Chapter 49
Grace was pacing the waiting area outside the ER when Yuhwa stormed in, her long hair damp from the rain.
“You brought him to a hospital?” Yuhwa’s raised voice drew a few stares.
“It was the only thing I could think to do,” Grace said, keeping her own volume low.
“What if they figure out he’s different?”
Grace shushed Yuhwa, pulling her to the far end of the waiting room.
“This is worse than the other times. Not something an ice bath would fix. It was call an ambulance or wait around for a sonnimne to find us. Which would you have preferred?”
Yuhwa gave in enough to sit, her back ramrod straight as she crossed her arms.
“I couldn’t just let him die,” Grace whispered, her voice breaking on the last word.
Yuhwa sighed. “I know.” She pulled Grace into her arms.
She took the comfort Yuhwa offered and rested her head against the goddess’s shoulders. Grace’s body shuddered as she held back the tears. She didn’t want to cry right now. Not until she knew what was actually happening with Hae.
They sat together ten more minutes before the doctor came out. He approached with a solemn expression. “You’re the family of Hae Su?”
Grace nodded, ignoring Yuhwa’s curious look. She’d had to give the hospital a name. She hadn’t had the forethought to come up with anything clever.
“Is he going to be okay?” Grace asked.
“He’s stable for now. Though he went into cardiac arrest twice.”
“Cardiac arrest?” Grace and Yuhwa chorused. Twin voices of shock.
“Does he have a family history of heart disease?” the doctor asked.
“No.”
The doctor frowned again. “It seems that his heart is weakened by what looks like multiple silent heart attacks over a short period of time.”
“Silent heart attacks?” Yuhwa asked.
“It’s when someone doesn’t know they’re having a heart attack,” Grace explained.
The doctor nodded in agreement. “We’d like to hold him overnight for observation, perhaps do a few more tests.”
“More tests?” Grace said slowly. “So there wasn’t anything…abnormal in his blood work or anything?”
“Nothing that would tell us what’s wrong with him,” the doctor confirmed.
Grace and Yuhwa shared a curious look. So, nothing to indicate Hae was more than human. What did this mean?
“Can we see him?” Grace asked.
“We’re moving him to an inpatient room. You can see him once he’s settled.”
When the doctor left, Yuhwa grasped Grace’s hand. “What’s wrong with him?”
She watched the doctor’s retreating back, like he might come back with a better explanation. “I’m not sure.”
“It sounds like he’s dying.”
Grace’s chest squeezed at the words, though she’d had the same thought. She didn’t want to give in to the fear. “People recover from heart attacks all the time.”
“That’s when the doctors know what’s causing them,” Yuhwa said. “Isn’t it?”
“Well, what could be triggering this? Your father?”
“I don’t know.”
“What happens to gods if they…” Grace couldn’t finish the question. Didn’t want to give the words any power by speaking them aloud.
But Yuhwa bluntly asked, “Die?”
Grace winced and nodded.
“I’m not sure,” Yuhwa admitted, and Grace realized she sounded scared. “I didn’t know we could.”