TOO LATE, MY LOVE

The Diagnosis

On the day Aitana Bonmatí is diagnosed with stomach cancer, her husband, Pedri Miller, is across the city taking care of his first love’s children.

The hospital corridor stretches long and white, smelling of antiseptic and stale coffee. Fluorescent lights hum overhead, casting a sterile glow on the linoleum floor. Aitana sits on a hard plastic chair, her slender fingers wrapped so tightly around the strap of her sling bag that the leather bites into her palm. She does not fidget. She does not cry. She simply waits, her petite face pale and still, like a photograph.

Footsteps approach. Keith Rogers emerges from the pathology lab, his white coat unbuttoned, a manila folder clutched in his hand. His face is a careful mask of professionalism, but his eyes—grey and tired—betray the weight of the news he carries. He stops a pace away and clears his throat.

“Aitana, the results are out.” He lifts the folder as if it weighs fifty pounds. “It’s a 3A malignant gastric tumor. If the surgery is successful, the five-year survival rate is between fifteen and thirty percent.”

The words land in her chest like stones dropped into still water. Fifteen to thirty percent. She turns the numbers over in her mind, but they refuse to make sense. The vending machine at the end of the hall hums. A nurse’s cart rattles in the distance. The world feels very far away.

She looks up at Keith, her voice barely a whisper. “How long do I have if I don’t do the surgery?”

Keith shifts his weight. The folder cracks open, but he does not need to read it. “Six months to a year. It varies from person to person. In your case, I strongly recommend two rounds of chemotherapy first to shrink the tumor before we operate. It reduces the risk of the cancer spreading or undergoing metastasis.”

A year. Maybe less. The thought hits her like a cold wave. She thinks of all the mornings she has wasted in that cold penthouse, waiting for a man who never comes home. She thinks of the nursery down the hall, the empty crib, the music box that still plays its lullaby to no one. All that suffering, and now time itself is being taken from her.

She bites the inside of her cheek until she tastes copper. “Thank you, Keith.”

“Don’t thank me.” He closes the folder and tucks it under his arm. “I’ll arrange for you to be admitted right away. We can start the first chemotherapy cycle this week. You need to act quickly, Aitana. This kind of tumor doesn’t wait.”

She nods, but the motion feels disconnected, as if she is watching someone else’s head bob on a string. She stands, slinging her bag over her shoulder, and walks toward the elevator. Each step echoes in the empty hallway. She passes a window that looks out onto a grey Manhattan sky, and she pauses. The city moves beneath her—yellow cabs honking, pedestrians rushing, life roaring on without a care. Up here, everything is silent and still, as if she already exists in a different world.

In the elevator, she pulls out her phone. No missed calls. No messages. She types a text to Pedri: “I need to talk to you tonight. It’s important.” Her thumb hovers over the send button. Then she remembers where he is right now—probably sitting in a brightly colored pediatric clinic on the Upper East Side, laughing softly as Alessia’s child giggles, his face relaxed into the gentle man he never is at home. She deletes the message and shoves the phone back into her bag.

The elevator doors slide open onto the ground floor. She walks out into the cold afternoon. A sharp wind whips between the skyscrapers, tugging at her coat. A street vendor shouts about roasted nuts. A bike messenger weaves past, bell ringing. She stands on the curb, a death sentence folded neatly in her purse, and for the first time all day, tears prick at the corners of her eyes.

She does not let them fall.

Back at the penthouse, the silence greets her like an old enemy. The marble floors gleam under recessed lights. The floor-to-ceiling windows showcase the glittering Manhattan skyline, but the beauty feels like a mockery. She drops her bag on the kitchen island and pours herself a glass of water. Her hand trembles, and the glass slips. It shatters on the marble, water spreading in a slow, clear pool.

She stares at the broken glass. A sob rises in her throat, but she swallows it down. No one is here to hear it anyway. No one is ever here.

The hours crawl by. Pedri does not come home. She heats a can of soup she cannot eat. She sits on the sofa, wrapped in a blanket, watching the lights of the city blink on one by one. Somewhere out there, her husband is with another woman, living a warm life that does not include her. And inside her body, a silent enemy is multiplying, cell by cell, stealing her future.

That night, she lies awake in the king-sized bed, the sheets cold on Pedri’s side. She presses a palm flat against her stomach and imagines she can feel the tumor, a hard knot of death lodged beneath her skin. The clock on the nightstand ticks. She closes her eyes and sees the numbers Keith gave her: 15 to 30 percent. A gamble. A long shot.

She makes no decision yet. Instead, she lets the darkness swallow her, and she dreams of falling.