The Sickness Read Online Free PDF Page A

me, have faith in me, trust me . . . please, answer me!
    Hoping to hear from you soon.
    Sincerely,
    Ernesto Durán
    When Miguel arrives, Andrés is already sitting at a table slightly apart from the other tables, drinking his second whisky and ice. Miguel looks harassed and preoccupied.
    â€œSorry I’m late,” he says as he sits down.
    Andrés merely makes a vague movement with his head, neither a nod nor a shake, as if hoping, nonetheless, to communicate something by that gesture. His face almost breathes unease and distress.
    â€œOn the phone you said it was something serious,” says Miguel, “but now that I see your face, I feel quite frightened. Whatever’s happened?”
    Andrés points to the two envelopes on the table.
    â€œHave a look at those,” he says, almost in a murmur.
    Miguel picks up one envelope, takes out the X-rays, and holds them up to the light. First, those showing the lungs, then the images from the brain scans.
    â€œThere’s no mistaking the signs. There’s no other way to read them,” says Andrés. “Or is there?”

    Miguel turns toward him, tense, not sure what to answer. The waiter approaches and before he can say anything, Andrés cuts in with:
    â€œHe’ll have a vodka with ice and lemon. A double,” he tells him emphatically, deliberately, his eyes fixed on Miguel.
    â€œI have to perform a fistula operation this afternoon,” Miguel says in answer to a question no one has asked, although he doesn’t sound very convinced.
    â€œJust tell me what you think. There’s no hope, is there?”
    Miguel doesn’t so much sigh as snort, before turning back to the X-rays. He again holds them up to the light, looking at them almost obliquely. The contrast between the blue and the opaque white reveals spots, dark irruptions, shadows that should not be there.
    â€œIt’s a spinocellular carcinoma, isn’t it?” Miguel asks, still scrutinizing the results of the scans.
    â€œStage IV,” says Andrés. Then he points to one of the CT images. “With cerebral metastasis,” he adds, his voice breaking.
    â€œWhose X-rays are they?” Miguel asks rather fearfully, looking straight at him now.
    â€œMy dad’s,” says Andrés.
    They sit staring at each other for a moment, not saying a word, wrapped in that rare complicity that comes with friendship.
    â€œShit!” is all Miguel can manage to say after that pause.
    Andrés quickly talks him through the sequence of events: first, the fainting fit, then his own presentiment, the results of the blood tests, that presentiment again, the
chest X-rays, and the CT scans. Miguel tries to get more details, to find other possible explanations.
    â€œIf he weren’t my father,” Andrés says, “you and I would have looked at the plates and concluded that there was no hope, that it’s the mother of all tumors, that the patient is basically screwed,” he adds, his voice choked with emotion. “There’s no need for a biopsy, there’s no point in opening him up.”
    â€œMaybe, but . . .” Miguel would like to say something, but there’s nothing to say. He can’t fool Andrés.
    â€œWhy do we find it so hard to accept that life is a matter of chance?” Andrés asks suddenly, a lump in his throat.
    They both fall silent. Another whisky, another vodka. Miguel makes a phone call to cancel that afternoon’s operation. Andrés puts the X-rays and CT images back in their envelopes.
    â€œAnd your dad, of course, knows nothing.”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œYou’re not going to be so stupid as to tell him, are you?”
    â€œThat’s what I always do, isn’t it? It’s what I’ve always said, the position I’ve always defended: the transparent relationship between doctor and patient.”
    Another silence. Then Miguel tells him that he’s never agreed with that