Desperation

A man's wife has cancer. They are broke. He has to go on a crime spree to get the money he needs to pay for her chemo and potential save her life. But every consequence has an action.

My wife was diagnosed with cancer a couple of months ago. The doctor said she had weeks to live, but she was still alive, thankfully, and I thank God everyday for that. It is colon cancer, which is curable, as long as you have the money to do it. We, however, do not. Before all of this, she was a librarian, and that made quite a bit of money; and all my life I've been a struggling writer, only making ends meat on a couple of books I published. The rest were commercial and critical flops, much to my dismay.

I didn't know what to do. She needed the chemo, needed to get it so she could feel better. Perhaps the medicine would cure her cancer, and then she would live with me for years. Who really knew about stuff like that? God could just decide to take her life just like that, with one snap of a finger. I mustn't think things like that though - that would only make my mind worry more, make me less at ease. 

I was sitting at the kitchen table reading the paper. My wife, Linda, wheeled her way into the room with a wheel chair. She looked disheveled. Her hair was on it's end - skin looked pale and cold. Her eyes had a sort of distant look to them. She looked twenty years old then she actually was. To me, it looked like her face was pulled back in wrinkles. She was connected to an oxygen tank she kept in the back compartment of the wheel chair. 

"Hey, babe," she said. Her tone of voice was very small, weak. 

"How are you doing right now?" I asked.

"Decently," Linda said. "I can't really move a whole lot right now to be honest with you. I'll just have to wait this out."

"You won't have to wait much longer," I said, "because soon you will have the chemotherapy that you need to get you well again."

"And if that doesn't happen?"

"I'll find a way," I said, "I don't want you dying on my watch." I knelt down to her, grasped her hand. It was as cold as ice. She can't have that much longer, I thought, a month, maybe two. I need to do this. Now.