CHAPTER 2: The Night It Stopped Raining
Only three people remained in the room.
The boy.
The dying doctor.
And the eldest daughter, who refused to sit back down.
The storm outside grew louder, rain striking the glass like impatient fingers.
The doctor finally spoke again.
“Twenty-eight years ago… it was raining like this.”
His voice drifted, as if he was no longer in the hospital.
“I was chief surgeon. That night, they brought in a young woman after a car accident. Pregnant. Critical condition.”
The boy’s fingers tightened around the paper.
“My mother,” he said softly.
The doctor nodded faintly.
“There were complications. Only one could survive. Mother or child.”
The eldest daughter’s face tightened. “You chose the mother,” she said coldly.
A long pause.
“No,” the doctor whispered.
That single word changed the air.
“I chose the child.”
The room froze again.
The doctor’s breathing became uneven, as if the memory itself was pulling him apart.
“But the hospital board… they needed statistics clean. A dead newborn meant negligence. A scandal.”
His eyes opened slowly.
“So they told the world the baby didn’t survive.”
The boy took a step back.
His lips parted—but no sound came out.
The umbrella beside the bed suddenly felt heavier than anything in the room.
The doctor’s voice cracked.
“I signed the amendment… I thought I was saving my career so I could protect her later. But I never saw her again.”
May you like
He looked at the boy.
“And I never knew where they took you.”
