My sleep l last night had been complete shit. Everything was starting to catch up with me. Not that I wanted to miss any time with Ziggy, but it made it so difficult now that I knew how he felt about me. How he thought he felt about me.

I slept through my alarm and had no choice but to call Theresa and ask her to move my shift. Now I will be working an overnight shift the same day as Rebecca's engagement party. I clocked in at two in the afternoon, still trying to wake up. An alarm sounded from up the hall. I immediately started running.

I made it to Ziggy's room where Theresa and another nurse were already with him. He held a bin on his lap. Nausea again.

The monitor beeped loudly beside him. "What's . . . What's going on?" he asked me when I run over to him. His head hung with his fatigue.

"Your pulse is very low," I answered. He vomited into the bin and then panted. "Ziggy?" his head bobbed. "Hey, stay with me."

I leaned him upright, his sweat-soaked skin was cold and pale. His lips were cracked at white from lack of fluids.

"How long have you been feeling this way? Since this morning?" He gave me a weak nod. I looked over his chart in the computer and saw no logs for pills administered since last night. "Have you not been giving him the anti-nausea medication on schedule?" I asked the nurse.

"He didn't ask for them."

"He's been throwing up for hours. When was he supposed to ask?" I seethed. I grabbed the topical medication from the cart and administer it onto his inner wrists. His eyes attempted to focus on me from under his bald brow. I glared at the nurse before turning back to him. "This should help in a minute."

He looked dismayed, and I knew it won't be enough. Theresa looked at me and left to grab the intravenous version.

I climbed into the bed behind him and stroked my hands up and down his back. "Deep breaths, Ziggy." He nodded and did as I told him. He was in desperate need of relief. Theresa returned after a few moments and added the drug to his bag. "Deep breaths. In . . . and out." He leaned up and followed my breathing, exactly as instructed.

Over time, his breathing calmed. I rubbed the back of his neck to soothe him further. He looked at me over his shoulder.

"Getting better?" I asked him. He nodded. I glared at the other nurse. "You can leave now," I said through gritted teeth. Her brow furrowed with tears as she the room. Theresa followed after her to give her a proper lecture, or so I hoped. I wet a cloth and gently pressed it against his dry lips. He looked at me with a thankful expression as he took it from me, continuing to breathe deeply.

He leaned back against his pillows, wiping the sweat from his forehead. I opened the balm and dipped in a gloved finger. He moved the towel and I dabbed the ointment against his lips.

"I'm sorry I wasn't here," I said just above a whisper. He looked down at me and stroked my forearm with his hand.

"Mr. Ziegler," Dr. Mathews said as he walked in with Theresa. "How are we feeling?"

"Like death," he quipped. I glared at him.

"Well, that is not what we like to hear. It seems your blood counts are very low, which isn't unusual during your treatment. We'll give you a blood transfusion, and you should feel much better. In the meantime, we will delay your next round so you have more time to recover."

"Delay it?" Ziggy looked like he was going to cry. "More days of this?"

"Only a few, but we are getting closer. Just hang in there a little longer."

Ziggy suddenly covered his mouth his eyes widened just before leaned over the side of the bed and vomited onto the floor in front of the doctor's expensive shoes. Dr. Mathews patted him on the back.

"I'm so sorry," Ziggy apologized.

"Don't worry about it. We'll get you to feeling better as soon as we can."

"Great," Ziggy said weakly, slumping back onto his pillow, "because I'm getting really tired of this shit."

I didn't have a minute of downtime before the party. I sat down on a couch in the corner of the room. Todd's house was amazing—old, with the antique charm of built-in bookcases, and cherry wood at all the door frames and crown molding. The hectic pace of the party's preparation nearly did me in. I was exhausted. Between taking care of Ziggy and dealing with the co-dependence and transference that seems to be happening between us, I had no energy left for small talk with strangers.

With the speeches over, my tiredness took over. I had been nursing the same glass of wine for the last hour, knowing I was just a few hours away from the second half of my shift. I covered my yawn with my hand.

"There you are!" Rebecca came over.

I stood quickly and plastered a happy smile on my face. "You found me."

"Your speech was so great, Sabs," she cooed. "I would have let myself cry if I didn't think my mascara would run."

"Well, we wouldn't want that."

That speech left me in tears when I wrote it, but emotions always seemed optional for her. Though I usually admired that trait, I was not in the mood to deal with her brand of candor.

Todd came over and wrapped his arm around her waist. "I hope my favorite couple is having a wonderful night," I say to them both.

"We are," Rebecca smiled gleefully and kissed Todd's cheek. I covered up another yawn.

"You look tired," Todd said to me.

"Honestly, I'm exhausted."

Max walked over to join in our small circle. I felt my smile droop. I knew Todd and Max were friends. That was how we had met before our short series of dates. But tonight, Todd told me Max would be one of his groomsmen. Spectacular news. "Hey, Sabs. How's it going?" he said, trying to be nice. In his defense, he was making it the least awkward it could possibly be.

"It's going," answered with a smile.

"Are you still dealing with your obnoxious patient?" Rebecca asked.

"He isn't obnoxious. He just . . . doesn't have a support system other than me."

"All you do is take care of him every day at work, and then you're too tired to do anything else. That's not healthy."

"That's my job," I shrugged.

"You're still dealing with Ziggy?" Max asked. I started to answer but Rebecca cut me off.

"It's not your job to give your entire life over to this guy. He's needy and inconsiderate," she said.

"He's sick. Of course he's needy."

"Can he not occasionally find someone else? You're not his only nurse. He's going to make you sick by stressing you out this much. "

I sighed with annoyance and took a swig of my warm wine.

"Max said he got on stage at his party and told all his friends they were pieces of shit," Todd prodded.

"Literally. In those exact words," Max agreed. "After he took her upstairs and tried to fuck her."

"What?" Rebecca and Todd said at the same time.

I shook my head with exasperation. "He did not try to fuck me," I lied, though no one seemed to be listening to me.

"He did all that, and you can still bear to be around him all the time?" She looked at with a suspicious sneer. "I know the guy's hot, but this seems like too much trouble."

"It isn't like that."

"It seems like it is."

I gripped my glass so tight I feared it would break. "Ziggy doesn't have any family and he doesn't have close friends. Someone has to be there for him," I insisted.

Rebecca smiled at me as if she'd won a case. "And now you're defending him."

"I'm not defending him," I say too defensively.

"Yes, you are!" The humor faded from Rebecca's face. "You are letting him use you. Period, full stop."

"He has cancer! What do you expect me to do, let him die alone?"

"If you want to bend over backward to take care of some dying guy for your own karma, then go ahead. But even if you manage to keep him from dying, it's not going to make up for what happened with your mom." My heart stuttered in my chest at the mention of my mother.

I glared at her, completely shocked by her audacity. "What?"

She looked guilty. "I didn't mean it like that."

"Then how did you mean it, Becca?" She started to save face, but I didn't care to hear it. " I'm too tired to deal with this right now. I'm just going to call it a night."

"Sabs, don't go."

I sat down my wine glass. "Congratulations again, you two," I said as kindly as I could manage while fighting back tears, then I left.

I stormed outside, knowing I would still have to stand in the yard while I called an Uber. I pull out my phone and started to cry.

"Sabs!" I turned to see Max running towards me. I wiped my tears to tried to keep him from seeing me cry. "Let me give you a ride."

"No, you should stay."

"I'll come back after a give you a ride," he insisted, pulling his keys from his pocket.

"No, Max. If you leave Becca will be even more upset with me."

"Okay, well . . ." His eyes drifted over me. I didn't know if he saw me as a past fuck or a charity case. "Don't let that guy take advantage of you. It's not selfish to take a step back and care of yourself for a while."

I nodded. "I know."

"Do you?" He took a few steps backward and then turned to go back inside.