Page 89 of Better Than Gelato
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The hospital is cold and smells like disinfectant. Paolo was listed as Diego’s emergency contact, so he got to go back with him. But Jake and I remain in the lobby, shocked and confused.
I’m frustrated that Jake, who’s practically a doctor, doesn’t know what’s wrong with Diego.
“I only saw him for a few minutes before the ambulance came,” Jake explains for the third time. “His pulse was faint but steady. That’s all I know.”
After an eternity, Paolo comes back and pulls a chair in front of us. He sits but takes a minute before speaking.
“Diego is sick. Leukemia. Stage 4.”
The words sink in slowly.
I ask stupidly, “How many stages are there?”
Jake takes my hand and squeezes. “Just four,” he whispers.
We both look at Paolo. He opens his mouth to say more, but then his whole face crumples like melting plastic. He bows his head, and I watch his shoulders shake as he cries silently. I put my hand on his shoulder, but I don’t think he notices. After a minute, he collects himself, takes a breath, and tells us everything.
“Diego found out about a year ago. He’s been getting treatments at your hospital, Jake.”
“I saw him there,” Jake says now, and it’s hard to decipher the emotions on his face. Realization? Regret? “It was months ago. He said he was visiting a friend. I-I didn’t have any reason not to believe him.”
“He didn’t want anyone to know,” Paolo says. “For a while, the treatment was working so well, he thought he could just keep the whole thing a secret and get through it on his own.”
I think of goofy, smiling Diego trying to get through something like this on his own, and my heart breaks.
“Then five months ago, the treatment stopped working,” Paolo continues. “His body just stopped responding. The doctors don’t know why. That’s when I found out about it. I heard him throwing up early in the morning in Switzerland.”
Early in the morning. When Jake and I were kissing in the library. When the group came down and saw me and Jake doing the Floss dance and Diego laughed so hard.
“I made him tell me everything, and he made me promise not to tell anyone. He didn’t want the pity.”
Paolo sighs and rubs his eyes. I notice for the first time the bags under his eyes, the wrinkles crossing his brow. He’s been carrying this secret on his own and it’s taken a toll.
“They tried different treatment options, none of them worked,” Paolo says. “He…he made the choice to discontinue treatment.”
None worked. Discontinue treatment.
Jake clears his throat and asks, “How long?” His voice is hoarse.
“They said a month or two,” Paolo says. “That was a month ago.”
My brain refuses to understand what it’s hearing. “He was great on our Cinque Terre hike. He was smiling and laughing the whole time.”
Jake nods slowly. “A lot of patients do better after stopping treatment. Without the side effects, their body feels good for the first time in months.” He pauses. “But then the cancer progresses unchecked.”
I feel a sudden rush of anger. For the unfairness of cancer. For Diego’s decision to stop treatments.
“Well, then we check it. We fight this. We find some better treatments.” I pin Jake with an accusing look. “Isn’t this what you do with your mice? You cure cancer. That’s what you told me. So cure Diego, give him whatever you’re giving those mice.”
Jake shakes his head. “We’re years away from clinical trials. Our research is promising, but it’s still in the early stages.”
I feel like we’re wasting time. We need to be doing something about this. I stand up suddenly and my chair falls over, clattering loudly, breaking the oppressive silence of the lobby. The noise feels so good I stalk over and kick another chair. And then another, each one crashing to the ground with a satisfying clang. I want to hurl a chair through the window, light the ugly gray sofa on fire, burn this whole building to the ground.
I feel arms wrap around me. I hear Paolo’s low voice.
“I know how you’re feeling right now,” he says.
