The Vitamins We Swallow

The vitamin regimen sat on the nightstand like a small offering: D for bones, B12 for energy, Omega-3 for a heart that had been skipping beats since the diagnosis. Elena counted them out each morning, her palm cupping the colorful capsules like prayer beads.

"You know those don't actually fix anything," David said from the bathroom, his razor scraping against skin that had grown foreign to her fingers.

"They help," she said, because some lies were necessary.

They'd come to Palm Springs on doctor's orders—"take a break," "reduce stress," as if grief were a condition that could be sunned away. The resort pool glittered below their balcony, and David had spent every day since their arrival swimming laps, back and forth, back and forth, while Elena sat in the shade and watched.

He moved through the water with the grim determination of a man outrunning something. She knew what it was. They both did.

That evening, room service delivered salads that arrived already wilted, the spinach leaves curling like dried flowers. Elena picked at hers, the irony not lost on her—all those years she'd spent serving David healthy meals, steaming broccoli, roasting Brussels sprouts, and now he sat dying across from her while the spinach turned to slime in the desert heat.

"The doctor called," David said finally, his wine glass untouched. "There's a trial. In Switzerland."

Elena's hand went to her throat. "When?"

"Six weeks. If the insurance approves."

He reached across the table, palm up, the gesture so familiar it broke something loose in her chest. She took his hand, their fingers tangling, and for the first time in months, she let herself imagine—just for a moment—that the vitamins on her nightstand might actually work. That somewhere in the world, something could.

"Okay," she said. "Okay."

Outside, the palm trees stood motionless against a sky that refused to darken, holding their breath like the rest of them.