“Ludicrous?” her dad finishes. “Insane? Not happening?”
“Charles, stay calm.” Sherri touches his chest with a hand. Looks up into his eyes, a plea in hers. “I know how you’re feeling. But let’s just stay calm and figure this out together, okay?”
“There’s nothing to figure out, Sherrilynn. She’s nineteen. She’s not getting married. And certainly not to some playboy celebrity she literally just met half an hour ago.”
I can’t help a flash of hurt and irritation at being pigeonholed. “I’m not a playboy, sir. With all due respect, I’m not like that.”
“I know my daughter has had a silly crush on you for years. She plays your videos on repeat. She’s watched all your movies. You’re just taking advantage of that. But she’s not a plaything for you, buddy.” He straightens and puffs out his chest, anger blazing in his eyes. “She’s my daughter. She’s a teenager. She’s sick. She’s…innocent. And I’m not going to let you take advantage of her.”
Jo is quiet, but fierce. “Dad, stop.” She steps between us. “I’m not a child.”
“You’re my child.”
She swallows hard—I can hear it. “Daddy, please. It’s not like that. He’s not taking advantage of me. How could he? If I asked him to leave, he would.”
“So then ask him to leave.”
“No. I will not.” She stays quiet. “Was it a celebrity crush when I’d never actually met him? Yeah, it was. Was I thinking my dumb video would actually be seen by him? No? Could I have ever in my wildest dreams ever imagined this would happen? Heck no! This is as much a shock to me as it is you.”
“I don’t understand what’s happening.” Her dad whispers this to her. “You don’t know him. You can’t marry him.” He swallows, licks his lips. “You’re sick, sweetheart.”
Jo laughs, a quiet sniff. “Dad, I know.” She puts her hands on his shoulders. “That’s why.”
“It doesn’t make sense.” He shakes his head. “You can’t. You need…you need us. You need to be taken care of when…” He shakes his head, clears his throat. “Jolene, baby. This is just not happening. You can’t marry a man you just met literally half an hour ago. It’s crazy.”
“That’s why I have to do it! I’ve spent my whole freaking stupid life being ruled by this damn disease! It’s defined me. I never went to a normal school. I never had normal friends. All my friends except Bethany are cancer kids. I never went to homecoming or prom. I’ve never been asked out. I’ve never been reckless or—or irresponsible. I couldn’t! I was always in the freaking hospital! I couldn’t even leave our house half the time either because I was recovering from chemo or radiation or because my immune system was so jacked up from everything that going out in public would risk me getting even sicker. You guys took me on a tour of the world that was beyond anything I could have dreamed of, and you will never know how much that’s meant to me. You can’t. I know I’ve said thank you, but that doesn’t cut it.”
She grips his shirt in her fists.
“What you have to understand is that I’ve never done anything crazy or irresponsible. I want to do this. I know it makes no sense. But he showed up and we have a connection. We have chemistry. I like him—him, Dad. Not the celebrity, but him, the person I can see he is in the short time I’ve known him. I want to be a little crazy just once in my life. I want to risk my heart.” Her voice is thick. “I want to be looked at the way he looks at me. I like the way he holds my hand.” She looks at me briefly, then back to him. “And…and maybe we get married. And maybe I…maybe I don’t want to be…innocent, Dad.” She pushes him a little. “I want to have something like a life. I want to do something just because I want to do it, and not think about my disease. This is my chance. And I’m going to take it.”
Charlie turns away, paces a few steps across the kitchen, then stops. Rubs the back of his neck. “How am I supposed to say no to you, Jo?” He pinches the bridge of his nose. “I want you to have that, the chance to…I don’t know. Do something normal. Although, by any metric, this is far from normal. But I get that you want to do something just for you. But baby girl, there are…practical considerations. You do have to think about reality. I’m not trying to burst your bubble, here, but—”
Jo cuts in. “Dad, I am thinking about reality. And honestly, I have no idea what happens next or how any of this is going to go. I don’t think Wes does either. But no matter what, I’m not going to just run off and leave you guys.” She ducks her head. “I haven’t forgotten that I’m dying, Dad. It’s not something you can just forget. And…when the time comes, you’ll be with me. But I do also want to spend whatever good days I have left…some of them, at least, with Wes.” She glances at me. “There’s a connection there, Dad. I can’t explain it. But it’s real.”
Charlie sighs. “You don’t have to explain it to me, honey.” He glances at his wife. “I knew from the moment I met your mother that I was going to marry her. It was like a voice in my head, in my soul, and the very first time I saw her, I heard that voice saying, ‘that’s it, she’s the one. Marry her. Don’t let her get away.’” His gaze goes back to Jo. “And I think if…if I’d known one of us only had a certain, limited amount of time, I think—I know—that I wouldn’t have waited, no matter how crazy anyone else may have thought it was.”
“This conversation is the closest you’ve ever come to acknowledging out loud, to me, that I’m terminally ill,” Jo says. “And I’m not sure I like it. You’ve always just been…cheerfully determined to pretend everything is normal, and honestly, Dad, that’s all that’s kept me sane, some days. It’s allowed me to pretend I’m normal, and when you’re anything but normal, that’s a real gift.”
Charlie’s shoulders shake. “I love you, Jo-Jo-bean. So much. I’ll do anything for you.”
“Even letting me marry a playboy celebrity I just met?” She shoots me sly, teasing smile when she says this.
“If it’s really what you want, then yes, honey, even that.” He breathes out slowly. “I just don’t want to see you get hurt, honey.”
She snorts. “Look at it this way, Dad—I’m not really risking anything in this. I’m not gonna be around long enough to get my heart broken, right? He is,” she says, jerking a thumb at me, “but I’m not.”
Charlie’s eyes narrow, and he flinches as if struck. “Jolene Park! I don’t find that very funny.”
“Neither do I, as a matter of fact,” I say.
Jo sighs. “I’m sorry. But honestly, it’s not entirely a joke.”
“Even less funny,” Charlie says. “I know humor is one of the ways you process this, but it’s hard for your mother and I to joke about it.”
“I know.” A sigh. “I know. I’m sorry.”
Charlie turns to me. “And you, Mr. Britton. You are aware of what you’re getting yourself into, right? This isn’t a normal situation. You can’t just pull my little girl into your orbit for a little while and then move on when you get bored. Now don’t get testy,” he says, seeing the protest appearing in my expression. “I don’t know you from Adam, so I’m just covering my bases. I feel like it’s my bound duty to say the things even she herself may not say. My daughter has the biggest heart in the world. She’s the most joyful, caring, positive person I’ve ever known. She’s suffered more than just about anyone I know, and yet I’ve never heard her complain. So, I’ll say this for her: if you can’t see this through, then you have no business even trying.”