I wasn’t scared, though I think I was the only one who wasn’t. It’s not like I’d let that deadly, six letter word take over me. I hadn’t let anything else in my life overpower me, after all. So I put up with everything quite well. I threw up when the chemo made me sick, and then I’d brush my teeth and smile and put on some fancy lipstick.

I saw the way my friends looked at me; like I wasn’t the same person anymore, just because I’d lost my strawberry blonde hair and about 20 pounds. I smiled twice as wide and laughed twice as much, but their fake smiles and worried eyes troubled me.

The chemo had stopped working before senior year had even begun, though by now it was almost over. But Mom and Dad kept it up in false hopes of a sudden recovery. And I kept a smiling face, because I didn’t want to let them know how much it hurt.