Jenna woke up the next morning, a smile on her face as she felt JC beside her.  He was curled up against her body, his arm wrapped around her waist as she lay on her back.

“Good morning,” he said sleepily.

“I wasn’t dreaming last night, was I?” Jenna wondered.

“Maybe?”

“No, I mean, you said something, we both did.  I just want to make sure it was real.”

“You mean when I told you I love you?” he answered, pulling her close and kissing her cheek.

“I love you too, but are you sure this isn't…”

“Isn’t what?”

“Because you feel bad for me?  It was one thing to make that 911 call, make sure I was ok.  But to be in a relationship with me after finding out they needed to do an MRI, there might be something…”

“You still have a lot of doubts, I know.  I would too, I guess.  If I WAS like that, you’d be sore and exhausted right now, and I would be gone without a trace.  That would have happened after the motorcycle ride up to my place, leaving my house in the morning and leaving you to Uber home, or just getting a hotel room or something.  Jenna, I genuinely care about you, I love you more than I probably should at this point.  The thought of losing you, I’m scared, Jenna.  You’re scared, it’s scary facing your own mortality.  Right now you’re wanting to protect yourself from being hurt by questioning if this is real between us.  I will be here until one of us is no longer living, and I hope to god it’s me, because I can’t imagine a life without you in it.”

“Wow, so romantic for 6AM…”

“I want to be open, honest, and up front with you.  You have enough on your mind right now with the MRI, I don’t want you worrying that I didn’t mean what I said, that this will be over once you’re back to normal.  I’m hoping it’s nothing and you’re back to normal soon, actually, so I can take you to events with me.  I’ve got a bunch of stuff coming up, and I’d like to take you with me.”

“Josh, I’m a teacher.  I can’t take time off work for things…”

“I’ll see what I can do, have Justin or myself pull some strings…”

“Josh, no.  I mean, I’d love to go with you to things, but if it’s going to interfere with work, I don’t know.”

“You don’t have to work.  I can just take care of you,” he said, nuzzling her neck.

“Josh. As great as that all sounds, we have no idea if they found anything, and if so, how bad it is.”

“You can’t think like that, though.  Life is too short, we’re dealing with that right now.  I’ve been through this before with my dad, and it made me realize to cherish things before they’re gone.  If it is as bad as you worry it is, I want to make the most of the time we have left.  I know that sounds sappy, but I do.  There’s a Halloween party that Eric throws every year, some charity fundraisers I’m going to, there’s a trip to New York planned.  I want you there beside me.  It’s mostly local, except the trip to New York, so maybe you won’t need to worry about time off except those days.”

“If I’m well enough, we’ll figure things out.  I don’t want to make promises and then back out because something happens.”

“That’s life though, isn’t it?  You make the plans you can, and if you have to cancel, then you do.  I don’t think anyone would fault you for that.”

“I need to get ready for work.   I need the distraction.”

“Babe, it’ll be ok, no matter what.  I love you, I mean it.  Nothing is going to change that.  I want you better so we can do things together.”

“I need to make my Instagram private soon, don’t I?”

“That’s up to you.”

“I have a fan account but very few people know it’s me running it, thankfully.  I don’t need THAT getting out.  Getting DMs every day, asking you to do this or that, asking for pictures of stuff.  I don’t know how Michael handles that.”

“He loves the attention,” JC smiled.

“I mean, obviously…” Jenna laughed.  “I’m gonna get ready for work, you wanna get coffee for you and cereal for me?”

“Won’t it get soggy?”

“I like it soggy.”

“Is that a euphemism?” JC laughed.

“Not sure for what, but I guess you’ll find out.  Throw clothes on, I don’t need Kelly seeing you in all your glory…”

“Another reason to get you back to my place, I don’t have to worry about shit like that.”

“I feel bad leaving Kelly.”

“We’ll figure things out.  It doesn’t have to be right away.  Maybe you live here, but stay at my place on the weekends.”

“I’ll think about it.  Tonight is our pizza and Friends night, that is sacred and not changing…”

“You got it, mama.  Go get ready for work.”

…

“How long do you think it’ll take to get the results back?” JC asked.

“I don’t know.  I made it a full day at work and now I’m back home in my comfy *NSYNC PJs.  I wanna try and forget as much as I can, enjoy the moment.”

“I feel bad, but I had something to do earlier that I didn't get to check in on Bronson and other stuff around the house.  I’ll be back in a bit, pizza in hand.  That ok?”

“Yeah.  I’ll get laundry started, at least ready to go whenever.  Hurry back.”

She gave him a quick peck before he headed out.  She sat down on the couch, scrolling through her phone, playing some games to try and pass the time.  She hoped JC wouldn’t be gone too long, knowing it would be at least an hour and a half with traffic and whatever he might need to do.

Her phone vibrated in her hand, seeing a number with the hospital.  She answered nervously.  It wasn’t good to have answers this soon, was it?

“Hello, this is Jenna…”

“Hello, I’m with Dr. Black’s office.  Normally we’d have you come in for an appointment, but with everything, we needed to speak to you over the phone and get things going.  We reviewed your scans from your last ER visit, and after looking at the MRI results, we have found a lesion on your brain that he believes is causing your problems with increased seizures, sitting on a part of your brain that is pressing on your brain and causing these seizures when medication should be preventing them.  It would explain the other symptoms you were complaining of as well.  We’d like you in tomorrow for a biopsy.  You’d report to the hospital and go to surgery.”

“Surgery?” Jenna gasped, almost choking on what she was hearing.

“Yes.  We’ll need to do a biopsy, so we’ll need to get the tissue.  If it’s benign and remains its current size, we may be able to find treatments to help keep your seizures at bay.  If it continues to grow or is cancerous, we will want to remove it as soon as possible.”

“Oh… ok…”

“I know it’s a lot to take in.  I apologize, but as soon as we got the results we wanted to contact you and get appointments going.  We’ll send the MRI results to your app so you have access to everything we just discussed, along with seeing when your surgery is scheduled for.  You might not be able to eat tonight if they schedule it for early in the morning, there needs to be at least 12 hours of fasting beforehand.  We’re working with surgical to get that scheduled now.”

“Thank you,” Jenna sighed, barely able to speak.

“We’ll be in touch, and see you tomorrow.”  The call ended, Jenna just sitting there.  Her mind went blank, in complete shock at what she’d just heard.  She wanted to cry, she wanted to scream, she wanted to call JC.  She did none of it, overwhelmed with a numbness emotionally that left her almost like an empty shell.

Soon her phone buzzed with an alert for her medical app from the hospital.  She couldn’t bear to open it, seeing the truth.  She just sat, waiting for JC to come back or for death to claim her quickly so this could all be over.

…

She eventually got up the courage to open the app, pull up the results.  Sure enough, the comments mentioned everything they discussed; a lesion found on her brain that was likely causing her symptoms.  A biopsy and further treatment would be pending the results of the biopsy.  It was all a waiting game, again.  As hard as it was waiting for the results of the MRI, she knew waiting for the results of the biopsy would be worse, take longer.

Jenna heard him unlock the door with her keys she’d given him, remaining unmoved on the couch.  He opened the door, a smile on his face. He had a pizza box in one hand, and a Pink Unicorn Smushmellow in the other. His grin faded when he saw the look on her face.

“Jenna? What’s wrong?”  he asked, coming into the apartment and closing the door behind him. He put the pizza down on the counter in the kitchen, and joined her on the couch. 

He put his hand under her chin, forcing her to look up at him. She really did have the most beautiful blue eyes he had ever seen. He wiped a tear away from her cheek with his thumb. 

“What’s this?” he asked softly.

She looked down at the ground, unable to speak. She picked up her phone and handed him the results of her MRI scan from the hospital. He looked at it and studied it for a moment, then swallowed hard. 

“It says that there is a lesion on your brain,” he said, trying to wrap his mind around what he had just read.

“They want me to check into the hospital in the morning for a biopsy…”  She could barely speak 

“A biopsy? They think it might be...” JC left that sentence alone.

“They don’t know. That’s why they want a biopsy," she said, shaking her head. He pulled her into his arms and held her there tightly. She melted into his embrace, needing his comfort. He ran his hand up her back, and into her hair holding the back of her head, and he brushed her lips with his softly.  His tongue teased her lips and they parted, allowing him access to her mouth, which he devoured hungrily.  She kissed him back passionately.

He stood and pulled her up with him, and picked her up into his arms and carried her to her bedroom.  He put her down gently on the bed, and laid down next to her. He brushed the hair out of her face, and tears started to stream down her cheeks. 

“No. No crying,” he whispered, kissing her forehead, and wiping her tears away with his hand. Their lips found one another’s again.  Several minutes later they both came up for air. 

“I’m so scared, Josh.  I know we were afraid of this with the MRI, but to find something…”

“It’ll be ok, baby.  I promise.”

“You can’t know that, Josh.  What if this is the worst possible scenario?”

Something clicked inside of him.  He had her to thank for what came out of his mouth next.

There ain't no darkness strong enough that could tear you out from my heart

There ain't no strength that's strong enough that could tear this love apart

He looked down at her, she was still the most beautiful thing he'd ever laid eyes on.

“Jenna, you are so beautiful. " His eyes filled with tears,  and he was suddenly overtaken with the emotion of the moment. The thought of losing her chilled him to the bone. He pulled her closer to him, as close as they could be with clothes still on.

"Make love to me, Josh." Jenna whispered into his ear. "Please, I need to be  with you.”