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The next day, during surgery, as we were nearing the end, the atmosphere in the OR had lightened. One of the nurses brought up Damian on the 18th floor again.
“Can you believe it?” she whispered theatrically. “He needed three cars just to come in for a check–up.”
I remained silent, but my hands didn’t stop moving. I thought about how protective Damian was of his son. Those three cars weren’t for him. They were because he had his child with him.
The comments had said that if Damian cherished his son so much, he must have cared for the boy’s mother
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Chapter 2
even more. I found myself wondering about Damian’s wife. What kind of person was she?
But she was gone. I would probably never know.
I gave my
head a slight shake, pushing the distracting thoughts away.
Then someone beside me asked, “So what’s wrong with the big boss, anyway?”
“Something with his stomach,” the nurse leaned in and whispered. “They already removed half of it. I heard that all he can eat is, like, boiled cabbage soaked in vinegar.”
My breath hitched.
thought of Damian’s pale face, his gaunt frame. I thought of that night at the gala, when he had been forced
to leave his son outside the restroom.
Stomach problems.
Had he gone to the restroom that night to be sick? He was afraid his son would see him in such a vulnerable
state and cry, so he had no choice but to leave him outside the door.
A wave of sympathetic nausea washed over me. Standing there at the operating table, my own stomach
twisted.
Only half a stomach left.
I couldn’t stop the thoughts from flooding my mind.
What does he eat? Does everything he eats make him sick? Will he… ever get better?
