They all crowded into the room. And they all saw it. They saw the nurse standing frozen with a plastic jar in her hand. They saw a pale, tear-streaked girl in a simple dress. They saw a cleaning woman trying to shield her daughter. And finally, they saw Artie, sleeping peacefully and breathing normally.
The chief of medicine stopped in his tracks. His gaze darted from the nurse to the jar, from the jar to the monitors, and finally to Lily. His professional mind, which had been baffled for days, began to piece together the terrifying puzzle.
Artie’s father stepped closer. He wasn’t looking at his son. He was looking at the jar. At the repulsive, living thing inside.
— “That…” his voice was a low rasp. “That was inside my son?”
The nurse nodded. She couldn’t find her voice. She simply held out the jar.
He took it. He held it up to the light. His fingers, used to signing multi-million dollar contracts and shaking hands with world leaders, were trembling as they gripped the cheap plastic. He watched the creature crawl along the bottom, trying to hide in the shadows. His expression shifted from confusion to horror, and then to something cold and hard. He realized his son wasn’t being killed by a “failure to thrive,” but by *this*. And if this was inside him, it hadn’t gotten there by accident.
He looked up. First at the nurse.
— “Who? Who found this?” he asked quietly. But the quiet carried a weight that made everyone in the room shiver.
The nurse shook her head. She hadn’t found it on her own. She had just done the work. She had been helped. Her eyes instinctively drifted toward the small figure hiding behind the cleaning woman. Toward Lily.
As if on cue, every head in the room turned. The millionaire father. The chief of medicine. Lily’s mother, who instinctively pulled her daughter even closer. An eight-year-old girl was now the center of the room’s heavy, silent attention.
She pressed herself into her mother’s uniform, hiding her face. She didn’t want them looking at her. She didn’t want to talk. She had done what she could. She just wanted the boy to live. Now she was surrounded by important, loud adults again. And in their eyes, she saw shock, confusion, and in the father’s eyes—a burning, demanding question.
Artie’s father took a step forward. He knelt down so he was at eye level with her. His face was stern, but his eyes were soft.
— “Lily,” he said very quietly. He was still clutching the jar. “You knew?”
— “Yes.”
— “You knew that was in there?”
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