All Chapters of The Art of Jessica Jane: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

The following week felt lighter.Not perfect.Not magical.Just... lighter.Jessica had started noticing that life no longer felt quite as heavy to carry.Not all the time.There were still bad moments.Still mornings where old memories sat quietly on her chest before she'd even opened her eyes.Still nights where sleep came slowly.Still days where sadness arrived for reasons she couldn't explain.But there were good moments too now.Real ones.Small ones.Moments she hadn't noticed before.Like Sophie nearly falling down lecture steps because she was trying to eat a sandwich and talk at the same time.Like sitting in cafés while rain tapped softly against windows.Like laughing until her stomach hurt because Sophie had somehow started another argument with a vending machine.Jessica still wasn't entirely sure how somebody argued with objects.Apparently Sophie had a gift."You know," Jessica said one afternoon, "most people lose arguments with people."Sophie looked offended."The m

Jessica stopped walking.For a second she couldn't move at all.Her mother stood near the reception area clutching her handbag tightly against her chest.Too tightly.Her shoulders looked small.Smaller than Jessica remembered.Her hair was untidy, as if she'd been running her hands through it over and over again.Her eyes were red.Not slightly red.The kind of red that came from hours of crying.Jessica felt something twist painfully inside her chest.Because suddenly she wasn't twenty anymore.Suddenly she was eleven.Standing at the top of the stairs.Watching her mother break apart all over again."Mum."Her mother's head lifted immediately.Then she crossed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around Jessica so tightly it almost hurt.Jessica froze for half a second.Then hugged her back.Her mother was shaking.Actually shaking."Oh thank God."Jessica frowned."Mum, what happened?"Her mother pulled back slowly.For a moment she didn't answer.Just looked at her.Loo

Jessica stood frozen in the doorway.For a second she simply stared.Because after everything that had happened, after panic and hospitals and words like mass and tests, some part of her had expected Daisy to look different.Smaller somehow.Fragile.Broken.But she didn't.Not really.She looked pale.Tired.Her hair was messy and pushed back unevenly from her face.A hospital blanket covered most of her body and there were wires attached to machines beside her bed.But she still looked like Daisy.Still looked like the little girl who used to colour grass orange and skies purple.Still looked like the little sister who used to climb into Jessica's bed after nightmares.Still Daisy.And suddenly Jessica couldn't breathe properly again.Not because of fear this time.Because of relief.Huge relief.The kind that hurt."Jess?"Daisy frowned slightly."Why are you standing there looking weird?"Jessica let out a strange sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob.Then crossed the room im

The Longest MorningJessica woke with a stiff neck and a dull ache between her shoulders.For a moment she didn't know where she was.The unfamiliar ceiling.The strange smell.The constant beeping.Then it came back.Hospital.Daisy.The biopsy.Her stomach tightened instantly.She looked across the room.Daisy was already awake.Staring out of the window.Neither spoke immediately.Neither needed to.The day was sitting between them.Heavy.Waiting."Morning," Daisy said eventually.Jessica frowned."You look terrible."Daisy rolled her eyes."Good morning to you too.""You genuinely do.""Thanks."Jessica stood and stretched."Have they fed you?""They tried."Jessica immediately understood.Hospital food.Enough said.A faint smile appeared on Daisy's face.It disappeared just as quickly.The smile wasn't the problem.The waiting was.Everything felt like waiting now.Waiting for nurses.Waiting for doctors.Waiting for tests.Waiting for answers.Jessica hated waiting.Waiting ha

The next morning arrived grey and cold.Jessica woke to the sound of rain tapping against the hospital window.For a moment she forgot where she was.Then she saw Daisy asleep across the room.And remembered.The biopsy.The waiting.The results that still hadn't arrived.Her stomach tightened immediately.Nothing had changed.And yet everything felt different somehow.Paris had slipped quietly into her thoughts overnight.Not loudly.Not as a plan.More like a question.A possibility.Something she'd almost forgotten people were allowed to have.Dreams.Jessica stood and stretched carefully.Her back protested.Apparently hospital chairs were designed by people who hated human beings.Daisy stirred."You look ancient."Jessica laughed."There she is."Daisy opened one eye."You made a noise.""A noise?""A very old noise."Jessica rolled her eyes."You're lucky you're sick.""That's what everyone keeps saying."The words came out lightly, but something in Daisy's expression changed a