peanut butter and jelly, except the jelly is always on the swings, and the peanut butter is stuck in your hair!
“Speaking of swings, I tried to swing as high as I could. I felt like I was flying! Until I realized I was just going in circles and got dizzy. Now I know why they call it a spin.
“After the park, we had ice cream. I had chocolate, which was awesome because chocolate is basically the best thing in the universe. And my mom had vanilla, which is just a fancy way of saying ‘plain.’ But that’s okay, because vanilla ice cream is like the superhero of ice creams—it’s simple, classic, and always saves the day when you’re out of chocolate!
“Oh, and we saw a dog at the park. It was doing tricks! It could roll over, play dead, and even give high fives. I tried to teach my brother how to do it, too. Let’s just say, he’s really good at playing dead—he fell asleep on the grass!”
I slide of the edge off the bed and bow, finally looking in Ryleigh’s direction.
Her lips are mashed together, like she’s holding in a laugh, and then all at once the dam breaks and she can’t stop.
She laughs so hard, she topples on her side and starts to cough, clutching her chest while I try my best not to panic.
Righting herself, she inhales, releasing one more ragged cough as she wipes at her damp eyes. “Wow. I don’t even know where to start.”
“I gave you a lot of material to work with.” I snicker, satisfied she’s okay as I hop back on the bed.
“There’s jelly on the swings and peanut butter in your hair? It doesn’t even make sense.”
I bark out a laugh. “I was eight. It made sense to me at the time.”
“Who knew Grayson De Leon was a major closet nerd?” She shakes her head, her eyes dancing with humor. “I might never recover from those jokes. I mean, you just elevated my cancer jokes to a whole new level.”
I cast her a wry smile. Nothing will make me think her cancer jokes are funny.
“So, what happened?” she asks.
“What do you mean?”
“Why’d you stop wanting to make people laugh?”
My smile fades and I shake my head as I swipe my coffee cup off the nightstand. “My turn.”
“What?”
“It’s my turn to ask a question. You already got one, and now you’re trying to sneak a second.”
Ry snorts. “I didn’t know there were rules.
“When you find out you’re cancer free, what are you going to do? I mean, with your future?”
She exhales and stares at her bedroom wall, the one with the soccer mural. A wistful smile tips her lips until it fades, and she says, “I don’t know. It’s hard to plan a future you don’t know you have.”
“‘I don’t know’ doesn’t count as an answer.”
She clucks her tongue. “There are rules about answers now, too?”
“I don’t know is a nonanswer. It doesn’t even count.”
She huffs, crosses her arms over her chest. “Fine. I guess maybe I might want to go into pediatric nursing.”
My brows rise. I don’t know what I expected her to say, but it wasn’t that. “Nursing?”
