Free Tattoos and TaTas (Chocoholics #2.5) by Tara Sivec

cancer. I have cancer. You can’t even fucking say it!” Claire screams.
    “NO! I can’t fucking say it because you’re right! I don’t want it to be real. I don’t want this to be happening right now. I don’t want you to be sick. I can’t stand the fact that there is absolutely NOTHING I can do to make this better!” I shout back.
    She flings the blankets off of her and gets up from the couch, stalking over to me.
    “You still don’t get it! This isn’t about YOU! You can’t fix it, you can’t make it better, you don’t know what to say, you don’t know what to do. YOU, YOU, YOU! This is happening to ME, Goddammit, and I just need my fucking friend! Why can’t you just be my friend? This is out of everyone’s control, especially yours. If you can’t deal with that then you need to get the fuck out of my house.”
    We stand toe-to-toe, both of us wearing equal looks of anger. As much as I don’t have the right to be mad at her, I can’t help it. This was never supposed to happen. Our friendship was solid and I thought nothing could ever break it. She’s pissed at me for not being a good friend and I’m pissed at her for not understanding that I don’t know HOW to be a good friend if I’m not the one making things better. She knows I’m a control freak, how can she possibly expect me to not feel helpless about this?
    “I’m sorry I’m not perfect!” I fire back. “My friend gets sick and I don’t know what the fuck to do, so sue me! I’m trying here and you’re not making it any easier. You want to talk, talk, talk about this horrible thing that’s happening and I can’t do that. I can’t just act like it’s the most natural thing in the world to talk about my best friend having breast cancer! I’m not a sappy, talk about my feelings kind of person and you should damn well know that by now. I got a fucking tattoo to show you I cared, I’m taking care of your shop so you can rest and I’m trying to take your mind off of things because I don’t know what else to do!”
    Claire takes a step back and crosses her arms across her chest. “I never asked you to get a tattoo, nor did I ask you for help with the shop. All I needed was my best friend to tell me everything will be okay and you can’t even do that. I know it’s horseshit. I know we don’t know if everything will be okay, but I need YOU to believe that. How the hell am I supposed to believe it if you don’t? You can’t even LOOK at me!”
    I realize I’ve been staring at a button on her shirt the entire time she spoke and quickly look up to meet her eyes. I don’t know what she sees on my face but it’s enough for her to shake her head at me.
    “Just get out,” she tells me sadly.
    I’m so pissed that she’s ordering me out of the house I don’t even think about the fact that this is the first real fight we’ve ever had in thirty years of friendship and I’m not sure if we’ll ever be able to recover from it.
    “Fine! I’m out of here!” I scream back.
    I walk away from my best friend and let the front door slam behind me. I get to my car and let the anger flow through me as I pull out of the driveway and head home. My anger festers and builds until I get inside my house, throw my purse across the kitchen and head to my bedroom. It all disappears as soon as I flop down on my bed and realize what just happened. I curl my legs up to my chest and, for the first time since Claire told us what was going on, I let myself cry. I cry so hard and for so long that I can’t breathe. I keep right on sobbing when I feel the bed dip behind me and Jim curls up against me, wrapping his arms around me and holding me close. He doesn’t say a word, he just lets me cry.
    I can’t believe I screamed at my best friend. She’s got cancer, she’s sick and she’s scared and I stood in her living room and yelled at her. What kind of person does that? I should have just taken what she threw at me. She deserves to scream and yell and