Wish Upon A Star

"So how'd your parents tell ya?" Star asked, trailing her fingertips up and down Jeff's narrow chest as she lay beside him in bed.

"They didn't make a big production out of it. They just sat at my bedside and told me how it was going to be."

"Still, that's gotta be rough. For alla yous," Star murmured.

"Eh," Jeff made a dismissive sound, then waited for the ventilator to fill his lungs with sufficient breath for his next sentence. After an hour, Star was starting to get used to the way it interrupted the flow of their conversation. "You have a lot of leeway with an eight year old. It's not the same sense of loss as it is for an adult. They talked to a child psychologist about it once the doctors finally confirmed my injury was irreversible. The shrink said to just be straightforward."