Julia looked up at the same old ceiling that she had been looking up at for the most of her childhood. There was a crack that she could just see out of the corner of her left eye, where the plaster had fallen out, leaving a paler patch in the ivory ceiling in the shape of a star. She traced its line as it wound through the old glow in the dark stars that her father had stuck up there when she had first fallen sick, back when she had expected to heal and be back on her feet in less than a week because it’s just a cold, Julie, you’re going to be running around with Gina and Fanny in no time! It had not been just a week. It had been two years of hospital visits and constant fatigue and sickness and – Julia blinked, the fog in front of her eyes clearing. She could feel the soft material of her quilt and her beanie, suddenly feeling too rough on her sensitive skin. “Julie,” her mother called, her voice softly breaking through the silence. “Are you awake?” She turned her head to look over at the door where her mother’s head hovered through a crack. She looked tired, dark circles under her eyes and her straight brown hair falling out of the banana clip that held it back from her face. “I am,” she whispered, her voice cracking slightly. She swallowed, pushing herself up in bed. “What is it, Mum?” Caroline walked in and took a seat at her daughter’s bedside, reaching out to feel her cold hand like it was an ingrained habit. She looked nervous, shaken. “How do you feel today?” she asked, still in that same soft voice, as if anything else would make Julia shatter. Like she was a fragile piece of glass. Julia considered the question for a moment. After years of sickness, she had gotten used to actually thinking about how her body felt, about how she felt about it. And she knew that what she could feel was not the best. “Not great,” she admitted. “Everything hurts a little more.” Every breath she sucked in felt like a monumental mountain she had to climb, like she was not going to be able to settle the churning in her stomach. Her mother’s face dropped just a little bit more, and Julia caught the tears before she blinked them away and plastered a smile on her face. “The results of your check-up aren’t showing much progress,” she admitted, sounding like the words had been torn out of her reluctant throat. “But it hasn’t gotten worse either.” Julia closed her eyes and let the words sink into her like sticky quicksand sucking her down into uncertainty and silence once more. * The wind is cool and sharp on Julia’s face, bringing a healthy blush into her cheeks. Her eyes, which had been dull and tired in the three years she had spent in and out of the hospital, glimmer with renewed interest and life. Fanny glances at her out of the corner of her eyes, watching her stand, motionless on the rocks against which the waves crash. The spray dampens her jeans, but Julia does not move. “How does she look?” Gina asks, walking up from behind her with their ice creams in her hands. She hands the chocolate cone to Fanny and stands to look at Julia. “Peaceful, I think,” Fanny replies. She leans slightly into Gina. “It’s strange.” “Why?” “She thought she’d die, but she’s alive, and she’s doing all of this, but she doesn’t look excited or happy at all.” Gina sighs and looks out at the raging sea, the steel-grey skies the same colour as Julia’s eyes. “I can’t tell what she’s thinking,” she says, shrugging off her jacket. “But I can tell she’s getting cold.” “Hey, Julie,” Fanny says, stepping up beside her and slipping an arm around her waist. “You’re starting to shiver, girl.” Gina drapes her coat over Julia’s shoulders and comes to stand at her other side, leaning her head on her shoulder. “What’s going on in that head of yours?” she asks softly, rubbing Julia’s cold fingers between her hands. Julia turns to her with the brightest smile on her face.  “I’m alive, Gina,” she says, and the wonder in her voice nearly breaks Gina’s heart all over again. She exchanges a glance with Fanny behind her back, a glance that speaks of the days they had waited outside the room, listening to Julia’s soft crying behind the door, until she was ready to see them and pretend like everything was fine. “I’m seeing the ocean. I can feel the wind in my hair.” Julia’s hand rises to wind through the short brown strands as if in a trance. “I’m alive, and it’s beautiful.” * “What do you mean, she’s not getting better?” Fanny asked, wringing her hands together. She bounced on the balls of her feet, her soft soles squeaking slightly on the hospital floor. “Ma’am?” Caroline ran a hand through her hair and pinned it back haphazardly with her banana clip. “Yeah,” she exhaled, finally dropping her hands. “They want her back in here for observation, so she’s not gonna be coming home for a bit.” Gina grabbed her arm, her fingers digging into her skin in her anxiety. “But she’ll come out some time, right?” she asked, her voice uncertain. “They said you caught it early enough, that she’ll be better soon!” Julia’s mother looked worn out, Fanny noticed. As hard as it was on them, it must have been harder on her by a thousand times.  “We’ll keep her company, ma’am,” Fanny said, making up her mind. “We don’t mind.” Beside her, Gina nodded almost violently, her neck cracking with the sound. “We’ll get her stuff so she doesn’t fall behind, and she’ll - we’ll keep her company.” Caroline’s eyes filled with tears that she quickly blinked away. “Thank you so much,” she said gratefully. “There’s so much I want to do for her, but -” “What does she want to do?” Gina interrupted. “What can she do for herself?” * Julia’s eyes widen at the sight of the ice cream in Gina’s hand. “What flavour is that?” she asks, staring at the swirls of pink on the white cream, and the almonds and cherries that sit on top of the rapidly drooping cone. “Raspberry and vanilla, but with cherry pie filling mixed in,” Gina says a little too gleefully. “You want to try the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my life?” Fanny groans and pushes at Gina’s shoulder. “The girl’s just gotten better, you want to give her diabetes now?” “I want to eat it,” Julia says breathlessly. “I will.” They watch her take the cone with almost reverent hands, and Gina and Fanny have to bite back a grin at the way her eyes roll up into her head when she takes her first mouthful. “God, this is amazing,” she moans, and then digs back in. “I can’t believe I’m actually eating it.” The sea spray hits their faces and they laugh, crowding together to protect Julia’s ice cream from the salt. Gina and Fanny think they can pretend that the salt on their faces is from the waves. * “I think I’m going to die,” Julia told them in a very matter-of-fact way when they walked into her room. She had been moved back home, and it was very jarring to see the thin, nightgown-clad figure lying in her familiar bed with the flowery bed sheets and the bright blue wall paint. Her half-finished piece of crochet hung off her table, the yarn unspooling in twisted loops of red under her desk. She had a beanie on her head, covering her closely shorn hair, and Fanny recognised the pattern as being the one that she had sent Julia before everything went downhill. “Nonsense,” Gina said, briskly moving a sweater off the chair so she could sit in it and swivel around to look at Julia. She met Fanny’s glance as she climbed onto the bed, sitting near Julia’s feet. “Everyone looks at me with this - this weird pity on their faces,” Julia said. “I don’t think they think I’m going to be alright.” Fanny covered the hitch in her breath with a cough. “I think you should make a list of what you want to do when you get better,” she said, leaning forward. “And Gina and I can make as many of those happen as we can.” Julia raised a sceptical eyebrow. “You sure about that?” “You’re still alive,” Gina said firmly. “You’re gonna make that list, and Fan and I are gonna make it happen.” * “Hey, Julia. Look at this.” Fanny tugs insistently at her hand until she stops and turns, losing sight of Gina for a moment. She knows Gina will notice and come back, but before she can even begin to articulate the thoughts in her head, she spots what Fanny had stopped her for. A long-haired ragdoll cat sits on a basket, the wind from the sea ruffling its pure white fur. Its eyes are a brilliant blue, and seem to fix on Julia with a transparent curiosity.  “Do you want to pet her?” the woman beside the basket asks, smiling gently at them. “Yes please,” Julia breathes, and sinks down to her knees to reach out. The cat sniffs her fingers and then leans all the way forward to rub its head against her hand. Her breath catches, and she gently begins to scratch behind its ear. A low purring comes from its chest. “Her name is Joy,” the woman says, leaning forward to scratch her under the chin. “She’s barely a couple of months old. She really loves the sea.” “Hi Joy,” Julia murmurs, her fingers running over the soft fur at her neck. “I’m Julia.” Fanny stands back with Gina, and they watch the brightness in Julia’s eyes return, the stiffness in her shoulders relax, the tone of her voice turn softer. Somehow, in that moment, it sinks in for them too. Julia is alive, and she’s petting a cat on the beach. * “Mum?” Julia sounded hoarse even to herself. She didn’t turn from where she was lying in her bed, facing the wall. The curtains over the window shifted slightly in the breeze from outside. The summer sun shone through the chinks in the cloth, but Julia closed her eyes against it. It hurt. “Yeah, sweetheart?” “I think I know what I want to call that list Gina and Fanny want me to make.” She was proud of herself for the way her voice stayed steady, but she couldn’t stop the slight shudder in her shoulders when she heard her mother’s shaky breath behind her. Her hand was warm, even through all the layers on Julia, when she placed it on her shoulder. “What do you want to call it?” she asked, and her voice was steady too. “It’s my list of impossibilities.” Caroline’s hand continued to rub soothing circles onto Julia’s shoulder. “What do you mean?” Julia finally turned around, capturing her mother’s hands in her own. She was all slender fingers and thin bones, worn down by the stress of the last couple of years. It wasn’t just Julia who had lost herself. Everyone around her had things they wanted but couldn’t do. “It’s - I don’t think I’ll live long enough to do all of them again,” she said quietly, and finally met her mother’s eyes. They were dry, a slight frown creating a crease in between her eyebrows. “Do you truly - truly believe that?” she asked in response, not looking away. Julia flinched. The thing was - she didn’t know what else she could do but use a list of impossibilities to mourn her future. * “I want to go in the boat again,” Julia says, crossing her arms across her chest and taking a solid stance on the boardwalk. Gina and Fanny look at her with matching expressions of disbelief. “We tried to ask you so many times,” Gina begins, throwing her arms up in the air. “But you kept turning us down!” Fanny continues, her hands on her hips. “And now? You -” Gina sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose between her fingers. “Really, Julia? Now?” Julia looks so hopeful in that moment, the setting sun sending streaks of red and orange across her face and hair. Her top flutters in the breeze, and the simple rings in her ears glimmer in the golden light. “Fine, I’ll go buy another ticket,” Fanny groans. “But this is the last time, Julia! We’ll be late for our reservation at the restaurant if we go again.” Julia nods, her face splitting into a giddy, joyous grin. They can’t even stay mad at her, not when she stands in the stern of the boat and closes her eyes as it cuts through the water, the spray wetting her clothes even more.  She laughs, a loud, free sound that echoes across the sea, and Fanny and Gina think they have never heard a more beautiful sound. “This is so wonderful,” Julia whispers, staring with wide-eyed wonder at the sun sinking into the ocean in front of her. The boatman brings it to a steady halt, so the gentle rocking under their feet allows Fanny and Gina to stand up and walk up to her, joining her at the railing. “Do you see it?” she asks, not tearing her gaze away. Gina pulls her own dark sea-wet curls away from her face while Fanny pushes her sunglasses onto the top of her head, and they join her in watching the sunset. “We do,” Fanny says. “We do, girl. We see it too.” There are tears in Julia’s eyes. “I never thought I’d see such a beautiful sunset.” Gina pulls her into a one-armed hug and leans her head against hers. “Take it all in, then. Because it’s right there, and you’re seeing it.” * “Going on a drive is so basic,” Fanny said, taking a pencil to Julia’s list. They were in her hospital room, waiting for the results of her latest tests. “Come on, Julie, I know you can think of more stuff. I mean, ice cream? Watching a spring sunset? A boat ride?” Julia groaned and leaned back into her pillows. “You know it’s stuff I think I’m never gonna get to do, right?” Gina smacks her hand gently with her own fancy pen with feathers out of the back. “It’s stuff you’re definitely going to do, so zip it.” “Your mum said the doctors are hopeful.” Fanny scribbled something in the margins of the paper on her lap, and then reached out to grab a piece of the peeled apple that Caroline had left on the side table before she went out to talk to the doctors. “Cautiously optimistic.” “They were that before it all went down too,” Julia said, frowning at the IV stuck in her arm. “And now I’m here, with more chemicals than blood in my veins.” “You exaggerate,” Fanny said. “Gina, what are you doing?” Gina looked up from the bag she was rummaging through. “I wanted to give Julia something, but I can’t find it.” “What is it?” Julia asked, leaning over to look over the edge of the bed into the bag on the floor. “A postcard,” Gina said, sticking her arm all the way in and searching. “My brother sent me a card from the beach, and I want to show you. So we could - aha!” She pulled out a mildly crumpled postcard and flattened it on Julia’s blanket. Fanny abandoned the list and came over to look at it. “We could do this,” Gina finished, pointing to the picture on the back. It was the silhouettes of people in front of a setting sun on the beach, jumping into the air, arms out in casual abandon.  Julia ran her fingers across the glossy picture, her lips pursed. “Fan, did you - did you read the rest of the list?” she asked pensively. “I did,” Fanny replied, just as softly. “Are you sure about it, Julia?” Julia gave her a small smile. “It’s supposed to be a list of impossibilities to me, Fanny. What’s more impossible than an ice cream on the beach, and a bunch of wild adventures on the sea?” Gina picked up the abandoned list. “We’re gonna get you a cat,” she declared. “Just so you can have a capital M moment.” “And the food.” “And the food.” Julia sank back into her pillows, her chest feeling too tight to breathe. She couldn’t tell if it was the tightness of her own sickness and her body failing her, or the warm tightness of realising that people hadn’t really given up on her. It was a list of impossibilities, but it had begun to look just a little bit more possible now. * “Someone’s getting married on the beach,” Gina gasps, sticking her nose against the glass window that their table is in front of. Julia blinks, laying down her fork. It has only been a couple of months since she was fully cleared to wander around, free of the constraints that had shackled her for three years. It will take time for her appetite to return, especially given the snacks she allowed herself to indulge in, savouring every moment of feeling, like she would never be able to do it again. Gina’s exclamation comes at an opportune moment - she can lay her fork down without awkward questions about how tired she is. “On the beach?” Fanny asks, leaning forward so she can see out of the window too. “How did we - oh! Julia, look!” Julia sees that an entire section of the beach has been cordoned off, and soft, golden fairy lights twinkle in the twilight sky. They sway gently, looking like a swarm of fireflies lighting up the darkness. In the distance, the moon reflects off the ocean, and the waves are softer than they have been all day. The bride is laughing, throwing her head back as the bridesmaids hand her the bouquet. She is barefoot, and her dress is simple and white, stopping above her knees. She all but runs over to where the groom stands waiting, dressed in an equally casual outfit, the legs of his pants rolled up. They laugh again when she reaches him, and he holds her like she is a precious jewel, cradled in his arms. “Fanny? Gina?”  They turn to look at me, probably sensing the weird note in her voice. “I’m really happy I’m alive,” Julia says, and her heart feels ready to burst. “I’m so happy my list of impossibilities became possible, that I could go to the sea, that I could walk with a cat, that I could eat the ice creams, that I could eat all of this, that I could do it all with you.” Gina has tears in her eyes, and Fanny is gently patting her arm, blinking her own eyes to clear them. Julia smiles, and looks back out at the couple, who are dancing slowly under the moonlight now, so close together that they make a single shadow on the beach. “I’m changing the name of my list,” she says. “It’s my list of possibilities, now. And there’s so much I want to add to it, because I’m alive.” She sniffs, and Gina and Fanny both reach out to hold her hand. The tears finally come, and she looks at them both with brimming eyes and speaks with a voice that cracks under the weight of the emotion she feels. Gratitude, happiness, sorrow. She remembers mourning a future she thought she would never have, and she remembers doing everything she thought she would die before doing again. She remembers the people who pulled her into their orbit as they believed in her and her life. “I’m so glad I get to live again.”