Warning: Please have tissues at your disposal. I bet so many of you will hate me after you read so, I am so sorry.
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Cancer.
*
He wasn't supposed to find out this way. He wasn't supposed to find out at all period. About four months ago Bethany was diagnosed with lung cancer, and just her luck it had been while Derek was on tour. She had thought long and hard about telling him or not but she had realized that the second she told him he would want to come home, but he worked so hard on the tour and she couldn't watch him just throw it all away because of her. No, she was going to beat Cancer, and that way Derek would never find out, he wouldn't treat her any different.
*
The only reason he had found was because of Julianne. And the only reason she knew was because Julianne had insisted they go to the hospital after Bethany was continuously throwing up after eating and getting dizzy, they had thought she could've been pregnant. It's ironic how something they had originally thought was going to be the best thing ever, turned out to be the worst nightmare. But Julianne had accompanied her to the hospital, expecting the news that she would soon have a baby niece or nephew running around, but the doctor had delivered the news that Bethany had lung cancer. Bethany had sworn Julianne to secrecy and it worked for months, that is until Bethany was told she could possibly only have three months of life left, Julianne cracked and told Derek. She couldn't bear the thought of Derek never getting to see Bethany again, well at least alive.
*
Julianne had flown out to Nashville where the next show in the tour had been planned, and broke the news to him and the rest of the tour mates after the show. They were all devastated but nobody could come close to what Derek was feeling. He screamed and cried, he punched walls, and when everybody was done crying after an hour or two, he was just getting started. He yelled at God to take him instead, and to leave Bethany. Julianne broke seeing her brother like this, but when he noticed she was still there, she got the scolding of her life for hiding the secret.
*
"Don't you get it Julianne, you hid this from me for FOUR MONTHS! I COULD'VE SPENT THAT TIME WITH HER, BUT NO! NOW I HAVE THREE MONTHS LEFT WITH THE LOVE OF MY LIFE BEFORE SHE'S GONE FOREVER, HAVE YOU THOUGHT ABOUT THAT!?!" Mark and Val pulled him to the couch watching him again break down. "Why didn't she tell me?" Julianne wanted to speak up, but she lost her voice, her apologies got stuck in her throat because she knew how wrong it was to keep the secret, even if her best friend begged her to keep quiet. Derek would never forgive her, and she would never forgive herself.
*
The tour was cancelled; none of the cast could bear to keep performing while one of their best friends was dying. They all made their way back to Los Angeles, desperate to see Bethany. They all walked in at the same time walking in to see her sleeping. She lay on the bed her eyes closed, about a hundred wires connected to her. Her skin once radiant, was now dull and had a grey coloring to it. Her hair once in tight curls and blond highlights, was now dull and lifeless, and her body once perfectly proportioned with perfect curves was now skin and bones. They were already crying, and they hadn't even been in her room for more than five minutes.
*
Their sniffling woke Bethany, to say she was upset was putting it mildly, she whipped her head around the room, "Why are you here?" Derek walked over to her, tears streaming down his face collapsing on her bed and pulling her into his arms, "Oh baby." "You weren't supposed to know, I was supposed to get better, I didn't want to ruin the tour!" Derek cried harder, his heart breaking because she had honestly thought the tour was more important than she was. He held her as they both cried, the rest of the group joining in. "Baby you're the most important thing in the world to me, I love you." Bethany looked reluctant to say it back, she didn't want to cause Derek any pain when her time came, she had to push him away, to save him the pain. She loved him so much, and this was the last thing she would do, for Derek.
*
She didn't answer him, she ignored him and the rest of the group. They didn't deserve the pain either. The doctor walked into the room, seeing the mass of visitors. "Can I talk to a family member of Bethany Mota? In my office please." Derek, Val, and Mark walked up as they were the ones that could keep their emotions in check. They followed the doctor through a maze of hallways, until they arrived at his office, he invited them to sit down, "We've noticed something in Bethany, though her cancer is at stage 3 which is where the cancer should be spreading, it's not. She is one of the few people that body's are strong enough to beat this type of cancer. We know she can beat it, she just needs the encouragement from you and her family. She can beat this, she's a fighter, but she's simply choosing not to fight. Tomorrow we will set her in for chemotherapy, we know she can do this." Derek let out a sigh of relief and exhaustion, they could do this, they could do this together, and that was what he was planning to do.
*
They thanked the doctor and hurried back to Bethany's room where they found her throwing up her food into a trash can. Their moods darkened considerably watching her deal with this. Derek still felt an ache in his heart every time he looked at Bethany's eyes. Her caramel colored eyes that had once been filled with wonder and light were now lackluster, like the life had been sucked out of them, no wonder she never posted on Instagram or YouTube anymore: that was how she kept the secret so long.
*
And that was how it was for the next month, Derek would go to the hospital every single say, Bethany was refusing to talk to him, she couldn't hurt him, she told herself. He watched her get worse and worse every passing day until one day he received a phone call, he felt his heart sink, scared of what would happen in he answered. "Heell-oo" he stuttered out. He heard the doctor start out, "We are so sorry-". He threw the phone at the wall, not wanting to hear more. He crashed down to the bed, crying uncontrollable tears. He punched the wall, he screamed. He couldn't believe it, Bethany deserved so much more life than she ever got. They never got a chance to get married, or have kids; he never even got the chance to propose to her.
*
Mark must've heard the noise and he walked in scared, "Derek" he asked, already thinking the worst. Derek just looked at him and nodded, and Mark crashed down to his knees to cry. They cried as long as they could, neither of them bothering to tell anybody else. That is, until the rest of the cast decided to drop by. They found Mark sitting on the couch in a ball, tear tracks down his face, but Derek, he was still going strong. He had left a path of destruction everywhere he went, he had broken mirrors, crashed down frames, they found him hugging a picture of Bethany on the stairwell, and that's when they knew.
*
They all fell the exact same way he did. And together they dealt with the pain, but nobody could reach whatever dark place Derek was in.
*
The funeral was horrible, Derek especially hated it. He knew Bethany wouldn't want them to mourn her death in all black; she would have wanted them to celebrate the life she lived. But he went to show respect, but in his own way he celebrated for Beth.
*
He played her songs, he posted on her Instagram, reminding everybody the extraordinary life she lived, reminding everybody not to forget the amazing person she was. The others did the same, they wanted to remember Bethany, they had each kept something small that had once belonged to her, Derek had kept the majority of the things, he had kept Winnie, he had kept her phone, he had even kept her clothes which he insisted still lingered with her scent.
*
Derek never found love again, he was still in love with Bethany, and he couldn't wait to see her again. He never tried to kill himself to be with her, for when in heaven with Beth, she would be so mad she wouldn't talk to him ever again, and what good would that be? He kept living, reminding people of Beth with a smile on his face, knowing that every day lived; was one day closer to her.
