My son was diagnosed with leukemia. The only successful bone marrow match was my husband.
But right before he was supposed to enter the operating room to have his marrow extracted, my mother-in-law grabbed him by the arm and dragged him out the door.
"Sign the divorce papers and the asset waiver first. Otherwise, my son is not donating a single drop of marrow!"
I stared at them in disbelief.
Five years of marriage. Five years of me working full-time to support the household while my husband studied for his civil service exams and pursued his doctorate.
All because I'd given birth to a son with a hearing disability, my mother-in-law had treated us like cursed omens.
From inside the sterile isolation unit, my son's faint cries drifted through the glass. I signed the papers through a blur of tears, surrendering every property and every penny of savings to my name.
My mother-in-law snatched the agreement with a satisfied look. Only then did my husband change into his sterile gown.
Two hours later, the doctor came rushing out.
"The donor stopped the procedure halfway through. We only collected half the required marrow volume. That amount is nowhere near enough to save the child!"
My whole body was shaking as I ran out of the waiting area.
Audrey Chavez stood blocking the doorway to the ward, chin raised, not a shred of guilt on her face.
"That pathetic little pile of assets you signed over? That only bought half my son's marrow!"
"You want to save that deaf runt? Have your family come up with five million dollars in cash for the rest!"
——
Inside the sterile unit, my five-year-old son, Cliff Gilbert, seemed to sense something was wrong. His small body curled in on itself, and a whimper escaped him, thin and trembling, like a wounded kitten.
He wore hearing aids. That feeble cry was so quiet most people wouldn't have heard it, but to me it was a poisoned blade driven straight through my heart.
"Cliff..." I pressed myself against the isolation glass, tears flooding my vision until everything dissolved.
"Sarah Fox! What are you standing there for?" Audrey's shrill voice sliced through the air behind me. "Did you not hear me? Five million! Not a cent less! Otherwise your son can lie in there and die!"
I whipped around. My eyes were bloodshot, burning as I fixed them on her, then on the man standing behind her. Dana Gilbert. The man I had loved for five years.
He was still wearing the hospital gown he'd just changed out of. His face was pale, but he wouldn't meet my gaze. His eyes stayed low, darting to the floor.
Just three hours ago, I had walked him to the operating room doors with my own hands, silently grateful that he was willing to donate marrow to save our son.
Now I saw it for what it was. A trap. Every step of it planned by the two of them.
First, use the divorce papers to strip me of everything I owned. Then use the marrow my son needed to survive to bleed my family dry of whatever was left.
My parents died years ago. The only relative I had was a cousin living overseas. They were trying to back me into a corner with no way out.
"Audrey. Dana." My voice was so raw it didn't sound like mine. Every word tasted like blood. "You'll pay for this."
Audrey let out a sharp laugh. The fleshy folds of her face bunched together, smug and vicious. "Pay for it? Pay how? That deaf little son of yours is the real punishment! I told you from the start, deafness is hereditary. You refused to listen. And look what happened. You gave birth to a money pit, and now you want to drag my son down with you!"
Her words were needles, hundreds of them, and not one missed.
Cliff's hearing disability was the deepest wound I carried.
Because of it, Audrey had never shown us a moment of kindness. She called Cliff a "little bastard" and a "deaf runt" to his face.
And Dana had gone from heartbreak in the beginning to impatience, and then to cold indifference.
I used to tell myself it was just the stress of work. Now I understood. Deep down, he was exactly like his mother. Cold-blooded and selfish to the bone.
"Money?" I wiped my tears and looked at them, my gaze flat and dead. "I won't give you another cent. Dana, you chose to stand by and let your own son die. So you and I are done. Completely."
I turned away. I couldn't stand to look at their faces for one more second.
Dr. Rick Lambert, the attending physician, was still waiting for my answer. His expression was grave as he looked at me. "Mrs. Fox, your son's condition is extremely critical. The transplant was interrupted, and his immune system has already been thrown into total disarray. We need to find a new marrow donor as soon as possible, or... convince the original donor to complete the remaining extraction."
