Before I Forget His Name novel · Chapter 9 of 24

Chapter 9: Wrong Stop

Livia's POV

After the first round of the vaccine, the scan showed the tumor site was stable.

I was not cured.

We had only borrowed some time, and nobody would tell us when the loan came due.

I moved out of the hospital and into Adriano's apartment across the street.

We had separate bedrooms, and he kept his rule about never knocking after nine.

Every morning he wrote the plan for the day on a whiteboard in the kitchen.

Medicine, therapy, a walk, and one small thing that had nothing to do with cancer.

The Wednesday board said, "Take a tram. Livia picks the route."

"I can't read the map," I said.

"Then you'll read it badly." He handed me his coat. "I'll follow."

He had been back from New York for nearly two weeks, and he never told me what had happened at the table.

I had stopped asking.

His hair had started to come in, a black shadow on his scalp, uneven over one ear.

On the tram I stood beside him, holding the rail, with the map open on my phone.

The numbers kept shifting. A three turned into an eight, and a line I knew turned into one I'd never seen.

"It's the seventh stop," I said.

"It's the fifth."

"You said you'd follow."

"I'm following. I'm also reading."

I looked at his head.

"Your hair is crooked," I said.

"It's not."

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