Free A Time to Die by Lurlene McDaniel Page B

his face with a nearby towel. “Not bad,” his spotter said. “That’s the most repetitions you’ve done this week.”
    He draped the towel over his neck and stood. Across the gym, he saw Vince, struggling to do arm curls with a set of barbells. When Vince had first appeared at the extracurricular weight lifting program in the school gym, Eric and the others had been skeptical. Now, watching Vince fight for breath as he lifted, Eric felt a grudging admiration for him. Vince wasn’t a quitter, and he was making progress. Eric could see how Vince’s upperbody was developing through the course of his workouts.
    Eric thought better of going over to Vince. Except for having to see each other in English class, they steered clear of each other. Ever since the night of Howie’s party, Eric had felt uncomfortable around Vince. Eric went inside the locker room; he had showered and dressed and was ready to leave when Vince came over to him. “You got a minute?” Vince asked.
    “Sure. What do you need? Is it about an English assignment?”
    “No. I want to talk to you.”
    “I’m listening.”
    The noisy locker room was beginning to fill up. Vince glanced around. “Not here. Want some pizza? I’ll buy.”
    The thought of pizza made Eric hungry, and he was curious about what Vince wanted to discuss. “Sounds all right. My car’s out in the lot.”
    “You’ll have to drop me back here to pick up mine after we eat.”
    “No problem.”
    They walked out into the blustery day, and Eric raised the collar of his sheepskin jacket to ward off the chill. Once the two of them were in Eric’s Chevy, Vince directed him toward a pizza parlor. Feeling somewhat uncomfortable, Eric flipped on the radio and turned it up loud.
    At the nearly empty restaurant, they chose a booth and ordered. While they waited for theirpizza, Eric fidgeted with a paper napkin. “So, what’s up?” Eric finally asked.
    “Kara.”
    Eric felt confusion, then a small stab of fear. “She’s still doing okay, isn’t she?”
    “Do you care?”
    “Now, wait a minute—”
    Vince leaned forward, close to Eric’s face.
“You
wait a minute. For reasons that make no sense to me, Kara likes you. I’ve got some things to say to you, and so hear me out.”
    Eric swallowed, unsure of how to respond. “I like Kara,” he said, shredding the paper napkin into strips.
    “With friends like you, who needs enemies?” Vince said sarcastically. A flare of anger shot through Eric, but before he could react, Vince added, “Do you know what that girl’s been through these last few weeks?”
    “Christy told me—”
    “No matter what your sister’s told you, you don’t know the half of it. I’ve been there, so I
do
know, and now I’m going to tell you. When you’re hospitalized with CF, you feel as if you’re drowning in your own body fluids. For every day you’re lying in that bed, the nights stretch twice as long. You’re scared because there’re no guarantees that your doctor’s bag of tricks will work this time—it seems that the nasty little germs get more resistant every time they’re faced with a new antibiotic.” Vince ticked off points on his fingers as he spoke. Eric sat quietly, not interrupting.
    “I know what it feels like to think that everybody in the world’s having a good time but you because the only faces you see are nurses and doctors and lab techs who poke you full of needles and suck blood out of you until it hurts so bad, you think you’re going to scream.
    “I know what it’s like to cough up your guts and vomit blood. And I know how it feels when you wake up one morning and realize you’re still alive and that you made it through one more episode, only to know that you’ll have to do it all over again. Until the one day you don’t wake up at all.”
    Eric had broken out in a cold sweat, but he kept his expression stony, ashamed of the revulsion he was feeling as Vince’s words bombarded him. Poor Kara. Poor