Читать книгу Coma - Federico Betti, Federico Betti - Страница 7

V

The examinations made on the seventh day showed a remarkable improvement: Luigi Mazza was responding well to the treatments and the healing in progress was making great strides.

He was thirty-five years old and his still young body was able to somehow able to get rid of the concussion that was caused by the car crash on the emilian county seat’s orbital road.

Although the man was motionless in the same position, without realizing when, periodically, the sedatives were administered to him to keep the state of medically inducted coma, nor realizing of possible visits, something was changing for the best inside him.

The doctors were satisfied and didn’t hesitate to tell the patient’s brother.

“Thank you so much for what you’ve been doing for him, really. If I knew who the guilty party in all of this was, I swear I’d tell him off. You can’t reduce someone like this, on thee edge between life and death!” said repeatedly Mario Mazza, talking to the healthcare team.

“He won’t die, you can be sure”, confirmed the head physician of Ospedale Maggiore, “He’s healing, even if he will need some time”

There wasn’t a day in which Mario Mazza wouldn’t go visit his brother. He was sixty years old, twenty-five more, he was widower since when, ten years before, his wife died prematurely because of a sudden leukaemia. So, they both found themselves alone, one by choice and the other one by constraint, and their bond was always stronger and well-founded.

Although they never thought of living together, they met each other habitually every day anyways. Only in some cases of impossibility due to the events, could happen that in one week they wouldn’t meet for seven days in a row.

They often had dinner together and, when they were both in agreement, they would also treat themselves with a dinner at a restaurant, choosing between several options that the city of Bologna and the near-by area offered to them.

They were both passionate about ethnical cuisine, to alternate with the traditional one or to pizza, often to try different flavours and traditions: from the more popular Chinese restaurant to the Indian or the Greek, up to the restaurants less popular by the masses, like the African restaurant or the Persian one, every occasion was good to vary and taste unusual dishes.

They agreed on many things, from the most important ones to the most trivial; they also had similar taste in music. Both Luigi and his brother liked almost every genre: one didn’t listen to house music because, according to what he said, it made him sleepy; the other one almost hated popular music, considering it inconsequential. He said that there’s music for every occasion and every kind of music generates different emotions depending on the genre; “The popular one doesn’t leave anything inside of you”, claimed the older brother.

Thinking about all these things, looking at Luigi lying there motionless, he got a lump in his throat and could barely hold back his tears.

“The time allowed for visits is over!” shouted a servant, waking him up from his thoughts.

“I’ll go away immediately” answered Mario, walking towards the exit.

When he arrived on the road, the darkness of the night wrapped him like a dark mantle.