Chapter 1The Price of My Life: Billing My Mother-In-Law

The bleeding wouldn't stop.

I lay on the delivery bed, the overhead lights blindingly white. Someone shouted, "More pressure!" I could hear running, the sound of shoes squeaking frantically against the linoleum floor.

My consciousness was sinking.

I couldn't feel the pain anymore. Just cold. A deep, creeping cold starting from the soles of my feet.

The delivery room door wasn't shut completely. Voices drifted in from the hallway.

It was my mother-in-law, Martha.

She was on the phone.

"...Five hundred thousand dollars, that was the agreed-upon dowry. If she doesn't make it, can we get that money back?"

I heard it perfectly clearly.

Every single word.

* * *

I didn't die.

The doctor said I hemorrhaged two liters of blood and they spent forty minutes trying to stabilize me. They managed to save my uterus.

The baby lived, too. Six pounds, two ounces, a little boy.

When the nurse brought the baby over for me to see, I was still shaking. Not from the cold, but because my body hadn't fully returned from the edge.

I looked at my son. A wrinkled little face, eyes squeezed shut, mouth opening and closing like a baby bird.

I didn't cry.

I was thinking about that sentence.

"If she doesn't make it, can we get that money back?"

The hospital room door opened.

David walked in.

He looked pale, his eyes a little red. He stood by the bed, looked at me for a moment, and said, "You scared me to death."

I looked back at him.

"When you had to sign the consent forms, how long did you hesitate?"

He froze. "What?"

"To save the mother or save the child. When the doctor asked you to sign. How long did you hesitate?"

"I didn't hesitate," he answered quickly.

Too quickly.

People don't answer that fast when they're telling the truth.

I didn't push it.

I was too exhausted. Tubes were sticking out of me, and a blood transfusion was still dripping into my arm. I closed my eyes.

David sat beside me for a while.

He didn't hold my hand.

He didn't ask if I was in pain.

He was looking at his phone.

Through my half-closed eyes, I saw the screen. It was a text thread with his mother. He was replying to her.

I shut my eyes completely.

Ten minutes later, the door opened again.

Martha walked in.

She was carrying a thermos, walked straight to my bedside, and set it on the nightstand.

"You're awake? Eat something."

She glanced at the baby, a smile breaking across her face.

"Six pounds two ounces, not bad."

She opened the thermos, poured out a bowl of soup, and held it out to me.

"Drink this, it's pork rib broth."

I didn't take it.

I was staring at her face.

This was a face I had looked at for three years. A round face, eyes that crinkled into slits when she smiled, a loud, booming voice. The neighbors all called her the friendly Mrs. Hayes.

Twenty minutes ago, this same face was out in the hallway on the phone, voice lowered, weighing my worth like a piece of meat on a scale.

Could they get the five hundred thousand dollar dowry back?

While I was bleeding out, she was doing the math.

"Mia, are you going to drink this or not?" she asked again, her voice a notch louder.

I took the bowl.

My hands were shaking.

A little bit of broth spilled onto the blanket.

She didn't notice.

She was too busy looking at the baby.

"He looks just like David," she smiled.

I lowered my head and sipped the soup.

I couldn't taste anything.

It tasted like absolutely nothing.

That night, David went home. He said he needed to clean up the house and get things ready for the baby.

Martha left, too. She said she'd be back first thing in the morning.

Only the baby and I were left in the room.

Out in the hallway, I could hear other new mothers talking, men's voices coaxing them—"Does it hurt? What do you want to eat? I'll go buy it."

The husband of the woman in the bed next to mine came back with a bouquet of flowers.

On my nightstand sat that half-finished bowl of pork rib broth.

Cold.

No flowers. No fruit. Not a single "You went through so much today."

I rolled onto my side, facing the wall.

The baby let out a tiny grunt from his bassinet.

I closed my eyes.

I didn't cry.

My brain just kept replaying that one sentence, over and over.

"If she doesn't make it, can we get that money back?"

The next morning, the nurse came in for rounds.

"Where's your family? Why isn't anyone here with you?"

"They went home to clean up," I said.

The nurse gave me a look but didn't say anything else.

She changed my dressings, checked my bleeding, and told me to get plenty of rest.

I asked her, "Yesterday, during the emergency... who signed the consent forms?"

"Your husband."

"Did he... sign them quickly?"

The nurse hesitated.

"You just focus on resting."

She didn't answer.

But her hesitation was all the answer I needed.