Chapter Two: Rain in Brighton, Fire in Guadalajara
1032 Words
POV: Juliana Alejandro
Rain slid down the windows in thin, slanted lines, beclouding the Brighton rooftops into a dull grey smear. In her confined space above a fish and chips shop, Juliana Alejandro crossed her legs on the edge of her foam, holding a chipped mug in both hands with lukewarm coffee between her hands.
The walls were thin. She could hear the clang of the fryers below, someone yelling over the counter, and the usual drunken laughter of students outside the takeaway. Heat pulsed through the radiator with a low hiss like the room was exhaling pretending to offer warmth. The rug sagged under years of footsteps, and the bulb above her bed flickered when she turned the kettle on. She didn’t mind. She’d slept in worse places.
She was staring at the ceiling.
When her phone finally rang. A faint tremble betrayed her calm.
She almost didn’t answer.
“¿Tia Rosa cómo estás?”( Tia Rosa how are you doing?)
Her aunt’s voice came through in a whisper, raw and strained. “Estás sentada, mija?”(Are you sitting down, my daughter?)
Juliana’s heart twisted. She braced herself.
“Sí. (yes.) What happened?”
There was a long pause. Too long.
Then, softly: “Nachito no está bien.”(Nachito is not well.)
She closed her eyes. “How? What happened?”
“They’ve been running tests for Nacho for quite some time. At first, they thought it was just a stomach infection, maybe something with his kidneys. But today, it has been confirmed that he has been diagnosed with Neuroblastoma.”
Her heart palpitated hearing Neuroblastoma even though she does not have the inkling of what it is.
She whispered the word back like it was foreign. “Neuroblastoma”
“Es un tipo de cáncer,” (” It is a type of cancer”) Tia Rosa continued, her voice trembling. “En los niños. Le ha afectado el abdomen. ( In children. It has affected the abdomen). El doctor dice que necesita empezar el tratamiento de inmediato.”(”The doctor says he needs to start treatment immediately.”)
“How much?”
“They’re asking for a deposit to start at the private clinic. It’s fifteen thousand dollars.”
Juliana felt the air leave her lungs.
Fifteen thousand what?
“That is almost 280,000 Mexican pesos.” she said
The number echoed like a cruel joke.
“Where on planet earth will I cough up that huge amount of money?” Tia
Her last payslip showed just over £300. Her scholarship covered tuition, barely enough. Rent swallowed most of her part-time wages. Her savings were gone. She made each pound work harder than it should.
She pressed her palm to her forehead trying to figure out something on the fly.
“I’ll find it, I promise,” she said with assurance.
“¿Cómo?”
“I don’t know,” Juliana replied. “But I will.”
There was a pause, then a sigh on the other end. The only kind of aunt who gives when she wants to argue but chooses hope instead.
“You are so predictable, I figured you would say that,” Tia whispered. “Te quiero, mi niña.”(I love you, my girl)
“Dile que mamá lo ama,” (”Tell him that mama loves him.”) Juliana choked out. “Tell him I’ll call tomorrow.”
She ended the call and finally let the tears drop.
Later that evening, she was at the university cafe, she stood by the university counter, arms folded and smile forced into shape. The shift was long. Her wrists ached. Her feet burned.
“Flat white, soy milk, extra hot,” barked a girl in designer boots, not looking up from her phone.
Juliana made the drink without a word. Condensation fogged the outside of her glass. Her body was present, but her thoughts had traveled back to that little hospital far from home in Guadalajara, where her five-year-old son was wrapped in a fragile layer of warmth.
She’d lied to everyone. Her Classmates. Even her close friends. She had no father, mother, no siblings and no emergency contact just the smile she wore like armor and the books she clung to like a lifeline.
But now, something had to break.
After her shift, she stopped at the corner shop. Just milk. That’s all she needed. She stared at the price.
£1.45.
She checked her card balance at the till.
Insufficient funds.
She apologized and walked out, leaving the milk behind. Her hands were shaking again.
Back in her room, she sank into her mattress, her legs were crossed and her eyes were fixed on Nacho’s picture. Nacho’s picture was printed on a cheap paper and was curling at the corners. Toothless. Mischievous. Brave.
She pulled her coat tightly around her and lay down.
She whispered into the dark. “Please don’t take him away from me Abba. I’ll do anything. I’ll work more. I’ll sleep less. I’ll lie if I have to. Just give me a way out of this.
Her phone buzzed. It is a calendar notification.
Final Literature Seminar 9:00 a.m. sharp
Professor Hargreaves
Juliana let out a hollow, bitter laugh.
Leonardo Hargreaves.
Professor Death-Glare.
He was the coldest, most brilliant, and most brutal professor at the university. His wife had died years ago, they said, and he hadn’t smiled since. Students feared him. Staff avoided him. His red-inked feedback had reduced more than one scholarship student to tears.
She had tried to impress him once. Quoted Neruda in an essay about grief and metaphor. He’d circled the line and scribbled:
“Don’t reach for pain you haven’t earned.”
She had cried in the library bathroom that day.
But now… she had earned it.
Every word.
Every scar.
Every sleepless night.
She looked at her hands. Raw, cracked, ink-stained. She wasn’t the same girl who came to Brighton full of hope and student dreams.
She was a mother now.
And tomorrow, she’d sit across from a man who lived in silence and she’d wonder what price he’d pay for someone else’s pain.
- Writer
