“Maybe four months at the most.” Tears fill his eyes this time.

“Then, there’s still time. We can find someway to save her. Maybe a new drug will come on the market.” I can feel hope trying to fight in me.

Dad’s eyes flicker to Adam behind me. Then, his hand comes to the back of my head, tilting my eyes to his. “It might. Hold on to that hope, and so will I. We’ll keep praying that something happens to save her.”

I stay in Dad’s arms for a long time. Adam goes to the kitchen and starts to make coffee.

I just want to be with my sister right now, so I leave my dad and Adam.

I walk down the hall to Casey’s room and quietly open her door.

She’s lying on her bed, facing the window. She looks so tiny there.

She is tiny and so young.

She deserves to have a life, a long life.

We lost Mom. Haven’t we lost enough without losing Casey, too?

Kicking off my shoes, I climb onto the bed behind her and put my arm around her.

She turns her head, looking back at me. “Hey,” she says.

I bite my lip to stop from crying, blinking the tears away. I need to be strong for her. “Hey.”

“Dad talked to you?”

“He did.”

She lets out a slow breath and blinks up at the ceiling. “I…don’t feel ready to die yet, Evie. I know Mom’s up in heaven, and I want to see her, but I don’t want to leave you and Dad.”

My heart cracks wide open.

I rub the tears from my eyes. “You’re not going to die,” I tell her. “Mom won’t let it happen. She loves you, but she doesn’t want you up in heaven with her. That’ll mean she has to start picking up after you again.” I smile at her, trying ease things a little.

Casey laughs softly. Her little giggle reminds me of when she was a baby, and I used to sit for hours with her, making her laugh. The memory hurts. It hurts so badly.

She curls her hand around mine, and I feel her tiny fingers hook onto my ring.

I freeze.

She lifts my hand and examines it. Then, she looks at me, her eyes wide. “You got married?”

I feel sick. I’m the worst person in the world.

Casey shouldn’t have found this out right now. I should have taken my ring off. Adam and I left our rings on because the plan was to come in and tell Dad and Casey straight away. But, of course, that didn’t happen.

“Yes,” I answer slowly.

“Holy cannoli!” She turns over to face me. “I can’t believe you got married!”

I give an uneasy smile.

“Was it in a church?”

I shake my head. “Vegas.”

“Vegas! Oh my God!” She giggles. “Does Dad know?”

“No, and we don’t need to talk about this right now. You’re more important.”

“No freaking way. We are so talking about this. And you say Dad doesn’t know? Is Adam out there right now with Dad?”

“Yes…”

“And does he have his wedding ring on?”

Shit.

“Mmhmm.”

“Then, Dad knows. He might not have spotted it right away, but I’m guessing he had other things on his mind then. Give him another five minutes, and he’ll know.”

Fuck.

But as I stare at Casey’s face, my worry evaporates. I touch my hand to her face. “You’re smiling,” I say.

“Sure I am. Dad is going to blow a gasket when he finds out that you and Adam just got married in Vegas. And that means, for a short while, we don’t have to think or talk about what’s happening with me.”

“Oh, Case.” My eyes instantly fill with tears, and I wrap my arms around her, pulling her to me.

“Just so you know, I’m a little annoyed that I didn’t get to be a bridesmaid,” she says muffled against my shoulder. “But I am happy for you.”

I hug her tighter. “We’ll have another service, maybe on the beach, and then you can be a bridesmaid. How does that sound?”

She tilts her head back, resting it on the pillow, she smiles at me. “It sounds perfect.”

As I lie here with my arms around Casey, staring into her beautiful face, I tell myself that I will make that a reality. She will be my bridesmaid. Because there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do to save her. I will find a way to save my sister.

I’m losing hope.

I thought I would find some way to save Casey or that some miracle would happen or that the doctor would call and tell us he got her on a clinical trial for a new wonder drug. I convinced myself of it.

But nothing’s happened.

No miracles. No calls.

Casey is still dying.

I’m still going to lose her.

Casey was right when she said Dad would spot Adam’s ring. We had another ten minutes together before Dad knocked on the door, asking me to come out and see him.

He didn’t blow a gasket though, like Casey had hoped. He was calm, rational. He told me he was sad that I’d lied to him. I felt sick at that one.

But then he asked me if I was happy.

I didn’t feel happy at that moment. But I was happy with Adam, and I told Dad that and that I loved Adam.

Dad’s eyes got all watery again. He wrapped his arms around me and told me that was all he ever wanted for me. Then, he kissed me on the cheek and told me he was going to sit with Casey for a bit.

Adam called Ava later that day and told her that we’d gotten married. He said it didn’t go exactly as he’d expected. She didn’t yell when he told her that he wasn’t going to go to Harvard or going to work at the studio, that he was staying here. He said she told him that he’d made that choice, so he would be cut off. He told her that was what he wanted.

And that was the end of that.

She made good on her promise.

His credit cards no longer work, and his car was taken away. At least he still has the truck for a bit longer. He’d paid in advance for that, and the beach house is paid up until the end of the summer.

He has some money that he’d put into a separate bank account of his own to tide him over until he can get work. So, technically, he’s still living off his parents’ money, but it’s all he can do at the moment. And he’s been talking to Grady about the pro-surfing thing.

Life is still going on. I’m still working.

But at the same time, it feels like everything is standing still.

I feel like I’m walking with sludge most days.

Right now, I’m just getting ready to go back to the apartment to spend the night with Casey.

I’m living between the beach house and the apartment at the moment. But, for obvious reasons, I’ve been spending more time at the apartment with Casey.

I came to the beach house from Grady’s to spend some time with Adam before he goes out with Max. With me working all the hours I can and spending every spare moment with Casey, Adam and I haven’t seen much of each other these last five days since we got back.

But tonight is Adam’s bachelor party. Max insisted on it, considering he’d missed out on throwing Adam one before we got married, and he talked Adam into it with a kind reminder that he was pissed that he couldn’t be there when Adam and I got married.

That worked. So, Max has organized a night out with Grady and the guys from the Shack. They’re going to hit up some bars, and because Adam and Max are too young to drink, my husband and his best friend will be making good use of their fake IDs tonight.