Chapter 19 - The Decision No Parent Should Ever Hear
The hospital board assembled within minutes.
Administrators.
Department heads.
Senior surgeons.
Everyone crowded into a small conference room overlooking the pediatric wing.
Charts covered the table.
Operating schedules filled the screens.
Dr. Voss spoke first.
"I can perform both operations."
Relief briefly crossed Elena's face.
Then he continued.
"But not simultaneously."
The relief disappeared.
"The trauma surgery requires approximately four hours."
Harrow added quietly,
"Lucia's procedure could take six."
A board member asked the question no one wanted to hear.
"If both surgeries cannot begin immediately..."
He hesitated.
"...which child goes first?"
The room became completely still.
Claire lowered her head.
Elena stared at the table.
Neither mother spoke.
Neither wanted another family's child placed second.
Dr. Voss folded his arms.
"I refuse to choose based on age."
"Or finances," Adrian added.
"Or publicity."
The chairman sighed.
"Then what do we base it on?"
Harrow opened Lucia's newest scans.
Another physician displayed Ethan's trauma images.
Medical discussions filled the room.
Blood pressure.
Oxygen.
Bleeding.
Airway.
Cardiac output.
Probabilities.
Risks.
Adrian barely heard them.
He wasn't thinking like a businessman anymore.
He was thinking like a father.
Outside the conference room, Elena quietly walked to the hospital chapel.
She sat alone.
No dramatic speeches.
No desperate bargains.
Only silence.
Several minutes later, the chapel door opened.
Claire entered.
She looked embarrassed.
"I didn't know anyone was here."
"It's alright."
Claire sat beside her.
For a long time...
Neither woman spoke.
Then Claire reached into her pocket.
She removed a small photograph.
"My Ethan."
Elena smiled softly.
She took out her phone.
"This is Lucia."
The two mothers exchanged pictures.
Neither compared.
Neither competed.
Only shared.
At that exact moment, an emergency page echoed through the hospital.
Dr. Voss immediately left the boardroom.
May you like
One of the children had suddenly become unstable.
No one yet knew which one.
