Chapter 13 - Blood Type Loyalty
Z
For three weeks, the Saturday visits went smoothly.
Darlene arrived promptly at 2:00 PM, frail and soft-spoken. She brought small, modest gifts for Maisie—coloring books, stuffed animals, simple ribbons. She never raised her voice. She apologized to Laurel every single week, weeping openly and thanking her for her mercy.
Maisie slowly warmed up to her, sitting on the floor drawing pictures while Darlene watched with tired, adoring eyes. I stayed in the room the entire time, hyper-vigilant, searching for any slip in her persona.
There was none. Darlene looked weaker with every passing week, her skin taking on a yellowish, sickly tint.
Then, on the fourth Saturday, the true purpose of her return shattered our reality.
Darlene was sitting on the sofa, holding a cup of herbal tea, when she suddenly gasped, clutching her side. The tea cup slipped from her fingers, shattering on the hardwood floor. She slumped sideways, vomiting a dark, viscous fluid onto the rug before collapsing into unconsciousness.
"Mom!" I yelled, rushing forward.
Laurel screamed, grabbing Maisie and pulling her out of the room. I rolled Darlene onto her side, checking her pulse—it was weak, rapid, and thready.
"Call 911!" I roared toward the hallway.
Within ten minutes, an ambulance arrived, sirens blaring through the quiet neighborhood. Paramedics rushed inside, loading Darlene onto a gurney while giving her supplemental oxygen. Karen arrived at the house minutes later, hysterical, following the ambulance to Duke University Hospital in Durham.
I told Laurel to stay with Maisie while I drove to the hospital. Despite everything, she was still my mother, and watching her collapse in a pool of blood had ignited an instinctual, primal panic within me.
I arrived at the hospital ER waiting room. An hour passed in agonizing silence before a senior physician in blue scrubs walked out into the waiting area.
"Family of Darlene Calloway?" the doctor asked.
I stood up immediately, along with Karen. "I'm her son, Everett. How is she?"
The doctor sighed, pulling off his surgical mask. "She suffered acute liver failure triggered by late-stage organ metastasis. We managed to stabilize her bleeding, but her liver function has dropped below fifteen percent."
Karen broke into hysterical sobbing. "Oh God! Is she dying?!"
"Without intervention, yes," the doctor said gravely. "Her cancer has spread, but the immediate threat isn't the tumor—it's liver failure. Because of her age and cancer staging, she is not eligible for the national organ transplant list."
"Then what can we do?" I asked, my heart pounding against my ribs.
The doctor looked directly into my eyes. "There is only one option. A living-donor partial liver transplant. A healthy family member with matching blood type and tissue compatibility can donate a lobe of their liver. The liver regenerates in both donor and recipient within months."
Karen immediately shook her head, backing away. "I... I can't! I have a heart arrhythmia! I'm not a candidate!"
The doctor turned his gaze to me. "Mr. Calloway, your mother's blood type is O-negative. A very rare type. We ran a quick database check on family records. You are also O-negative."
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I felt the air leave my lungs.
"If you don't donate a piece of your liver within forty-eight hours," the doctor said softly, "your mother will suffer total systemic organ failure and die."
