Five Years as Spare Parts

After my miscarriage, my abdomen felt like it had been crushed by a truck.

My husband William walked in wearing his white coat.

He pulled off his gloves while coldly informing me:

It's good this baby's gone. Now we can remove part of your uterus and transplant it to Juliet.

I thought I'd misheard. I weakly asked:

"What did you say? Who's Juliet?"

His eyes held no warmth, as if looking at an organ container:

"My first love. She has congenital underdeveloped uterus and can't be a mother. You have a good constitution. We won't be having children anyway, so you might as well help her out."

I struggled to sit up, disbelief filling my eyes:

"William, I'm your wife! You want me to give my organs to your old flame?"

He pressed down on my shoulder, his tone brooking no argument:

"This is the medically optimal solution. It's also your chance to atone."

"Atone? What did I do wrong?"

He looked down at me from above, adjusting his gold-rimmed glasses:

"You've occupied the position that should have been hers for five years. That's your mistake. I've already signed the surgical consent form for you. If you don't cooperate, I'll stop your father's medication tomorrow."

I lay on the cold operating table, staring at the blinding surgical light overhead.

So in his heart, I wasn't even a person. Just a spare parts warehouse.

After William said this, he threw the surgical informed consent form directly in my face.

The sharp edge of the paper cut across my cheek, stinging painfully.

The pen tip nearly blinded my eye.

I ignored the pain on my face and desperately grabbed the hem of his white coat.

"William, are you insane? I just had a miscarriage! That was our child!"

"Doing a transplant surgery nowdo you want me to die on the operating table?"

William slapped my hand away in disgust, as if brushing off something dirty.

"You won't die. I'm the lead surgeon. I know what I'm doing."

"Besides, that embryo wasn't viable anyway. It's better that it's gone."

"Juliet can't wait any longer. Her birthday is next month. This is my gift to her."

A gift? Using my organs to please his first love?

I trembled all over, whether from anger or cold, I couldn't tell.

"I won't sign! I'll call the police! This is intentional harm!"

William let out a cold laugh, the look of someone superior regarding an ant.

"Call the police? I'm your legal husband and your attending physician."

"I have the right to decide your treatment plan."

"And by the way, did you forget? Your father is still lying in the ICU."

At the mention of my father, I fell silent like a chicken with its throat squeezed.

William was satisfied with my reaction. He unhurriedly pulled out his phone.

"Your father's medical expenses are twelve thousand dollars a day. It's only through my connections that he's in the special care ward."

"With just one phone call, he'll be thrown into the hallway tonight."

"Want to try it?"

I bit through my lip. The taste of blood spread through my mouth.

Five years ago, I was a prodigy at medical school. He was a poor boy living on financial aid.

To support him through his doctoral studies, I gave up graduate school to sell insurance and wait tables.

I worked three jobs a day. My hands were corroded by dish soap.

Back then, he carried me on his back through the snow when I had a fever, swearing he'd protect me for life.

Now, wearing the designer shirt I bought him, he wanted to take me apart and give me away.

"William, did a dog eat your conscience?"

"I supported your education, supported your whole family. Is this how you repay me?"

William's face darkened, as if I'd touched a nerve.

"Shut up! That was all your wishful thinking, your self-indulgent delusion!"

"If you hadn't desperately clung to me, Juliet and I would have been married long ago!"

"You're just a burden. Besides cooking and washing clothes, what else can you do?"

"Juliet is different. She's George's daughter. She can advance my career."

"Giving her your uterus is the greatest value you'll have in this life."

Just then, the hospital room door was pushed open.

A nurse came in with a medication cart. Seeing the tense atmosphere, she didn't dare speak.

William resumed his sanctimonious appearance.

"Change the dressing for bed 3. Also prepare her for surgery. First case tomorrow morning."

The nurse hesitated: "Dr. William, bed 3 just had a D&C procedure. Her vital signs..."

"Do as I say!" William barked.

The nurse flinched and quickly nodded.

William pulled back my blanket in front of the outsider.

Without any respect, as if examining a piece of pork.

"Recovery looks fine. Won't affect the extraction."

Extraction. Was I a package?

The overwhelming humiliation made me want to scream, but I couldn't make a sound.

Because I saw a wheelchair had stopped at the doorway.

A woman sat in it, smiling at me. That was Juliet.

I'd only seen her photo in the inner fold of William's wallet.

It was an old photo from many years ago. The girl in the photo looked as pure as a white flower.

The current Juliet wore a hospital gown. Though sitting in a wheelchair, her complexion was rosy.

She even looked healthier than me, who had just miscarried.

The moment William saw her, he changed his expression completely, becoming tender enough to melt.

"Juliet, why did you come? There are bacteria here. Don't get infected."

Juliet coyly extended her hand, letting William help her.

"William, I was worried about Lena. Lena just lost her baby. She must be devastated. I wanted to see her."

She had William push the wheelchair to my bedside.

I smelled her expensive perfumethe one William had bought with my card last week.

Juliet grabbed my hand. Tears came instantly.

"Lena, I'm sorry. It's all my fault. My body is useless."

"I just want to give William a child so badly."

"Since you can't have one, just let me borrow your uterus. You don't need it anymore anyway."

Borrow? Could such a thing be borrowed?

I looked at her fake face, nausea churning in my stomach.

"Get out! Don't touch me!"

I used all my strength to shake off her hand.

Juliet fell backward deliberately, collapsing to the floor with a cry.

"Oh! That hurts!"

"Juliet!"

William rushed over to lift her up, then turned and slapped me across the face.

"Smack!" The slap was brutal.

It hit me so hard that my post-surgical abdomen cramped violently. My vision went black.

"Lena! You vicious woman! Juliet came to see you out of kindness, and you pushed her!"

I covered my face, my ears ringing.

"She's faking... William, are you blind? She's not even sick!"

I hadn't used any force in that shake.

And her pulse was strong and powerful, her palm warm. She wasn't someone with congenital disease at all.

I studied medicine. I still had that much judgment.

William didn't listen at all. He carefully lifted Juliet back into the wheelchair.

"If anything happens to Juliet, I'll take your life!"

Juliet curled up in William's arms, sobbing:

"William, don't blame Lena. She's probably just too jealous of me."

"After all, I'm the one you're going to marry. She's just a transition."

William tenderly wiped away her tears.

"What transition? She's just a housekeeper."

Then he took out his phone and, right in front of me, called my father's attending physician on speakerphone.

"Hello, this is William."

"Stop the ventilator for half an hour."

The doctor's hesitant voice came through: "William, this... the patient can't survive without the ventilator. Half an hour will be fatal."

William looked at me, a cruel smile playing on his lips.

"Do as I say. If anything happens, I'll take responsibility. Or rather, this is the family's request."

The call ended.

Less than a minute later, the alarm from the monitoring equipment in my father's room echoed down the hallway.

It was a countdown to death.

"No! William, you bastard!"

I broke down crying. Ignoring the severe pain in my abdomen, I knelt on the bed and kowtowed to him.

"Please! Don't hurt my father! I'll sign! I'll sign!"

"I'll give you whatever you want! Please don't stop his medication!"

Dignity? In the face of a loved one's life, dignity was worthless.

William was satisfied with my submission.

He hung up and ordered the oxygen restored.

Then he patted my face from above, like patting an obedient dog.

"Wouldn't this have been easier from the start?"

"Eight o'clock tomorrow morning in the OR. Make sure you're clean."

"I don't like dirty things."

Juliet covered her mouth and laughed: "Lena is so understanding. Thank you for your sacrifice."

They left. Leaving me alone in the darkness, listening to my father's weak heartbeat from the end of the hallway.

In that moment, the Lena in my heart died.

I kept my eyes open all night until dawn.

Like a movie playing in my mind, all the moments from these five years.

To save money to buy him medical textbooks, I bought the cheapest sanitary pads.

When he published his first paper, I was happier than him. I treated everyone in the lab to dinner.

Back then he said: "Lena, when I become a renowned doctor, the first thing I'll do is cure Dad."

Turns out, it was all a lie.

From the beginning, I was the "drawback" after he weighed the pros and cons.

Six o'clock the next morning.

William brought a group of medical interns for rounds.

He was high-spirited, his gold-rimmed glasses reflecting cold light, showing no trace of last night's ferocity.

"Everyone, today we'll discuss a special case."

He pointed at me, as if introducing an object.

"Patient Lena, habitual miscarriage due to uterine malformation. She has a strong desire to donate."

"We will perform a highly difficult partial uterine transplant surgery."

"The recipient is a young woman with congenital uterine underdevelopment."

The interns took notes, pens scratching away.

Someone muttered quietly: "This is a living donor transplant. Did it pass ethical review?"

William glanced coolly at that person.

"Family signatures are complete. The patient herself strongly requested to atone... oh no, to contribute."

He deliberately misspoke, causing whispers among those around.

Those gazes fell on me.

Probing, contemptuous, and pitying.

As if I were a soulless medical specimen, a piece of meat awaiting slaughter.

I gripped the bedsheet tightly, my nails breaking into my flesh.

"William, you're lying!"

I shouted with a hoarse voice.

"I'm not willing! You forced me! You were going to kill my father!"

The scene fell deathly silent. The interns looked at each other, their pens stopped.

William's expression didn't change. He even shook his head with a hint of regret.

He pulled out a paper from the medical chart.

"After the miscarriage, the patient developed severe delusional disorder. She's emotionally unstable and aggressive."

"This is the psychiatric evaluation report from last night."

He displayed the forged report for everyone to see.

"She constantly imagines someone is trying to harm her father. In fact, her father is already brain dead. We've just been maintaining him."

Public opinion reversed instantly.

Everyone looked at me like I was insane.

"So she's crazy. No wonder."

"William really has it tough, having to care for a crazy wife."

"So pitiful. She doesn't even know she miscarried."

I opened my mouth wide, wanting to explain, but found words so powerless.

In this world of authority constructed by white coats, I was just a madwoman.

William waved his hand: "The patient is agitated. Administer a sedative."

Two male orderlies rushed up and pinned me down, one on each side.

A cold needle pierced my neck.

"Let me go... William... may you die a horrible death..."

The medication took effect quickly. My vision began to blur, my tongue grew thick.

In my daze, I saw Juliet standing at the door. She wasn't in the wheelchairshe stood perfectly straight.

She mouthed words to me: "Idiot."

Then, while the interns were leaving, she slipped in.

She pinched my IV tube with her sharp nails until the tube was flattened.

"Lena, actually I'm not sick at all."

She whispered in my ear, like a serpent's hiss.

"My uterus is perfectly fine. I just don't want to give birth myself. Afraid of pain, afraid of ruining my figure."

"William said your uterus is well-maintained. Perfect for me to use."

"He also said you reek of cooking oil and have disgusted him for a long time."

"Only I am his muse."

My whole body was limp, unable to move, but I didn't close my eyes.

I bit through the tip of my tongue. The sharp pain kept me barely conscious. Blood flowed down from the corner of my mouth.

Juliet, William. As long as I don't die, I will skin you alive and pull out your tendons.

All the suffering I've enduredI'll return it to you a thousandfold!

The sedative dosage wasn't enough.

Or rather, hatred gave me drug resistance.

During the nurses' shift change, using my former medical knowledge, I pulled out the needle.

Blood droplets splattered on the floor like red plum blossoms.

I stole an intern's white coat, put on a mask, and stumbled out of the room.

I had to take my father away.

Even if I died on the road, I couldn't let him fall into the hands of this pair of dogs.

My father's ICU was upstairs.

I held onto the wall, shuffling step by step.

Each step felt like a knife twisting in my lower body.

Finally, I reached that familiar door.

My hand had just touched the doorknob when I heard voices inside.

"William, do we really need to keep Lena's father around?"

It was Juliet's voice.

"The ventilator is so noisy. It's giving me a headache."

Then came William's voice, cold as ice.

"Originally we could drag it out a few more days to control Lena."

"But since the surgery is happening anyway, this old thing is useless now."

"Plus, his little pension isn't even enough to cover the special care fees."