The sound was rhythmic. Relentless. Beep. Beep. Beep.
The sharp sting of antiseptic filled my lungs.
I tried to force my eyes open, but my eyelids felt heavy, sewn shut by exhaustion.
I heard voices. Loud, fractured voices.
"She's dying, Dante! How did you not see it?"
It was Giulia. My best friend. My sister in everything but blood.
She was screaming, her voice torn raw with a fury I had never before heard her aim at a man of his station.
"I thought she was lying," Dante's voice said. His voice was a ruin, as if he had been gargling with broken glass. "I saw the video. I thought it was a game. Another ploy for money."
"A game?" Giulia yelled. "Do you imagine coughing up one's own lungs is a parlor game? That this skeleton in the bed is some grand performance?"
I summoned what little strength remained in me and forced my eyelids apart. A sliver of light.
I was in a hospital room.
Dante was standing by the window. He looked disheveled, a jarring departure from his usual, severe perfection. His shirt was still stained with my blood. He hadn't changed.
"Fix her," he said to the man in the white coat, his tone admitting no possibility of refusal.
The doctor shook his head, his expression one of profound gravity. "Mr. Cavallaro, it doesn't make sense. She stopped treatment months ago."
"Why?" Dante demanded, striding forward. "Why did she stop?"
"She couldn't afford it," the doctor said quietly. "The course of immunotherapy she required is not covered by any conventional insurance. It demanded substantial cash payments, up-front."
Dante staggered back as if he had been dealt a physical blow.
"Money?" he whispered. "She stopped treatment over money?"
He looked down at his own hands, which had begun to tremble.
"I have millions. I have billions."
Silence stretched, suffocating and heavy.
"I cut her off," he said. The realization hit him as a physical impact. "I froze everything. Even her jewelry. I left her with nothing."
I saw his knees buckle. He grabbed the windowsill to stay upright, his knuckles bleaching white from the pressure.
"I killed her," he whispered.
Giulia stepped forward. She slammed a folder onto the table.
"This is her Living Will," she said. Her voice was cold. Deadly.
Dante looked at the folder as if it were a venomous snake. "What is this?"
"It says Do Not Resuscitate," Giulia said.
Dante shook his head, his features contorting in denial. "No."
Giulia continued, unrelenting. "It says no extraordinary measures. It says she wants to go without pain. It says she doesn't want you to extend her suffering just to make yourself feel better."
"Burn it," Dante said. He lunged for the folder. "I'm taking her to Switzerland. I'm taking her to the best specialists. I will buy every doctor in the world."
"You can't buy life, Dante!" Giulia screamed. She pushed him back, with surprising force. "She saved you!"
Dante froze. "What?"
Giulia was crying now. Tears coursed down her angry face. "She didn't leave you because you were poor, you idiot! She left you because her father was going to put a bullet in your brain!"
The room went silent. The only sound was the monitor. Beep. Beep. Beep.
Dante stared at her. His face was pale. Ghostly.
"She broke your heart to save your life," Giulia sobbed. "She has loved you every single day for ten years. And you... you treated her like garbage."
Dante turned slowly to look at the bed. He looked at me. He saw the tubes. The bruises. The skeleton under the sheets.
He was, at last, looking upon the truth of his own making.
He walked over to the bed. He fell to his knees. He took my hand. He was seized by a violent tremor.
"Elena," he whispered. He pressed his forehead against my palm. "Open your eyes, baby. Please. Tell me it's a lie."
I looked at him. I saw the man I loved. And I saw the man whose cruelty I had so carefully cultivated.
I didn't have the strength to speak. I just pulled my hand away.
It was a small movement. But it broke him.
He let out a sound that wasn't human. A howl of pure, unadulterated agony.
But I didn't care. I closed my eyes again.
I was, at last, ready for the sleep from which there is no waking.
