Irene had neither interrupted nor disturbed Ilyan's haywire emotions. She could not imagine what he must have been through when his father broke the news to him for the first time.
Irene gently placed Ilyan's head on the cushion that she had pulled from behind her back when she realized that he had fallen asleep after weeping for several long minutes.
She carefully got up from the couch and did not let her feet halt anywhere in between until she reached the kitchen. Once she was out of the living room and knew that any sound made by her would not reach Ilyan, the woman broke down.
She slapped her palms against the kitchen slab as her eyes poured down, letting out all the pain that she had been holding back in front of Ilyan. Her breath hitched in her throat as Ilyan's words reverberated in her ears, making her suffering worse.
Illnesses sucked but they were treatable, she had always believed but where one was supposed to go in cases like Christina's?
