“I don’t know,” I replied, trying to be as strong as I could. “They said she fainted and was rushed to the E.R.”
She sprang to her feet. “I’m coming with you.”
“No,” I said. “I appreciate it, but no. You’ve got a test coming up in twenty minutes or so. I can’t have you miss it because of me.”
She paused for a moment.
This was an important test that would account for 70% of her semester grade. I wasn’t going to let her forfeit it for me because, as a good friend, she was willing to do so already.
“I’ll handle this,” I said, wearing a plastic smile to hide my broken heart.
“Call me when you get there, I wanna know everything, so keep me updated, okay?” Her voice was laced with worry and desperation.
I nodded and then walked out of the café, her gaze trailing me as I moved quickly.
When I reached the hospital, I was asked to wait for the doctor, and I did that in my mother’s ward. I sat on the chair beside her bed, my hand holding on to hers as the steady beep of the EKG punctuated the stillness.
The ward smelled of antiseptic solution and cold air, the soft light catching my mother’s brown hair. She lay there, asleep, her chest rising and falling with slow breaths. I tapped my feet rapidly against the floor while chewing on my nails.
I hoped to God that whatever was wrong with her was nothing serious. And with every minute that passed and the doctor didn’t show up, my anxiety grew even worse. In my head, I already thought the worst and could pray that I was wrong.
When the door swung open, and a tall man with neatly trimmed facial hair walked in, my heart skipped a beat.
“Sorry to keep you waiting, Miss….” His eyes dropped to the file in his hand, as if searching for his patient’s name.
“Morgan,” I answered, rising to my feet.
“Right.” He stepped forward, flipping through the file.
“What happened to my mother?” I asked, my heart racing in anticipation.
He cleared his throat and met my gaze. “She has a severe cardiomyopathy.”
My brows arched.
I had no idea what that meant, but “severe” and “cardio” in the sentence never meant anything good. Especially not coming from a doctor.
He continued, “Her heart muscle is weakened and enlarged. It’s not pumping blood the way that it should.”
“Oh, my God,” I whispered to myself, my legs suddenly feeling too weak to carry my weight.
A sharp ringing filled my ears, drowning out the next words that flew out of his mouth. I gripped the chair’s armrest behind me and slowly sank into it.
“We need to operate as soon as possible.”
His words cut through my heart like a freaking knife as I buried my face in my palms. My pulse was racing, my mind reeling with a thousand thoughts at once.
Surgery was definitely going to cost a lot of money. Where the hell was I supposed to start from?
My whole body was shaking, and unshed tears kept stinging my eyes.
He continued, as if blind to the fact that I was having a fucking nervous breakdown. “After the surgery, she’ll need long-term medication, regular monitoring….” His voice droned on, explaining the situation like I didn’t already know how bad it was.
My fingers clenched around the fabric of my skirt, my nails digging into my flesh. I barely had enough savings to keep me stable for the next few months. In my head, I calculated every dollar, every cent in my bank account, and it all combined was laughably small.
“How much?” I asked without looking at him.
When he named the amount, my head instinctively rose to face him. My breath hitched in my throat as a bead of cold sweat trickled down my left temple. Even if I worked two jobs for the next two years, I wasn’t going to raise that money.
