Chapter 271: Collapse

Chapter 271: Collapse

Lily rushed over and placed her hand on Zola's back. She could feel Zola's shoulder blades jutting up like butterfly wings, the bones so clearly outlined beneath the thin skin that it hurt to look at.

"Zola, why don't you sit down, okay?" Lily's voice was soft, like she was coaxing a child.

Zola shook her head. Her face was dry, but her eyes were so red they looked like they might bleed.

Lily suddenly realized that Zola hadn't shed a single tear since the afternoon.

Her body was like a sealed container, holding everything inside — all the enormous, overwhelming things that could destroy a person — not letting any of it spill out, even as those things were tearing her apart from within.

Another nurse walked over, a young girl with a round face who looked barely in her twenties.

She was holding a form. She stepped up to Zola and said in that flat, professional tone, "Ms. He, I need you to sign this."

Zola looked up at her, and the look in her eyes was something Lily had never seen before. It wasn't anger, and it wasn't grief. It was something deeper, something more primal — a raw bewilderment, like someone who had just been dropped in the middle of a wasteland, staring out at an unfamiliar land with no markers, no signs, no idea where they were or which way to go.

"Sign what?" Zola asked.

"Just some standard paperwork." The nurse held out the form and a pen. "Regarding the arrangements for the remains—"

That word hit like a needle driving straight into something.

Lily watched Zola's body jerk violently, as if she'd been shocked. She reached out her hand — not to take the pen, but to grab the nurse's wrist, so hard that the young woman cried out.

"Remains?" Zola's voice shot up, sharp as shattering glass. "What do you mean, remains? You're talking to me about remains? My daughter is alive! She's still alive! Give her back to me! Give her back!"

The nurse stumbled back in fright, but Zola wouldn't let go of her wrist, her fingernails digging deep into the skin. Lily quickly wrapped her arms around Zola's shoulders and tried to pull her away, but Zola's strength was terrifying — as if everything she'd been holding back had exploded all at once into something wild and uncontrollable.

"My daughter was just born!" Zola's voice rang through the empty hallway, bouncing off the white walls and coming back in broken fragments. "She was fine when she was born! You're the ones who said something was wrong! You killed my daughter! Why did you let her die? Why?"

Two orderlies came running and helped Lily pull Zola away from the nurse.

They pressed Zola down onto a bench. Her body kept fighting, like a fish thrown onto dry land, thrashing and twisting, desperate to get back to the water — but the water was gone. Nothing in this world could carry her back.

Her mouth was still moving, but the words had fallen apart, coming out in torn pieces, like shredded paper fluttering from her lips.

"Her heart..." Zola suddenly said something coherent, and it was more heartbreaking than any of her screaming. "The doctor said there was something wrong with her heart..."

She lifted her head, eyes wide open, staring at Lily, at the nurse, at everyone around her, as if she'd just remembered something urgent.

"The doctor said there was something wrong with her heart! Did you check her heart? Was it her heart? Was it? What was wrong with her heart?"

Lily wanted to calm her down, but she had no idea where to begin. All she could do was crouch down and hold Zola's face in both hands, making her look directly at her.

Tears finally came to Zola's eyes. The tears that had been locked away for over ten hours finally found a way out, flooding down like a dam breaking, running down her cheeks and over Lily's fingers, burning hot — hot enough to blister skin.

"Zola, listen to me." Lily's voice was shaking, but she tried to keep it steady. "Stop thinking for now, okay? Just stop thinking."

But Zola couldn't hear her. She shoved Lily away, stumbled to her feet, and lurched toward the operating room, screaming as she went: "I want to see my daughter! I want to see her right now! Open the door! Open the door!"

Her fists slammed against the operating room door, making a dull, heavy sound. The hallway lights blazed down on all of it — on Zola, on her knees in front of that door, beating her fists against the metal.

Lily grabbed her from behind and used every bit of strength she had to drag her away. Zola's body shook violently in her arms, like a leaf in a storm, like a building in an earthquake, like everything that was in the process of collapsing.

"Cordelia — Cordelia — I'm here — I'm right here —"

The voice drifted back and forth through the hospital hallway in the middle of the night, passing door after closed door, light after pale light.

It was impossible to imagine. She already couldn't hold herself together just knowing her child was gone. If she actually saw the body...

Half an hour later, the elevator at the end of the hallway opened.

Zola had stopped fighting. She was slumped against the wall beside the operating room door, crumpled like a piece of paper someone had balled up and thrown away. Lily crouched beside her, one hand holding hers tightly, the other moving slowly up and down her back.

Her eyes were dry and red — the tears had run out. Her voice was gone from all the screaming. All that was left were occasional low sounds from deep in her throat, like a small animal badly wounded, too exhausted even to cry.

Lily heard footsteps and looked up, and went completely still.

She had seen this man in photos before — bright-eyed, smiling easily, full of life.

But the man walking toward her from the end of the hallway looked like someone had drained everything out of him. He was wearing a wrinkled dark jacket, his hair disheveled, as if he'd rushed here from somewhere far away. His expression wasn't grief — it was a kind of numbness, a blank emptiness.

What hit hardest was his hair.

At his temples, large patches had gone white, spreading out like winter had arrived early and settled there.

He wasn't walking fast. If anything, he was slow, his feet dragging along the floor.

Lily noticed he was holding something in his hand. As he got closer, she could make it out — a tiny pale pink sock, swaying gently with each step he took, with that innocent, delicate little sway that had no place in this hallway, among any of this.