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"Mr. Amalfi, I'm sorry, we've run out of time."
"But she's on the donor list; isn't someone there viable?"
I refuse to give up. I will never give up. As long as she is breathing, I will be fighting for her.
"There's a long list of people, suffering just like your daughter. The chances of finding a match at this point are really low and I just need you to understand that at this point there is nothing more that we can do other than to make her comfortable."
"Comfortable?" I stand up abruptly, the panic and fear I feel is taking over and I can't seem to control it. "Does she look comfortable to you? Her heart is failing, her liver failed ages ago and her body is being poisoned by bile. She isn't comfortable - she's dying."
I break down -- aching sobs crashing through my chest, suffocating my lungs, tearing me apart.
My little girl is going to die and there is absolutely nothing that I can do about it.
"I - um - I'll give you a moment." The doctor says gently and then hurries out of the room. They know who I am. They know I'm dangerous. They know that right now I am very unstable and looking for someone to take this anger out on.
But I have no one to blame -- no one to point fingers at for not fixing this.
The universe chose to do this to my baby and the universe chose not to save her.
I sit for hours, listening to the rhythmic beeping of her heartbeat in that high-pitched drone of the hospital machine. Even her heart is weak and struggling at this point.
The longer I sit the more numb I feel.
Hopeless and empty and numb. I prefer feeling numb to feeling the pain of losing her.
My most beautiful thing in the entire world. My heart and soul.
The only person who ever gave me an understanding of what love is. And now she is going to be ripped from my life in a cruel twist of fate and pain.
I've watched her suffer for years, and especially the last few months and then weeks have been the most brutal.
And all the while her mother partied and shopped and paid little to no attention to her dying daughter.
"Hey, Stef," Matteo says, walking into the private hospital room where Merelda is resting.
"Hi," I say with empty emotion.
"How's she doing today?"
"It's not good. No one is a match, and the doctor tells me…" my throat closes. I take a breath. "The doctor tells me that the chances of finding someone on the donor list are low."
"He said that?"
"He said we should prepare for the worst at this point. She's run out of time."
Tears fall silently down my throat, and I wipe them away quickly.
"Ah, man, I am so sorry. Fuck that breaks my heart. I wish I was a match. I would help you in a heartbeat."
"I know man. I know that if there was anything you could do you would do it." I mumble morbidly.
"Anything man. If there was anything. I would." He sighs and pulls the other chair towards the bed, sitting down and taking her hand on the other side of me.
I watch him smile at her with warmth and love and I find myself wishing again that this was some nightmare that I could just wake up from. A bad dream. Not real. One of those dreams that haunt you for weeks after they happen because they were so emotional - and every time you remember it you are filled with relief because it didn't actually happen.
I wish.
"How long does she have?" Matteo asks quietly as Merelda stirs and mutters something in her sleep. Even in sleep, she seems to be in pain now.
