Clichés are clichés for a reason.

Do the things you want to do.

Don’t do anything you don’t want to.

Eat the things you want to eat.

Be with the person who makes you the best version of yourself.

Live truthfully, as best as you can.

DO stop and smell the roses, and the coffee, and the scent of freshly cut grass. They really are the moments that make us smile.

Look in the mirror every morning and tell yourself, “I’ve got this.” Because you do.

Live your best life. It’s the only one you’ll get.

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Something is not quite right with James. Nothing obvious, but something nevertheless. I can feel it. He is distant, distracted, but when I ask him if he is OK he brushes me off, saying he is fine, it is nothing. But even though he is as attentive and loving as ever, I can’t shake the murky feeling that he is slipping away from me. The closer we get to the wedding the tenser he becomes.

The number of letters and packages arriving has doubled; it appears reader excitement for the wedding has reached fever pitch. When I was in hospital the magazine ran an article that basically implied I was plugged into machines and barely clinging onto life. Sensationalism at its best. I understand it sells copies, which is ultimately the magazine’s intention, but it doesn’t sit well with me. People up and down the country actually held candlelight vigils; Amanda shows me the photos that were uploaded on to the Facebook page. I am touched by their love, and terrified by it at the same time. These people care so much for me, someone they’ve never met. I worry that I don’t merit it.

A week before the wedding, Nadia herself comes to the house to find out how I am feeling and how the wedding prep is going. I am sullen and mutter monosyllabic, noncommittal answers in protest against her perceived lack of morals. If she notices she gives no sign of it. Mercifully, Kate and Mum are willing to discuss wedding details till the cows come home, so I leave Nadia in their capable hands and escape to the beach.

I head for the waterline and then turn south to walk alongside it. The tide is on the turn, making its way slowly back up the sand. Like the disease inside of me, its gain is indiscernible to the naked eye, but unrelenting.

It all feels like it has gotten out of hand. I am not the only person in this country dying of cancer. Far from it. According to statistics, over six hundred other people will die this year of breast cancer alone. I am just a number. A name on a list, a bar on a graph, a slice in a pie. I don’t know why people are interested in me especially, but they are. And as much as I want to tell Nadia it’s enough now, if reading about me makes just one woman do a self-exam on her breasts, or push her doctor for more tests, a second opinion, a proper diagnosis, then it will be worth it.