Winning the Lottery

Ch. 37 Death

The next morning, Jake was still asleep when I woke. It was too early for him to be at work, so I got up and changed into fresh blue scrubs. I did my makeup and tied my hair in a bun. Then, I made my way downstairs and found Diane by the door, holding a cup of coffee.

I took it and stepped outside.

We left.

When I got to work, I clocked in and found Dr. Welch and Dr. Walker. They were doing the surgery together.

We all scrubbed in and went into the operating room.

For hours, we worked through the patient, carefully going around nerves and vessels. When his spine was exposed, you couldn't even see it.

I saw something big and black. It went from C3-C6. Massive. It was an absolute monster.

"How is this guy not paralyzed?" I asked.

"I have no idea," Dr. Welch spoke.

I nodded and looked down at the massive tumor. I couldn't believe the man wasn't paralyzed, that he only had relatively minor symptoms.

Carefully, Dr. Welch removed the tumor. Dr. Walker kept an eye on the spine and the discs. I held a retractor, observing every movement they did.

When the surgery was over, I took the patient to recovery. I watched his stats and took him to his room, where I continued to watch him.

He stirred. "Are you a doctor?"

"I am. How are you feeling, sir?"

"I feel like a weight's been lifted. Literally."

I smiled.

Dr. Welch and Dr. Walker came in and told him how the surgery went.

When they left, the patient looked at me. He smiled, "I feel like a new man."

"That's great," I smiled. "I'm Dr. Malone. I'm going to be monitoring you today, okay? If you need anything, just have a nurse page me and I'll be here."

He smiled, "Okay. Thank you."

I nodded and left the room.

I went to check on Mr. Hamilton.

He was barely sitting up. He looked so tired, so frail.

"Hey, handsome," I smiled, walking in his room.

He gave me a weak smile. "How are you?"

"I'm good. How are you feeling?"

"Tired, really damn tired." He rubbed his eye and sighed.

I checked his vitals and wrote them down.

"Britt, can you do me a favor?" he asked.

"Yeah. What's up?"

"Can you make today a no visitors day? Please." he pleaded.

I nodded and spoke, "I can. I'll let the nurses know."

He nodded. "Thank you for yesterday. It was a nice day, nice to see Melanie so happy. He's going to take care of her. When-When I'm gone, she'll be okay."

I nodded.

"I wish I could see you and James get married. He's going to be so happy and he'll do everything he can to make you happy for the rest of your life. That's-That's good. It means I raised him right. I didn't fail."

"You didn't fail."

"I only failed me."

I looked up at him. "Peter-"