Lethal Discoveries by Erica Pensini - HTML preview

Chapter 103

I will not forget Mori’s face when he saw me. Happiness and consternation fought each other, altering his expression as his feelings swayed from one to the other.

He stood in front of the wheelchair looking at me in silence, and finally he said, “Iris”.

Just that, but with a deep sense of compassion that I did not expect from someone who barely knew me.

I smiled, guessing at my devastated appearance and yet not sure about how much I had changed. It was then that I realized I had not looked at myself in the mirror since I had gone to the hospital.

“The trip was fine”, I said, speaking with my same old voice.

Deep down I’m still who I’ve always been, I told myself, trying to hush the effect that Mori’s shock reverberated on me.

“Ah well, if I didn’t know what you have been going through I would wonder what they have been subjecting you to during the flight”, he said, laughing at last

And I laughed too. “Ah, yes, these airlines are brutal, trust me”, I teased, playing along

Mori laughed even harder, although what I said wasn’t particularly funny. And so we found each other merrily giggling for no reason, with the nurse and Jack staring at us with stunned faces.

Then the mirth died off, and Mori cleared his voice, shaking off the last bits of laugher

“We should go to the hospital I suppose. I have an ambulance waiting for us outside”, he said

“And oh, you can stay at stay at my place if you want”, he added, addressing Jack

“Thank you, but I have a hotel room booked…”, Jack answered

I knew he was torn between the fear of offending Mori by refusing his invitation, and his need of having his own private space

“Sure, I know you do, but in case your stay gets long…”, Mori began, and did not end his sentence

Jack didn’t answer, and after a pause Mori asked, “Shall we go then?”

I let Mori and Jack chat along, while I silently rejoiced at the aroma of coffee. I loved it, although it was not as smooth and intense as the when we had been out in the summer streets of Milan. That smell triggered something in me, it instilled within me the strong will to go out again in those streets, even if only for a day, but soon, today, now, no matter the consequences.

“I wish I could stay away from the hospital, just for a while…”, I said, almost talking to myself

“We’ll get you to walk outside on your own two feet, trust me”, Mori said

“But for now…”, he continued, and began pushing the wheelchair, “for now we’ll have to stay inside for a while longer”

I looked around, and embraced the place swarming with Italian voices and with people dressed in the distinctly European fashion.

“I don’t want to be cured, I just want to be part of life for a day. That’s all”, I said, before I could stop myself from spilling out the confession

“We’ve come all the way here cure you, Iris”, Jack said

But have we?, I thought to myself.

“Ok, let’s see if I can engage you with some science”, Mori said

“Puaf, science…”, I replied, even though it was true that – in spite of everything – science still intrigued me.

I was curious to learn the biological and chemical mechanisms that were putting me in this state. How often could you study a phenomenon so closely as when you are affected by it the way I was?

“Why do you think you are unable to walk now?”, Mori asked, knowing that I was simulating my reaction

“Because I am too weak?”, I said, miming irony

“Yes, but why?”, he kept asking

“Because the polymer has convinced my cells to commit suicide?”, I replied on the same mocking note

“How have you come up with this answer?”, he asked, stopping short and walking in front of me to see my face

“I was just joking, I made it up…”, I began

“Just that?”

“Well, when we were looking at the cells it looked like they had become so numerous and yet they didn’t move…it seemed like they had multiplied like crazy and then died off, as if their biological and reproductive cycle had been accelerated, but then…”, I started and stopped, unable to continue

“But then, after having lived so intensely, the cells become unable to continue the life cycle. In other words the polymer acts as a delayed bomb, it does not affect the first, the second, or the third generation of cells, but beyond that it pulls the trigger and the cells become sterile, so to speak”, Mori concluded

“And you know what causes this?”, Jack asked

“And do you know how to reverse this problem?”, he continued with a tense eagerness in his voice, before getting an answer to the first question

“I do have suppositions about what causes this, as for knowing how to reverse this…I am not quite there yet”, he started and paused

“But I will get there, I will”, he said, mainly talking to himself now, pushing the wheelchair further, and at a faster pace.

Eight months later

The air is warm again after one of Milan’s soggiest winters. Not that I really know how the winter was, but I was told so. The air in the hospital I lived in was climatized at a constant temperature of 25 °C, and the rooms were white and grey, mint clean, and perfectly illuminated by neon lights. Like the ones at FoodTech labs.

But now I am sitting at a table in a bar, in a street already swarming with cars and people at this early hour of the day.

“How’s your cappuccino?”, Mori asks

“Wonderful Mauro”, I say, now that I call him by name

He smiles

“I’ll be missing you tomorrow”, I tell him

“I will too”, he tells me, and stretches out his hand, laying it on mine

Tomorrow I will fly back to California, where Jack is waiting for me. He has been flying back and forth from the States to Europe, while I was slipping in and out of sleep in my hospital bed. He has been taking care of my apartment, making sure it would be there as I left it upon my return, although I’ll pack my stuff and move on as soon as I’ll get back. But I need to see the place one more time before I can move on. I wonder how it will feel like…

John told me that John Wheeler moved back to his old house with a new woman, the one I saw in the car back then, and with Wooster. So she really was his lover, I hadn’t been wrong about this. I am happy things went this way, after all they didn’t look like a great match, John and his ex-wife. But then, who am I to judge?

I’ve kept speaking with Avery, even after the trials where I was called as a witness, and to which, given my condition, I testified through a conference call rather than in person.

Mark Gill is in jail now, but his brother is still happily a big shot at Foodtech labs – or maybe not happily – but around nonetheless. Foodtech labs has gone through some trouble, but after all they found a way out.

HealthyFood Inc. has been also been under investigation. As far as I know someone there has been accused of negligence and got a fine – big but maybe not so big considered what was involved.

In addition to Jonathan Woods, other 21 people have died. Traces of the polymer were found in their bodies, but the medical reports recited, “Although adverse effects due to the intake of the chemical known as MagnaSize cannot be discounted, it is not possible to attribute the death of the patient to this substance with absolute certainty”. I don’t know if Dr. Alfred Bloomberg ever used my polymer in his tests. His trial is still not over, but in the meanwhile he is still kicking around and, from what I hear, the institute is being very supportive with him.

Sandeep was charged with minor allegations. The judge assigned him to a penitentiary in California, from where he was supposed to leave after 3 months. Just about now. Something went wrong though. Nobody knows what really happened, but Avery thinks he was bullied. From my side I think he lost his way in life – just like me. Whatever the reason, he took his life. Let’s respect the dead, no more speculations, please and thank you.

We never really knew what happened to Mike after he disappeared. He sent me a letter stamped from a postal office in Nebraska, which Jack found and read to me over the phone. “Iris, I was trying to find the truth. I couldn’t. I am well and I wish you good luck. M.”. That’s all the letter said. I never understood what Mike really meant with that, except that he never intended to betray us. I wonder where he is and how he is making out in life. Something tells me he has become a nomadic homeless, but then who knows…one day we will meet again, maybe, and then he will tell me his story, and I will tell him mine. I like to think so, I hate losses.

Once upon a time I believed there was a logic in this world, a sort of justice that straightened out things at last. But is there? Just look at this story, does any part of it make sense to you? It all started as a game, but then the game became a crime. I thought I deserved punishment for my doings – perhaps I meant no harm, but it is the outcome that counts. I left a mess splattered on the floor, and walked away alive.

It is true though that my life will never be the same again. I desired death, and now I desire the man who saved me. I’ve fallen in love with Mauro, could you guess? I never had the guts to admit it till now, and again, only to these pages.

“What are you writing?”, he asks me now, seeing me scribble these on my diary as I sip the cappuccino.

I smile

“Nothing…well, something. Maybe one day I’ll show you”, I say

I’ll leave tomorrow, the idea pains me but I must. I love Jack too. How is this possible? I don’t know, but then would you imagine that any of what happened is possible?

I am not sure what I’ll do when I get back to California. Jack’s opinion is that we should move to the east coast and start a new life. The past lives within us though. Is a new start truly possible?

I look up and lock my gaze onto Mauro’s soft eyes, pitch black. The sun floods his face by half, while the umbrella casts an oblique shade on the other side of him.

Such is life: lights and shadows.

The day is beautiful and the moment intense, torn between joy and anticipation of longing. I blink, and during my blink I see myself crossing the desert in a car, a trailer hooked behind us with our belongings. A new start, with our past right behind us, following closely. Blue sky, arid flatlands sprawled below the infinite horizon. I turn around and see Jack smiling on the passenger’s seat.

I’ve made a mess out of my life, but I still don’t want to let it go. Not in this bright day. I’ve corrupted myself, and yet, as I reopen my eyes and notice cappucino’s foam on Mauro’s nose I laugh – and for this one instant my laugher is pure joy, uncorrupted happiness.