“I have leukaemia.” Those were the first words out of Blake’s mouth after I answered the phone. “What? You’re lying to me,” I replied, praying
that he was. “Candy, I have leukaemia. Why would I lie about something like this?” At that moment, I burst into tears. He tried to tell me he would be
okay, that he was strong. But it was so hard for me to understand. Why does this happen to the best people, the ones who haven’t even lived their lives?
The next day at school, my friend Jessica handed me a red and blue ribbon, the kind you get off a perfume package. “Blake came over yesterday,
and he told me to give this to you. He said maybe you could wear it in your hair,” she told me, handing me the ribbon. I looked at it for a minute and
shrugged my shoulders, putting it inside my pocket. A month later, Blake was at a hospital about tow hours away from where we lived. I begged my
dad every weekend to take me to see him, and finally one day he told his boss he had to take afternoon off. I was thrilled. I wanted to give my best
friend a gift. But what? I pulled the ribbon out of my dresser drawer, found some scissors and clipped it into two pieces. I put one in my front pocket and
stuffed the other in an envelope, along with a letter explaining it to him. I told him to keep his half beside his bed, and I would keep mine near me, too. I
went into the hospital that day with a grin on my face the size of Texas. As i scrubbed my hands with disinfectant, I wondered if the ribbon would mean
anything to him. I walked in over to give him a long, hard hug. I handed him a teddy bear and the envelope. He opened the envelope and looked up at me.
“What is this?” he asked, a little bewildered. “Just read the letter,” I told him. We talked for a while and then he started looking tired, so I told him
that I had to leave and for him to get some rest. All the way home I held the ribbon close to me. That night, as I pulled off my jeans, I remembered the
ribbon still in my pocket. I took it out and folded it around my finger. And that is where it stayed all night. For the next four months, the ribbon was with
me everywhere I went: school, home, shopping, at friends’ houses, church and in bed. Where I went, it went. It was something to remind me that I had a
great friend who would be home very soon. Blake said that he wore his around his arm and sometimes kept it in his nightstand. He had it close to him
when he was being tested and treated and poked and prodded, when he lay scared at night that he might never get better and in the early morning when
he was thankful for another day. Finally, Blake came home! I was so happy. We went to see a movie, it was indescribable. That night, the ribbon was
still in my pocket. I had a feeling it would never leave, that I would never let go of what had kept me sane during that time we were apart. And I haven’t.
Q：Write down the main idea of the text here.
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