I said, “Since Monday at least.”
My mother shot me a look.
I ignored it.
The doctor pulled off his gloves and dropped them into the trash.
“We need imaging,” he said.
My mother’s mouth tightened.
“Is that necessary?”
“Yes,” he said.
There was no drama in his voice.
That made it worse.
He wrote the order at 9:52 AM.
Urgent abdominal ultrasound.
He added bloodwork.
He added a note for the imaging department.
Then he said the sentence that changed the shape of the morning.
“We need to see what’s happening inside.”
Inside.
It was such a small word.
But it made my mother stop arguing.
The ultrasound room was cold.
Not chilly.
Cold in that hospital way that seems to come from the walls themselves.
A framed map of the United States hung near the workstation.
A rolling cart held gel bottles, folded towels, and a plastic tray of probe covers.
The monitor glowed gray-blue.
The paper on the exam table crackled loudly when my mother eased herself down.
She looked smaller in that room.
Her sweatshirt was folded on a chair.
Her hospital gown gaped a little at the shoulder.
Her wedding ring sat loose on her finger.
For a moment, I saw not the woman who had raised me, but an elderly patient trying to be brave for her child.
That nearly broke me.
“This will be quick,” the ultrasound tech said.
He sounded kind.
He was maybe in his forties, with tired eyes and the practiced gentleness of someone who had learned that fear makes people hear every movement.
He warmed the gel between his hands, but it was still cold enough to make my mother inhale sharply.
“Sorry,” he said.
“I’ve had worse,” she answered.
I stood near her head and held her hand.
At first, everything felt routine.
The probe moved.
The machine clicked.
