Питер Мэй - A Silent Death

Cristina turned off the A7 at Aldi and followed the cracked tarmac surface of a tree-lined dual carriageway back into the dusty sun-bleached hills that rose in random undulations towards the mountains. Unfinished roads branched off to the left and right, petering out in the dust.

Cranes loomed over abandoned concrete apartment blocks on the rise, and in the valley beyond the school empty terracotta villas sat in rows among the gorse, facing on to the parched fairways of a tawdry-looking golf course. She spun the wheel and turned the battered family Seat down towards the school gates, past the shuttered sales office of a developer peddling homes that had never been built.

The road was lined with the cars of parents dropping off their children, a slow procession in both directions, the pavement crowded with chattering children in shirtsleeves and regulation skirts and shorts, satchels slung over shoulders or hanging from little hands. It was already hot, and Cristina had all the windows down.

She was embarrassed by her car, easing its way between all the shiny new SUVs: Mercs, Audis, BMWs. Many of which Antonio had probably sold. Even with two incomes it was all they could afford. Although Antonio was fortunate in being able to bring home a car from the second-hand lot every evening. Neither Cristina nor her husband earned very much, and the bulk of their disposable income went on providing the best education for Lucas that money could buy. Still, he was not doing as well as they had hoped.

She glanced in the rearview mirror and saw him sitting anxiously in the back seat. After Mackenzie had gone the previous evening, she had done her level best to help him with his homework, but knew she wasn’t really up to it. And so did Lucas. Only, it was he who had to face his teachers, not her.

Almost as if she had read her sister’s mind, Nuri put a hand over Cristina’s and offered her a pale smile from the passenger seat. Cristina could have wept. How was it possible that her little sister, stricken with breast cancer and on her way to Marbella for yet more chemo, could find sympathy for her ? It was all so unfair.

She turned in a circle at the bottom of the hill and drove back up to the gate to let Lucas off. He gave his aunt a sunny wave, but offered his mother only a quick sullen glance, before running off to find his classmates. They drove up the road, past a white tower with long crosses on each face, and Nuri said, ‘Thanks for this. I know you have a lot of things on your mind.’

Cristina shook her head and smiled, doing her best to hide the tears gathering in her eyes. ‘Family first,’ she said. ‘You know I’d do anything for you, sis.’

‘I know.’

Neither of them paid the least attention to the black SUV parked next to the chunks of concrete that blocked the road beyond the deserted sales office. Obscured by smoked glass, Cleland sat behind the wheel and breathed his satisfaction. Now he knew where the boy went to school. Knew where the bitch lived. And her sister. It was just a matter of time, and patience.

The HC International hospital in Marbella was set in sprawling gardens just off the A7, two hundred metres from the sea. Treatment rooms in Roman-tiled cottages overlooked an area of extensive lawns peppered by shady trees and flowering shrubs, recliners set out on stone terracing around a large turquoise-blue swimming pool.

Cristina had often wondered how much Nuri’s treatment here was costing. But just as she and Antonio were investing everything in the future of their son, so Nuri and Paco were gambling everything on her sister’s life. What point was there in having money in the bank if you were dead? There was a risk, too, that if she survived the treatment she would be infertile, and Cristina knew just how desperate Nuri was to have children. Although even if it turned out that she couldn’t have any of her own, Cristina suspected that Nuri would adopt. She adored children, and doted on her nephew.

First the nurses drew blood, and would only begin the latest treatment if her blood count was suitable: a surplus of white blood cells would postpone it. While the sample went to the lab for testing, Cristina and Nuri wandered through the gardens in the somnolent heat of the morning, listening to the cacophony of bird call coming from the trees, almost unaware of the distant rumble of traffic from the motorway.

It had always seemed to Cristina that Nuri was far too young to have been struck down by the curse of breast cancer at the age of just twenty-six. But her little sister had met the challenge with silent courage and very little complaint. Cristina knew that after each treatment she spent several days throwing up, exhausted and resting most of the time in bed.

They had gone together to a shop in Marbella to pick out a suitable wig to cover her increasing baldness. It was the only time Cristina had seen a crack in her sister’s brave facade. She had found her sitting facing the mirror in the little changing room at the back of the store, the chosen wig lying sadly in her lap, tears running down a face ravaged by the poison they had been pumping into her body. When Cristina sat beside her, putting an arm around her shoulders to pull her close, all she had said was, ‘I’m so scared, Cris. I don’t want to die.’

It was late morning by the time Nuri was summoned to begin her chemo. There were almost a dozen other patients in the treatment room, each in their own recliner, each with their own TV. Most of them knew each other by now and would ignore the television to exchange gossip and the latest family news.

There was a turnover, of course. Some patients reaching the successful completion of their treatment. Others dying. None of these women ever knew which of those two eventualities lay in wait for them. Cancer treatment was a lottery and the stakes were high. If you won you lived.

Cristina watched as a nurse expertly inserted a needle into a vein in the back of her sister’s hand. She taped it down, then began an initial flow of saline solution from an overhead bag to flush out her vascular system. Cristina saw the resignation in Nuri’s eyes. That psychological balancing act between what would make her sick and what would keep her alive.

But typical of Nuri, her mind was elsewhere, thinking of others. She said, ‘Obviously I’m not going to make it to Aunt Ana’s today. Would you...?’

Cristina squeezed her free hand. ‘Don’t worry about Ana, I’ve got that covered.’ She stood up and glanced at her watch. ‘I’ll leave you to it for the moment, sis. The ambulance from the Costa del Sol should be dropping Paco off about now.’

Paco was waiting for her in the car park. The ambulance from the Hospital Costa del Sol had already been and gone, a trip out to Marviña saved by the unhappy coincidence of his wife being in town for cancer treatment. He looked deathly pale, and shrunken somehow in his jog pants and T-shirt. In spite of having shaved, the shadow of his beard never left his face and seemed darker in contrast with his jaundiced pallor. His right leg was heavily strapped, and he was balancing unsteadily on crutches.

‘Hey Cris.’ He managed to drop one of them as he attempted to give her a hug. She stooped to pick it up, aware how much his sense of macho pride would be offended by the need of physical help from a woman.

She tipped a raised eyebrow towards his leg. ‘How is it?’

‘Hurts like hell. I’ll be off work for weeks. They say I was lucky. The bullet missed the femoral artery by a whisker. I’d have bled to death in minutes otherwise.’

Cristina looked with concern into his sad dark eyes. ‘Do you think he knew that? I mean, do you think he missed it on purpose?’

Paco curled his upper lip in anger. ‘I don’t think he gave a damn, one way or the other. If I died, I died. If I didn’t I would deliver his message.’ He met her eye for a moment, before quickly averting his gaze in embarrassment. ‘I’d be dead for sure, like the others, if I hadn’t been your brother-in-law.’ Then his eyes connected again with hers. ‘I guess I should be grateful.’