Goodbye, Mom

Ethan immediately pulled out his phone and had his lawyer draft a divorce agreement, threatening to make me leave with nothing.

I ignored him and turned to head into the operating room. But just then, a few bystanders stepped forward, blocking my way.

"Dr. Mitchell, we all know that you're a skilled doctor. But you became a doctor to save lives. You can't just ignore your mother. If you do this, who will trust you to treat them in the future?"

"Yeah. If you perform surgery on your mom, we'll look the other way. No one will report you, so it won't count as breaking the rules!"

After noticing that I wouldn't listen, Dad turned to the patient's family and kneeled in front of them. He begged them to forgo the surgery and give Mom a chance to live.

The family agreed, but I still refused.

"Surgery isn't a game. I've been preparing for this for a long time. Each patient's case is unique, and so is the surgical plan. You can't just swap one patient for another like that."

As I said that, I signaled to my colleague to take the kidney into the operating room.

Dad's desperate pleas only made the crowd more hostile toward me.

Someone pulled out their phone and started a live stream, inciting the entire internet to condemn me. The insults flooded in.

"This is what an expert doctor looks like? She can't even save her own mom, and she's supposed to save others?"

"Even animals know how to take care of their family. This ingrate is worse than an animal! She's not fit to be a doctor!"

"Get out of the hospital! If you don't, we'll never go there again!"

Someone even threw a set of keys at my head. Blood poured out instantly, and the scene quickly spiraled out of control. By the time the hospital administrators arrived, my surgical gown was stained with blood.

After hearing the nurse's account and seeing the comments online, they urged me to save Mom, but I still refused.

"I have my principles. No one gets special treatment. Not even my mother."

I left those words behind and stepped into the operating room.

Behind me, Dad's wailing echoed as he recounted all they had done for me over the years.

The cake soaked in rain on a stormy night, the textbooks paid for with spare change, and the mud-covered doll that conveyed love and blessings.

Despite their financial struggles, they had always given me all the love they could. I had been lucky enough to grow up in a warm family.

The day I got into the hospital for my residency, Dad and Mom held my hand and walked me around the village.

They had proudly told everyone that our family finally had a top student. They called me the pride of the Mitchell family.

When they found out that I was getting married, they had each worked three jobs for three years just to scrape together the down payment for a house. All so I wouldn't feel inferior in front of Ethan.

For 30 years, I'd never envied anyone else. I knew that their love for me was real, and I loved them too.

If that one thing hadn't happened, I might have risked my job to save Mom. But unfortunately, we couldn't turn back time.

The door to the operating room closed, shutting out Dad's desperate cries.

When the surgery was finally over, five hours had passed.

As I took off my mask and stepped out the door, I was met by a crowd of reporters eager to interview me, along with passersby condemning me on behalf of my parents.

"Hi, Dr. Mitchell. We heard you'd rather save a stranger than your mother. Is there something more to the story?"

"What story? She's just an ungrateful monster! The Mitchells raised such a heartless daughter. What a stroke of bad luck! She deserves to be hit by a car or struck by lightning!"

"She calls herself a doctor? Calling her an animal would be an insult to animals! The patient's family even agreed to give up the surgery, yet she still acted high and mighty. She prioritized her reputation over her own mother's life!"

"Get out of the hospital, Rosie Mitchell! Get out of the medical field!"