The Seven Sins

iii. greed

Cristiano calmed himself down after his tantrum, but kept thinking about the Argentine and how he ruined his life and career. Coughing up whole petunia flowers was tiring and he visited his doctor to write him justification for his training, which he didn't have either energy to do nor he wanted to choke himself to death. If he had one year left to live, he'd decided to live it to the fullest.

"Why do you need this, Cris? It's expensive!"

Cristiano looked at Katia and blinked, not surprised by her reactions.

"I have a year left to live, so I can buy whatever I want. I want to be luxurious. Is it a sin?"

Katis stayed silent. He grabbed at one beautiful Armani watch and bought it, a thousand euros barely noticeable on his bank account.

"Do you want anything?"

Cristiano smiled at his sister who looked at him with a glare: "Why are you like this? So greedy. Some people are starving, they don't have enough food! What is wrong with you! You will burn in hell one day, Cristiano!"

Cristiano's smile fell and he looked at her suspiciously: "Mom told you that. Am I right?"

Katia looked at him with tears in her eyes.

"Come back to Madeira. Spend time with us if you don't want anything else. We are here for you."

Her hand was on his shoulder, but Cristiano wasn't impressed by the show.

"Actually, you know what," said Cristiano, faking enthusiasm, "I do want something else. I want this shirt over there."

Katia lowered her hand and crossed her arms across her chest. It was no use, trying to get her brother to think about possible future. The disease has changed him, for worse. He became greedy, arrogant and selfish, and there was no way of stopping him.

After buying the shirt, he went over to the kids' section and took some stuff for Junior. Katia was not pleased by how careless Cristiano was and how he was spoiling Junior.

They went home, not talking the entire ride. Cristiano was happily singing a tune that he recognized from the radio. The music turned into an interview of sorts, and Cristiano didn't really pay attention to it, until the words football, best and player were mentioned. His ears perked up at that.

A timid, shy voice was echoing in his car, flooding everything, all senses of Cristiano, his ears and lungs and heart, where he could hear the bass thrumming in the beat with his heart. The voice had a specific accent, the one of Argentina, the one Cristiano has heard a lot of times while watching television or just like now, listening to the radio. The Rosarino accent sounded like distorted spanish and Cristiano really had to try to understand everything what he was saying.

"Did you meet the famous Cristiano Ronaldo?"

The Portuguese's breath stopped and he almost swerved off the road. Katia didn't notice, she was looking at the buildings flying past them at high velocity.

"Uh, yeah, one time. He was nice. He congratulated me on the win."

And that was it. Nothing else. He was nice? Was that some kind of a joke? For one, he knew he wasn't nice to him. At all.

His hands gripped the steering wheel as shame flooded him. Did Lionel really think he was just nice? He was a damn good player, and a good man! Cristiano couldn't believe his ears. This guy just swooped out the chair under his ass, and then called him nice? Unbelieveable.

Cristiano didn't notice a stray tear on his cheek until he stopped at a red light and Katia extended her hand to swipe it away.

"Don't cry, Cris. It's going to be okay."

He turned his head away from Katia as he coughed, not wanting any blood to get on her t-shirt. The window was stained red, rivulets of thick blood slowly trickling down the curve. A bright yellow petal and a part of a narcissus' corona was in Cristiano's lap.

He opened the window and threw it on the ground. When he closed the window, blood was smeared all over.