The pain in his stomach felt like a hot poker was stabbing him over and over. “Oh god, this really sucks,” he mumbled, gingerly placing a hand to his forehead.

Opening his eyes, Nick looked around the room trying to get his bearings on where he was. Initially he thought he was laying in a hotel bed but that was soon shattered when he saw the IV pole situated next to him. “Shit,” he mumbled as he stared up at the bag of fluid that was hanging.

The memories of the night before slowly crept into his mind. They were fuzzy and scattered but Nick was able to determine that he had drank that night, but why? He knew it was bad for him to be drinking when he was sick in the first place but he couldn’t recall why he had been drinking.

A feeble knock at the door interrupted his thoughts.

“Hi, I have your breakfast tray,” a petite woman quietly announced as she hesitantly stepped into the room. She quickly set the tray down on the table that was at the foot of the bed. “Do you want me to pull the table towards you?”

Nick shook his head slightly and instantly regretted it when his head started pounding. He motioned with his hand. “That’s fine there.”

The smell of the breakfast tray started his stomach churning. The last thing he wanted to do was throw up. It seemed that was all he did lately. His body had betrayed him so much in the past six months he didn’t care to think about it.

Resuming his thoughts about last night, Nick tried to think about why he had been drinking. As hard as he tried, he couldn’t recall.

“Good morning Nickolas, I’m hoping your night went well,” Dr. Andersen chirped as she entered the room holding a chart.

“Just peachy,” Nick grinned slightly, tucking his hand behind his head.

The doctor sat down on the edge of the bed. “You learned a valuable lesson yesterday, don’t you think?”

Nick rolled his eyes. “Spare me the lecture, please.”

Dr. Andersen shook her head. “I’m not going to lecture you, you’re twenty-two years old, just about the same age as my nephew and he’s got his head on pretty straight for his age. No, Nick, I what I’m trying to tell you here is that chemotherapy meds and alcohol are sometimes a deadly combination. For every drink you take you run yourself at a high risk of problems besides hangovers.”

Nick squirmed nervously in bed, drawing the covers up towards his chest.

“You were vomiting blood last night, do you know why?”

“Whiskey I suppose,” he smugly replied, focusing his vision past the doctor towards a tiny black spot on the wall across the room.

“Well I’m sure that wasn’t the brightest thing to drink for a person that’s well, but Nick, your body is fighting cancer and your platelets are low to begin with and you’re susceptible to bleeding as well as infections. Nick do you realize you could have killed yourself yesterday?”

Rolling his eyes, Nick let out a deep sigh. “And that would be bad, how?” he mumbled.

Dr. Andersen looked at her young patient questionably. “Are you giving up the fight?”

“Nah, I’m just taking a vacation, okay?”

“This really isn’t a joking matter. I’m serious.”

Adjusting himself to a more comfortable position, Nick winced when his stomach suddenly protested the movement. He quickly looked at the doctor to see if she saw him and he was relieved to see that she was reading his chart. “Doc, when is my body going to start looking like my body again?”

“It takes time,” she replied.

“Okay I think I’ve been pretty patient so far. This is getting a little old,” Nick snapped.

“Are you talking about you losing your hair?”

Growing self conscious, Nick absently placed a hand towards the side of his head. “I, um, didn’t think that was noticeable yet.”

“It’s not, I just know that it will be happening within the next few weeks more than likely,” she quickly retracted her comment. “I’m sorry, what are you concerned about then Nick?”

“This,” Nick sighed as he gestured at his bloated stomach. “Well, this and this,” he said as he pointed at his face.

“The steriods make your body retain fluids, it’s nothing to be concerned about, once the steriods stop the swelling will subside.”

“My stomach isn’t going down as often as I’ve been throwing up. It’s getting a little tiring wearing sweats 24/7. I’d really like to wear clothes again and look like a normal person instead of a moon faced bloated freak!” Nick wanted to mention the pains in his stomach, but bit his lip instead. He didn’t want to have her checking him out again.

“The swelling in your stomach is from the enlarged nodes, I’ve told you this before. The chemo will hopefully shrink the nodes and when things start to calm down we will remove your spleen. This all takes time sweetheart. If you stood on a scale you would probably be surprised to see that you’ve lost weight, not gained it.”

Nick let out a sarcastic laugh. “AJ and management would be happy to hear about that.”

“AJ?”

“A jerk friend of mine, skip it,” Nick replied.

Dr. Andersen’s eyes looked over her young patient. “Nick, you messed up your chemotherapy schedule with this drinking binge you put yourself through. I was hoping to keep things on track. The quicker the treatments progress, I’m hoping that you go into a remission.”

Remission? Nick’s head snapped up. Just as he was about to ask her a question the doctor’s pager went off. Looking down at the device, Dr. Andersen stood up.

“I’ll write the orders for your discharge and you can call for a ride home. I’ll see you again tomorrow.”

With that, the doctor hurried out of the room, leaving Nick alone once again.

Nick played with the words “remission” in his head. After a few moments he suddenly realized what had triggered the drinking binge - Julie was in remission and everyone knew about it but him. Brian was keeping the information from him. The more he thought about it the more his blood pressure started to climb. He was feeling an undeniable rage coursing through his body and Nick looked around the room for something - anything to vent his anger.

He absently felt the port under his collarbone, toying with the idea of yanking the IV out. After debating a few moments, he pulled the needle from the port and soon sticky dextrose from the IV bag was dripping onto the tiled floor. His eyes fell onto the breakfast tray that sat waiting for him. With a single swipe, the tray loudly clattered to the ground.

Next Nick pawed at the sheets and blanket that covered his body. Drawing the covers up he pulled the neatly tucked corners out from the end of the mattress. In a tantrum, Nick kicked his legs up and down wildly and he screamed - with his mouth closed - until the blankets fell off the bed.

“This is fucking crazy,” he cursed, slowly edging himself out of the torn up bed. Instead of stepping over the dishes Nick kicked the plate, instantly regretting it when the pain of his actions connected with his brain and he fell against the bed.

“Fuckin’ stupid shit!”

Nick limped into the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror, taking in his features.

“Are you okay in here?” a male voice called out.

Nick rolled his eyes at the remark. ‘Yah know there’s shit all over the room, the beds torn up. God what a dumbass.’

“Yup, I’m fine, just a little accident,” he lied.

“I’ll send housekeeping in to take care of this mess then,” came the reply back.

“Do whatever the fuck you want cause I’m leaving this hell hole as soon I get dressed,” Nick mumbled to himself directing his attention back to the mirror. “Carter you look like shit!”

Grabbing the toothbrush, Nick angrily squirted out toothpaste, half of it hit the brush the other half fell into a blue clump in the sink. Shoving the brush into his mouth, he instantly regretted his actions when it met up with the sores that lined the inside of his cheek. He mentally cursed himself and proceeded to gently scrub his teeth. Nick had grown accustomed to seeing blood mixed in with the foam from the toothpaste and quickly cupped a handful of cool water to rinse his mouth out.

Turning on the faucet to lukewarm water, he quickly lathered his hands and rubbed the soap over his face. All the time he was doing this Nick wondered why he even bothered. Feeling slightly refreshed, he limped back out into the room in search of the closet and his clothes.

“What the hell happened in here?”

Upon hearing the familiar voice, Nick stiffened in his tracks. Slowly, he turned towards the the doorway to see AJ, Brian, Kevin and Howie peering into the room.

He pasted a plastic smile on his face. “Hey guys.”

“What the heck happened in here Nick?” Brian questioned as they entered the room, stepping around the mess.

As he pulled his clothes from the closet, Nick tried his best to make light of the situation. “Oh, nothing, it was an accident.”

Looking at the torn up bedding, Kevin shook his head. He had seen this dozens of times living with Nick. Something had upset the kid and he flew into another one of his famous temper tantrums.

“So, as soon as I get dressed we can go, doc’s letting me go home.”

“Did she tell you that getting drunk wasn’t a good idea when you’re sick?” Kevin remarked in a serious voice, looking at his younger brother in a different way. He was starting to see things about Nick that he hadn’t noticed.

Nick nervously laughed it off. “Oh, I guess it’s not the best idea when you’ve got a cold so, yeah she kinda----”

Brian gently touched Nick’s shoulder and whispered into his ear. “They know.”

As he nodded, his face reddened at first from embarrassment then from anger.

“Nick, I had to tell them---”

“You had to tell them?” Nick questioned, angrily. “What the fuck gave you the right to tell anyone about me? First it was Lee and now you decide it’s time to tell the guys? What the fuck did I tell you? Do you fucking ever listen to anything I say?”

“Nick, I confronted Brian when I found your meds,” Kevin defended.

”My meds? Why the fuck were you snooping in my stuff?”

“I wasn’t snooping and that’s irrelevant, the fact is that we know about your ca.... your illness,” Kevin choked on trying to say cancer and opted to say illness.

“It’s cancer Kevin, can’t you fucking say it?” Nick taunted.

“Nick, come on,” Howie and Brian cried out, feeling uncomfortable about the emotions that were hanging in the room.

“Why didn’t you tell us, man?”

“So you can baby me? Nope, I don’t want that shit from anyone, especially from you guys,” Nick spat angrily.

The reality of the situation was becoming clearer to AJ as he took a longer, harder look at Nick. His skin had a dull effect and the features he used to joke about and say that he was getting fat had a different meaning to him now that he realized that the cancer story was true.

“We want to help you,” AJ stated softly.

“No one can help me,” Nick replied. “I’ll get through this on my own, okay?”

“Nick, quit being so goddamned stubborn, wouldja?” AJ shot back.

He could feel all eyes on him in the room. He dug at the strings on his neck that drew the blue hospital gown together. After successfully unknotting the string, Nick pulled down the left corner of the gown, exposing the port that was sticking out from under his collarbone. ”Take a good look, you like what you see?” The three that hadn’t seen the port before drew breaths in. Nick decided to expose everything since he felt like he was on display for their amusement. He pulled his arms out of the sleeves and let the gown drop to the floor. Nick directed his gaze towards AJ.

“See this?” He asked as he pointed to his bloated stomach. “This is what cancer does to you. This is all from cancer.”

“Nick...please, I’m sorry,” AJ rasped.

Nick’s gaze hardened. “I want all of you out of here! Show’s over, get the fuck out! NOW!”