The Fault in Our Stars

whole thing.”
“Which whole thing?” he asked, turning to me. The cigarette dangled unlit from the
unsmiling corner of his mouth.
“The whole thing where a boy who is not unattractive or unintelligent or seemingly
in any way unacceptable stares at me and points out incorrect uses of literality and
compares me to actresses and asks me to watch a movie at his house. But of course there
is always a hamartia and yours is that oh, my God, even though you HAD FREAKING
CANCER you give money to a company in exchange for the chance to acquire YET
MORE CANCER. Oh, my God. Let me just assure you that not being able to breathe?

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SUCKS. Totally disappointing. Totally.”
“A hamartia?” he asked, the cigarette still in his mouth. It tightened his jaw. He had a
hell of a jawline, unfortunately.
“A fatal flaw,” I explained, turning away from him. I stepped toward the curb,
leaving Augustus Waters behind me, and then I heard a car start down the street. It was
Mom. She’d been waiting for me to, like, make friends or whatever.
I felt this weird mix of disappointment and anger welling up inside of me. I don’t
even know what the feeling was, really, just that there was a lot of it, and I wanted to
smack Augustus Waters and also replace my lungs with lungs that didn’t suck at being
lungs. I was standing with my Chuck Taylors on the very edge of the curb, the oxygen
tank ball-and-chaining in the cart by my side, and right as my mom pulled up, I felt a hand
grab mine.
I yanked my hand free but turned back to him.
“They don’t kill you unless you light them,” he said as Mom arrived at the curb.
“And I’ve never lit one. It’s a metaphor, see: You put the killing thing right between your
teeth, but you don’t give it the power to do its killing.”
“It’s a metaphor,” I said, dubious. Mom was just idling.
“It’s a metaphor,” he said.
“You choose your behaviors based on their metaphorical resonances . . .” I said.
“Oh, yes.” He smiled. The big, goofy, real smile. “I’m a big believer in metaphor,
Hazel Grace.”
I turned to the car. Tapped the window. It rolled down. “I’m going to a movie with
Augustus Waters,” I said. “Please record the next several episodes of the ANTM marathon
for me.”

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