Chapter 1 – There She Goes
Few things in this world are more soul crushing than facing the disappointment of a parent. For Yoonie Brandt, fate had multiplied the devastation through timing.
The door opened and a nurse stepped out, looked around briefly and spotted Yoonie. “Dr. Brant?”
“Yes.”
“Your mother will see you now,” spat the nurse, not bothering to disguise her disapproval.
Get in line, thought Yoonie, pushing the door open. “Thank you.”
One of the suits crowded in before she could close the door.
“Really?” she asked irritably.
“Orders, ma’am.”
Whatever annoyance Yoonie may have felt for the intrusion dissipated immediately upon seeing her mother. Only three months had passed since the diagnosis, but in that time Hye Kim-Brant seemed to have shriveled into pale husk of her former self.
“Mommy,” whispered Yoonie, pulling a chair close to the bed. “You look well.”
“More lies,” returned the older woman, refusing to look at her daughter.
Yoonie’s eyes stung as she gingerly removed the newspaper from her mother’s hand. Yoonie folded it in half to hide the headline—Researcher Faked Results—and dropped it into the waste bin.
“Who is this?” asked Hye, nodding toward the man at the door without making eye contact.
“He… he’s just a friend, mom.”
“Lies upon lies.”
Yoonie tried to sound happy. “You’re being transferred to a better place today, mommy.”
The two sat in miserable silence until Yoonie leaned forward and took her mother’s hand.
The touch seemed to impart strength into the fragile older woman. She turned and stared fiercely into her daughter’s eyes. Speaking in Korean, the dying woman begged, “Tell me it’s not true. Everything they say, it’s all lies. You’d never do those things, never!”
“Mommy, I love you,” Yoonie whispered in English, tears now rolling down her cheeks. “Let’s talk about where they’re moving you to. It’s called—”
The older woman’s grip tightened and she switched to German. “Speak to me! I know you’re heart. We didn’t raise you this way.”
Yoonie bit her lip and hung her head. There was no way she could make this right, not in any language.