A Love to Live For by Nikita Heart

clouds, suddenly wondering what Joseph was doing at the moment. Was he already asleep? Or was he awake, thinking of me, too?
    I suddenly had a vision of the two of us lying on the grass side by side, holding hands and looking up at the stars together, and I smiled.
    We still had many wonderful memories to make and I couldn’t wait for him to come home so that we could really start.

Chapter Eight
     
     
     
    Joseph came back a week later.
    Although I was a little disappointed that he did not call me the whole time he was away, only sending me a few messages that were not particularly detailed or affectionate, I became excited to see him as soon as I received his message that said he was on his way home. I even baked some muffins to celebrate his return. Then, when he was near, I went to his house to wait for him there, wanting to be the first one to welcome him back home.
    As soon as he saw me, he smiled and I went over to hug him. After a few minutes of talking to him, though, I realized that something had changed.
    Joseph had changed, and not exactly for the better.
    I couldn’t put a finger on just what had changed, though. No matter how long I stared at him or how many times I sneaked glances at him when he wasn’t looking, he still looked the same. Still, there was something in his eyes and in his voice that was different, almost as if they were sadder or more hesitant. Then, there was the fact that he now paused more frequently when he spoke and tended to space out more when he wasn’t speaking, making me feel as if I was talking to an empty shell. And when I told him about all the things I wanted us to do together, which I had thought about hard and long while he was away, just to make the most of his remaining time, he didn’t seem the least bit enthusiastic. Yes, he smiled and said it was a good idea but I did not feel any sincerity at all.
    When I asked him if anything was wrong, he quickly said that he was alright, perhaps a little too quickly. He didn’t seem to want to talk about his trip, either, saying only that he went to see his doctor, and when I asked what the doctor had told him, he said that the doctor had simply suggested on him undergoing a new kind of treatment, which he declined.
    Even as I listened to him carefully, I knew that he was not telling the truth, or at least, that he was keeping something from me, something important that he was afraid to let me know. Perhaps it was my female intuition but I just knew.
    Whatever it was, he seemed intent on hiding it from me, and not wanting to start a confrontation and force the truth from him, I decided to try to get the information by some other means. First, I asked his sister and when she, too, didn’t tell me anything, although she was even poorer at hiding her emotions and so confirmed my suspicion that there was something Joseph was not telling me, I decided to call up Dr. Penning’s office, finding the number for his clinic online.
    The receptionist, however, would not divulge any information, saying that it would be against the medical code of ethics, and wouldn’t even let me speak to Dr. Penning, whom she claimed was a very busy man, and so I had nothing to go on.
    Deprived of information, my imagination started running and after reviewing what little information I had so far, a suspicion formed in my head – the suspicion that Joseph did not have much time left.
    It made perfect sense.
    After all, the fact that one was about to die soon was certainly depressing, even for someone like him who claimed he had already left his fate in God’s hands and was prepared to die, and it would explain why Joseph did not seem too keen on doing the things I had suggested. He simply didn’t have enough time left for them.
    What I couldn’t understand was why he wouldn’t tell me. Surely, I deserved the right to know? True, he probably just didn’t want to hurt me by telling me the truth, but his silence was even more hurtful. I was well aware of