All of them flooded back at once.
My stomach heaved. I clamped both hands over my mouth—and saw my arms. The arms riddled with dialysis scars.
Tears splattered against the floor.
My phone buzzed.
A text: Your kidney transplant surgery has been canceled.
And right after it—a new delivery order.
From this very hospital.
My parents had ordered a three-thousand-dollar luxury cake.
For a stranger's birthday party.
The notes section listed hundreds of words of instructions.
Yet they'd forgotten—today was also my birthday.
The absurdity and irony consumed me whole.
I couldn't hold back anymore. I shoved the door open and screamed.
"How dare you give my kidney to someone else?!"
"I waited three years in that queue!"
"You have no right to do this!"
I fought to control the trembling that came with my rage.
I rushed forward and snatched the consent form from my mother's hands, tearing it to shreds.
"Penelope, what are you doing here?!" She didn't even flinch. "Shouldn't you be out delivering food right now?"
"Don't tell me you're slacking off over a little illness?"
"Did everything we taught you go in one ear and out the other?!"
My mother's brows knitted together.