Page 1 of Enchanted

Chapter 1

Ethan

Death comes for everyone.

You’re born and you die. Those are the only guarantees we have in life. The vast majority of people don’t know when the latter will happen.

But I did.

I might not have known the exact time or day, but it’d be within the next six months. Seven, if I was really lucky.

That was if my doctors were to be believed, anyway. But I’d seen plenty of them over the past few months, and they’d all come to the same miserable conclusion.

“Treatment may prolong your life, but not beyond a few weeks.”

Others might have accepted their fate and not subjected themselves to unnecessary side effects or trauma. Part of me wished that was the path I’d chosen. To quietly go out with dignity instead of fighting until the last breath.

I’d considered it. I had. After all, nothing was going to change the outcome. Death was coming on swift wings, whether I was ready to greet him or not.

But that wasn’t going to stop me trying to hide or outrun him. I’d do whatever it took to scrape a few extra weeks out of this life. It hadn’t always been kind to me, but it was mine. If death wanted to take it from me, he could fight me for it.

I just wished the fight was a little easier sometimes.

My head was pounding as I reclined in the chair. Quiet chatter filled the air, mingling with the scuffing of nurses’ shoes. The scent of disinfectant was more familiar than the home I shared with Dave at this point. Made sense, given I’d spent more time here than there since we’d come back.

Returning to the UK hadn’t been on my bingo card for this year. Dave and I had relocated to Southern California just after I graduated from university, when I was just twenty-two. Back then, I’d had nothing but my camera, big dreams, and love for the man at my side.

Years of struggling to make a name for myself had firmly removed the rose-tinted glasses. My destiny wasn’t to be a world-famous photographer. Turned out Dave wasn’t the soulmate I’d believed him to be either. When I’d packed up my life to follow him to LA, I’d had a picture-perfect vision of our future. Picking out paint samples and rugs. Hosting dinners for our vast group of friends. Returning to each other at the end of each day, full of exciting stories about the fulfilling work life we were both enjoying.

And, further down the line, rings on our fingers. Maybe a kid or two running around.

None of that had happened. Instead, we’d lived in rentals where we weren’t allowed to hang a photo, let alone change the colour of the walls. There was no hosting of dinners. It was hard enough to afford groceries in LA, never mind the fact that we didn’t have the space for a fucking table. Then there was the issue of who we’d invite. Dave had plenty of friends. He was the kind of person others gravitated towards. I’d met many of them over the years, but they saw the world through a different lens to me, one that was a shallow facsimile of real life. The only current affairs they gave a shit about were ones between celebrities, not any playing out on the world stage.

It wasn’t that I hadn’t tried. I had. So many fucking times. But none of the bonds had stuck. Not like those I’d once shared with the people I’d left behind years ago.

I missed them so fucking much. It was my fault we’d grown apart; I knew that. The drifting had started before I’d even left, with me getting so caught up in Dave that I’d lost sight of everyone else.

I was literally the worst.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t contacted them at all after moving to the states. I’d kept in touch at first. But then I’d found myself changing the subject when Riley asked what jobs I had lined up. Coming up with excuses when Matty suggested I show him what my living space looked like. Outright lying to Lucky when he asked whether I was happy living in LA.

After a while, the lies had become too much to handle. I’d closed myself off and done the one thing I’d always judged others for.

I’d ghosted them.

I shifted restlessly in my chair, counting down the minutes until the dose would finish being administered. God, how I hated this. Dave had made it to my first few chemo appointments, but his job had kept him too busy to attend any since. And let me tell you, it was one thing sitting through endless rounds of chemo. Doing so alone, without anyone to distract you?

That was something else entirely.

My heart panged as Matty, Riley, and Lucky once more floated through my mind. Any of them would’ve sat beside me. Knowing Matty, he’d have come up with a rota so that I was never, ever, alone. Lucky would have had a pile of books to keep me entertained, while Riley would likely have commandeered a TV so we could game together. Just like we’d used to.

It wasn’t that I couldn’t call them. London wasn’t far from Southampton in the grand scheme of things. But who ghosted their friends for years, undoubtedly missing huge moments in their lives, only to reach out during a time of need?

Dicks, that’s who.

Well, I wasn’t a dick. Besides, I couldn’t be selfish about this. Sure, having them here would make me happy, but what would it do to them? It wasn’t going to change the odds of my survival. It was possible they’d mourn me when they heard the news, but to watch me go? Fade away until I was a shell of the man they once knew?

I wasn’t subjecting them to that.