The third night

#shortstory 

The light is yellow, strong enough to keep me awake, not enough for certain noises not to scare me, like this old woman here who breathes with her throat, she could get it over with.
I'm not worse off, my drip arm hurts a bit, but the professor said I'll die.
Three days that I know, and three nights.
My in-laws insist on talking about when Miria will be healed, when Miria returns to the office, when Miria takes the child to school. It is because of the fact that after the heart attack the old man is spared many things.
Luigi cried three days ago, then he said they will give me morphine when I can't take it anymore and he stopped crying. He is relieved, he shared his pain with me, a burden was lifted, he always needed to lean on someone.
My mother, she, even started scolding me again, "you have to finish all the meat", she said, "how long do you think you can go on with ice cream and that's it?"
If I sleep, I still dream of that concrete niche that closes, then it's better if I go to the bathroom now. I drag the infusion support down the hall, while upstairs, in the maternity ward, the mothers go to breastfeed their babies. Five years ago I was there too, with this same robe on, when the baby was born.
I pee, rinse my face, and look in the mirror. I no longer have hair, my head is like a meat egg. I have to remember the Easter egg for the little girl, Luigi may not think about it, he has many things on his mind. The car insurance, the change of ownership, the house in the name of both of us. “It takes money to die, you don't know how much, Miria,” he told me, then he bit his lip.
Two fat nurses, leaning against the door jamb, talk about stockings. I'd like to buy a couple if I still have time. Luigi would like them, he would take them off slowly, as they do at the cinema, as in the Graduate scene.
At the funeral I will be lying on the padding with tulle covering my face, a kind of wedding favor, like Aunt Carmelina, when we all went down to San Vito lo Capo, and there were so many people.
I go back to the room, the old woman snores and moves her hands in front of her face, as if chasing away insects, who knows what she sees. Who knows what you see before, after, during.
Carts are dragged into the corridor, I smell barley coffee. Sister Francesca crosses the aisle and opens the window, she lets the light in.
I did it, the third night has passed.