Chapter 5: Chicago

On Monday morning Matthias drove my sister to Chicago himself.

He didn't ask.

He just appeared at the hospital door at six with a sedan, two blankets and a thermos of ginger tea.

"The hospital transport is booked for noon," he said. "This isn't."

Ania looked at the blankets, then at me.

"Does he always bring his own weather?" she said.

"Get in the car," I said.

The drive took an hour and forty minutes.

Ania slept against the window for the first half, her hat slipping over one eye.

Matthias drove with both hands on the wheel and never went a mile over the limit.

"You're a careful driver," I said.

"I'm a careful everything."

"Is that why you're single?"

"I'm single because most people want the CEO and then want me to be someone else."

"Who did they want?"

"Someone who isn't tired."

He said it so lightly that I almost missed it.

The Halsted Cancer Center was a glass tower on the lakefront with a lobby.

A nurse in lilac scrubs met us at the door with a clipboard.

"Ania Sobczak? We have you in room twelve-oh-six."

Ania lifted her chin and went in with her sketchbook under her arm.

I went with her, and Matthias came three steps behind.

They hung her bag on a pole and started the first infusion at nine-forty.

It was a clear liquid in a plastic bag, and it looked like nothing at all.

"That's it?" Ania said.

"That's the first one," said the nurse. "Tell us if you feel itchy, hot, or strange."

"I always feel strange."

The nurse laughed and went out.

Ania watched the drip for a full minute.

"If I die in here," she said, "I want you to burn my sketchbooks."

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