Chapter Text
Daniela learns very quickly that everyone starts talking to you differently once you’re sick.
They soften their voices. They pause before saying her name, like it might break. They smile too much, or not at all. Doctors talk around her instead of to her, and nurses ask questions she already knows the answers to.
How’s your pain today?
Any dizziness?
Still feeling hopeful?
Hopeful feels like a trick question.
The hospital becomes a second home, except it smells like antiseptic and quiet grief. Daniela hates the way the ceiling tiles blur when she stares too long, hates the way time stretches into something thick and unmovable. She hates that her life now comes in cycles, treatment, recovery, waiting, repeat.
Cancer is a word that sits heavy in her chest, even when it’s not there.
She’s seventeen and already feels like she’s running out of time.
It’s on one of the longer days, when the hours crawl and her body feels like it belongs to someone else that she meets Sophia.
Sophia doesn’t look like someone who belongs in a hospital.
She’s sitting cross-legged on the windowsill of the common room, sunlight spilling across her face like it chose her on purpose. She’s laughing softly at something on her phone, eyes crinkling at the corners, hair pulled back messily like she didn’t expect to be seen.
Daniela notices her because she doesn’t look sad.
That alone feels suspicious.
Sophia catches her staring and grins. “You gonna keep looking, or do you want to come sit?”
Daniela blinks. “Uh—sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s fine,” Sophia says easily, patting the spot beside her. “Hospitals are boring. You need entertainment.”
Daniela almost says no. She almost always does.
But something about Sophia’s voice—warm, grounded, like she’s not afraid of the silence—makes Daniela move.
She sits.
They don’t talk about illness. Not at first.
They talk about music, about how bad hospital food is, about how the vending machines always eat your money. Sophia complains dramatically about the coffee. Daniela laughs, and it feels unfamiliar in her throat, like using a muscle she forgot existed.
“What are you in for?” Daniela asks eventually, because the question always comes.
Sophia shrugs, too casual. “Just… stuff. You?”
Daniela hesitates, then exhales. “Cancer.”
Sophia doesn’t flinch.
She doesn’t say I’m sorry like it’s a reflex. She doesn’t look away.
She just nods. “That sucks.”
Daniela snorts before she can stop herself.
From that moment on, something settles between them unspoken, but real. Like a star locking into orbit.
________________________________________________
Sophia becomes a constant without ever asking permission.
She shows up on Daniela’s good days with snacks she smuggles in her jacket. On bad days, she sits quietly, legs tucked under her, humming softly when the nausea gets bad.
She never asks how long Daniela has.
Daniela never tells her anyway.
They start calling the hospital roof their favorite place, sneaking up there when Daniela has enough strength. The city lights look softer from above, like they’re forgiving something.
“Do you ever think about what you’d do if you weren’t sick?” Sophia asks one night, swinging her legs over the edge.
Daniela watches her silhouette against the sky. “All the time.”
“Yeah?”
“I’d want something… loud,” Daniela says. “Big. Like I’d want to exist so hard that no one could forget me.”
Sophia smiles, but it wobbles at the edges. “You already do.”
Daniela doesn’t see the way Sophia presses her hand against her side afterward. Doesn’t see the way her smile fades once Daniela looks away.
What Daniela does see is how Sophia memorizes her how she notices the way Daniela’s hands shake when she’s tired, how she knows exactly when to change the subject, how she always stays until visiting hours end.
Slowly, inevitably, Daniela falls.
It happens in pieces: a laugh held too long, fingers brushing when they share headphones, the way Sophia says her name like it’s something precious.
Daniela doesn’t say it out loud.
She doesn’t think she’s allowed to.
__________________________________________
Everyone expects Daniela to be the fragile one.
Doctors. Nurses. Visitors.
Sophia plays the role of the healthy girl so well that no one questions it. She jokes with staff, flirts her way into extra blankets, carries Daniela’s bag without complaint.
But sometimes, rarely, Daniela catches it.
The way Sophia’s breath stutters when she laughs too hard.
The way she disappears for tests and comes back pale.
The way she avoids mirrors on bad days.
“Are you okay?” Daniela asks once, late at night.
Sophia smiles too fast. “Always.”
Daniela believes her, because believing feels easier than asking again.
Over time they notice a static between them, faint but electric. Sophia notices the way her life turned from gray to sky blue when they met. Daniela notices the way Sophia is the only one that makes her feel whole.
They kiss for the first time in the hospital stairwell, quiet and hesitant, like they’re afraid the world will take it away if they’re too obvious. Sophia’s hands are warm, steady. Daniela melts into her like she’s been waiting.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” Daniela whispers afterward.
Sophia rests her forehead against Daniela’s. “You won’t.”
It’s almost a promise.
___________________________________
The doctors start looking more hopeful.
Daniela’s treatment responds better than expected. Words like stable and manageable float into conversations. Her mother cries happy tears for the first time in months.
Everyone says Daniela is going to be okay.
Sophia starts getting worse.
She cancels plans. She sleeps more. She kisses Daniela like she’s memorizing the shape of her mouth.
“What’s happening?” Daniela asks, panic curling in her chest.
Sophia cups her face gently. “I just… need you to trust me.”
“For what?”
Sophia swallows. “For loving you.”
Daniela doesn’t know yet that love can be a goodbye.
She doesn’t know that Sophia has already decided.