SYNOPSIS
(EXTENDED VERSION)
Back to: Part 8
Part 9
A Winter For Two
Central protagonists: Andrew, Pablo
Waking up the next morning, Andrew can't believe what he's experiencing: he's feeling sane. Instead of waking up at dawn, he's slept the full night. His sense of reality and his sense of self are back to normal. For the first time in many months, he feels the hunger for a breakfast, and the overall longing for life. He smiles at the morning sun. His soul is somehow alive again, free from the unrelenting grip of depression.
Savoring every bit of his breakfast, and realizing he can again fully sense the taste of food, Andrew wonders whether his symptomatic improvement is the delayed effect of antidepressant drugs or God having finally answered his prayers and decided to spare his life. Much as he wants to reach out to Pablo and share the news immediately, he contains his joy because it seems surreal. Rediscovering simple pleasures of life as the day goes by, he decides to wait for three days to make sure he's on the recovery track. Meanwhile, his heart is full of joy as he thinks about moving to Spain. He's ready to start the preparations within a week, provided that his health keeps improving.
The next day, he realizes it does. The suicide pills go to garbage. He informs the head of his unit he'll never come back to the hospital. He orders the translation and notarization of his university diploma. He starts looking for new tenants of his apartment. He starts collecting documents to apply for a new Spanish visa and putting together his remaining savings.
On the third day, his improvement remains, so he finally writes an email to Pablo, disclosing the paternity question that kept him in mental block for so many months. With depression going away, he's feeling free to start his life from scratch in Spain, by Pablo's side. As soon as his visa gets issued, he's ready to come, and this winter will be so different from those he'd previously lived — away from Moscow's blizzars, it will be their "winter for two".
After sending the message, he calls his wife and asks her to let him come live at her house for a while, because his new tenants will soon move in. Quite surprised, Nathalie doesn't realize Andrew isn't moving back with them, but going to just spend a few weeks there before leaving for good.
The entire day goes by, but Pablo doesn't reply. Aware of Pablo's habit to reply to his emails as long as the phone is within his reach, he concludes that Pablo must be at a game or a prolonged coaching session. In the meantime, he has a straightforward talk with his wife, showing her the negative results of his paternity test and asking her for a peaceful divorce. Ashamed about her cheating revealed after many years, Nathalie is even more shocked to observe a massive shift in Andrew's mental condition. Learning about his intention to leave Russia, she agrees to finalize divorce as soon as they can.
As the evening hours give way to the night, Andrew gets anxious about the silence on Pablo's part. He calls Pablo's mobile, but no one picks up. He shakes off negative thoughts by Googling a medical prep school in Barcelona, but that only provides a temporary relief. Calling Pablo's mobile and home phone to only hear long beeps, he dials his mother's number twice, but she doesn't pick up either. Only on the third attempt does he get a response, but it's Pablo's father speaking and breaking the tough news to him.
After a sudden heart attack on the field, Pablo was brought into a hospital.The doctors already told them his diagnosis, being dilative cardiomyopathy. Andrew knows that it's a fatal, progressive, debilitating disease, in which the heart grows in size with its muscle thinning, becoming incapable of efficiently pumping the blood. Its insidious and difficult to diagnose during check-ups. Palliative treatments work for a year or two. Save for the possibility of a heart transplant, there's no known cure.
Appaled by the truth, Andrew hangs up. His story about God delivering him from mental illness no longer makes any sense. His dreams about living the rest of their lives together collapse. But instead of slipping back into depression, he realizes that however little or much time they have left, he's gonna make the most of it. There's no more time for sorrow.
In late December, he comes to Barcelona and moves into Pablo's family house. Aware of his long-stay commitment and career plans, they hope he can stay with them as long as possible, his presence helping Pablo cope with his new reality. The footballer is banned from any kind of physical exercise for life, and his days feels gloomy and meaningless.
On the morning of Andrew's arrival, Pablo happens to be alone at home. Without his parents being present, it's the first time they have sex in Pablo's bedroom. Outside of Pablo's awareness, Andrew collects his semen sample and hurriedly leaves, saying he left his passport in the airport. In reality, already being Moscow he arranged the steps to make Pablo's dream of fatherhood happen, but he doesn't have the courage to tell him about it yet.
The couple spends the next months inseparably, like best friends. They never find themselves alone to have sex again, but it doesn't matter. Andrew puts off his language and medical classes till March to fully enjoy their time together, which feels like a honeymoon to be remembered. It's supposed to be their winter for two, as he metaphorically framed it in his email.
In March, Andrew's classes begin while Pablo's condition starts to rapidly deteriorate. After a syncope he suffers at home while Andrew's away, his parents rush him to a hospital. Two weeks of intensive palliative therapy and the implantation of a pacemaker improve his condition for a while. Once back at home, one day he asks Andrew to drive him to the beach. They walk to a spot where Andrew realizes they met exactly six years ago — it's their anniversary that Andrew's completely forgot about. Pablo says one of his dreams has come true nevertheless — on this day, they're together and by the sea. Pablo puts down his sunglasses, grabs Andrew's hand and leans onto his shoulder. He no longer care about anyone recognizing them.
In May his heart failure grows so bad that he cannot breathe normally even walking up the stairs. He needs daily sessions of oxygen therapy. Put on the waiting list for a heart transplant, he's unlikely to get one because of his rare blood type. He opts to stay in the hospital, instead of installing the oxygen machine at home. He wants to keep Andrew and his parents from seeing him wither away. Alone in the hospital room, he sometimes wonders whether God has actually accepted his offered sacrifice and will make good on keeping Andrew's mental health intact despite the trauma of his imminent loss.
On a sunny, beautiful September day, Pablo's diseased heart stops beating and, despite multiple defibrillation attempts, he dies. A few minutes before going unconscious, he receives a text from Andrew revealing that his daughter, a healthy baby girl, was born through a surrogacy procedure. Keeping it in secret for nine months, Andrew told no one that he spent nearly his entire lifetime's saving on the enterprise. Pablo's parents are stupefied when Andrew tells them about the child. Losing Pablo, they see her budding life as a God-given gift.
Next: Epilogue