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Nelly never smoked in her life, and she only drinks moderately. She actively exercises a lot — running, fitness, martial arts (the works) — and probably spends more than 8 hours per week doing it.
She sleeps enough, and takes care of her children when she is not teaching, or playing sports. Although she has some allergies, and sometimes suffers from some minor back pains (due to heavy work-outs), she is as healthy as a (healthy) fish.
Or so she thinks.
Because Nelly was born with very rare mutated BRCA-1 genes. Usually, these tumor suppressor genes produce proteins that help repair damaged DNA, but when they are faulted, they cannot do the work they are supposed, and basically let cells go berserk.
In other words: cancer cells get enough elbow room to uncontrollably multiply and grow into something big without the BRCA-1 genes acting upon it, and elbow room is all the cells need. For people like Nelly, cancers are also extremely aggressive, and tend to metastasize much faster than for people whose BRCA genes work appropriately.
The thing is: Nancy does not know about these gene mutations — not until the first harmless sign surfaces in the guise of a bump.
And although she strived for maximal physical health during most of her life, not one single thing she has ever done in her entire life could and can fix those faulted genes.
When the bump surfaces and is finally examined, the cancer has already spread, and her future is reduced to a couple of years — at best.
The back pains did not originate from work-outs, by the way: they simply marked the birth of the shadows in which she will disappear forever —
Without a single trace.
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