PART I

My eighteen year old daughter walked down the hall for her honour walk and minutes later my husband disappeared after one phone call. “I was crying my eyes out and her doctor came running after me in the hallway. “Your husband begged me not to tell you the truth about your daughter,” he said, panting to keep up with me. I thought losing my sweet girl was the worst thing I’d have to deal with that day, but I was so wrong.

My daughter Hannah had been battling a very serious illness for nearly a full year in the intensive care unit. My husband, Kenneth, and I were practically neighbours to her at St. Vincent Medical Center in Minneapolis. Kenneth was not Hannah’s real father but he’d loved her and raised her from the age of six. She called him Dad, a title he earned with every bedtime story, every doctor’s appointment, and every scraped knee. I always thought I could count on him with my life and with my daughter until her last minutes proved me wrong.

One quiet evening Hannah looked slowly up from her untouched tray of hospital food. Mom, if I don’t make it through this, I want to donate my organs’, she said suddenly.

I put my coffee cup down on the bedside table and shook my head. Now don’t talk like that honey. “You’ll make it.”

“Mom, I am being dead serious right now,” she argued, her tone softer than mine had been in months, but steadier. “If there’s even a small chance someone else gets to go home to their family because of me, I want that to happen. I really don’t want another family in a cold hospital room feeling as helpless as we are right now.”

In that moment I was unable to respond to her. I just held her little warm hand in mine and let the tears quietly roll down my face. Kenneth, sitting on the window-sill, did not shed one single tear. Instead he gave her a slow nod and said in a calm tone.

“I’ll back you up in whatever you decide, Hannah,” Kenneth said quietly, reaching over to pat her arm.

For days afterward, I struggled with her choice. The subject was complete pointless as every single part of my heart wanted to believe she was going to get completely better. Hannah, however, was firm in her resolve. Finally, I sat with her and signed the official donor registry forms, simply because I could never find the strength to deny my daughter her last wish. Then came three weeks of agony before her monitors went flat and she was gone.

Before the surgical team took her to the operating room for the donation procedure, the entire hospital staff had an honour walk down the main corridor. On either side of the bright corridor were nurses, technicians and doctors. Some stood at attention, others quietly bowed their heads as her bed went by. Kenneth and I were right behind her bed, clinging to each other in utter despair. I was numb all over, and to sit and see the respect those medical folks showed to my daughter’s selfless choice absolutely undid me.

I sobbed into his chest while Kenneth threw his arm around my shoulders. “Grace, she did something so beautiful today.” He whispered in my ear.

At that moment his phone buzzed loudly in his coat pocket. He pulled it out, looked at the screen and immediately went deathly pale.

“I’ve got to go downstairs right now,” Kenneth stammered, backing away from me.

“What do you say?” I asked, looking up at him through blurry tear-filled eyes. “Now where are you going?”

He did not give a word of explanation. He turned and ran down the hallway in an instant, leaving me standing all alone in front of the surgical doors. I was silent, holding a little purple ribbon that a nurse had pinned to my sleeve earlier. I had not even begun to fathom why my husband had deserted me at such a time when I heard heavy footsteps coming fast behind me.

“Hold! “Just a moment, please!” a voice called out.

I spun around and saw Dr. Bradley, Hannah’s primary care doctor, jogging toward me. His face wore an expression of deep distress that I had never seen on him in our whole year in the hospital.

“Ma’am, I really need to talk to you right now,” Dr. Bradley said, catching his breath.

“Is anything wrong, Doctor?” “I asked nervously.” “Something happened?”

He looked nervously down the long corridor in the direction Kenneth had just run. Your husband asked me not to tell you the truth about Hannah.

My stomach sank into a cold pit. “What truth was he hiding from me?” I asked. “Did anything happen to her, before she died?”

PART 2

‘Yes, something happened, but it is not what you think,’ Dr. Bradley explained gently. He grabbed me by the elbow and took me to a bank of vinyl chairs down the corridor. I had really hoped that I wouldn’t have to tell you this painful news today. I honestly did believe your husband had legitimate reasons of his own, but after witnessing what just happened with Hannah, I just can’t keep quiet anymore.”

“What is it, sir? “Just tell me, please,” I begged, grabbing his forearm.

He took a deep breath, then spoke. “A few days before she died, Hannah asked me very specific questions about whether one of her donated organs could go to a specific patient.