Chapter 4

With no time left to waste, the officers made the call and grabbed a window-breaker to smash the glass, telling me to film the whole thing on video.

"I'm the one who broke the glass. If there's a problem, come to me. Saving her comes first, we can't waste any more time!"

Bang—

A dull crack, and the car window shattered.

The door finally opened.

The mother-in-law had already lost consciousness, her eyes glazed as she slipped under.

But her hands still gripped the bag of scavenged junk, and it was jammed in the doorway, stuck, refusing to go in or out.

A security guard cursed her under his breath, sighing the whole time, then fetched scissors and cut the bag away.

Everyone pitched in, drenched in sweat, and only just managed to haul her out of the car and rush her to the hospital.

She'd been in that car too long, and her heart had never been strong to begin with. The moment they got her into the emergency room, her breathing stopped several times.

Only after resuscitation did her heartbeat slowly come back, but she was still in bad shape.

"Too much time was lost. Her body temperature is up to a hundred and six. This is heatstroke. On top of that, she has some underlying conditions. She has to be moved to the ICU. You need to pay and complete the admission right away."

I'd heard about heatstroke every summer, but this was the first time it had happened to someone near me.

I couldn't make up my mind either, so I went off again to call Leon.

His phone never connected on the first try for me. I called many times before he finally picked up, and when he did his voice was edged with irritation as he asked what I wanted.

"Leon, Mom's in a really bad way. She has to go to the ICU right now, and I have to pay and get her admitted. I don't have that much cash on hand, it all went into the renovation. Can you transfer me some first?"

"Ha."

Leon let out a cold laugh, and any pretense between us was finished.

"Back then you said you wanted to renovate the place. I told you a basic job was fine, but you wouldn't listen. Now something like this happens and you want me to pay? I can hear your scheming all the way from out here!"

"Leon, how can you talk like that? You weren't like this before we married, and now you say things like this? Besides, if your mother hadn't secretly pulled the oxygen line out of my fish tank, those fish of mine would've sold for over a hundred thousand—"

"Enough, enough, stop it. I don't have that kind of money. Figure it out yourself! I've got a meeting. Don't call me again."

"So what you mean is give up on treatment? Not save her?"

"Do whatever you want, it's up to you. It's got nothing to do with me!"

Before I could get another word in, he hung up first again.

Even now he still thought it was my mother in the hospital being resuscitated, and the moment I brought up his own mother's fault, he dodged the subject entirely, not caring in the slightest what kind of miserable life I'd been living.

Fine. Then I wouldn't leave any room for it either. I walked straight to the doctor's office and asked to withdraw treatment.

"We won't treat her. I just called my husband, and he's the one who said to give up on treatment, that it's got nothing to do with him! He won't even save his own mother, so there's nothing I can do."

"You're not saving her?"

The doctor was stunned too, and tried to talk me out of it.

"This heatstroke of hers can still be treated. Get her into the ICU on the machines and there's no problem at all keeping her alive!"

"No. We won't treat her. My husband won't agree to it."

My tone was firm, and I said it as though my hands were tied.

The mother-in-law on the resuscitation bed seemed to have heard it. She jolted, overcome, and the heart monitor suddenly let out a shrill, blaring alarm.

Beep beep beep—