Chapter 5 - The Radiology Suite
The radiology department at midnight was a labyrinth of humming machinery, cold linoleum, and flickering fluorescent tubes.
The technicians were brisk, professional, and entirely silent. Every shift onto the cold X-ray table felt like an act of medieval torture. I had to grit my teeth so hard my jaw ached while the radiologist positioned the heavy lead aprons and aligned the scanning equipment over my battered ribs.
“Hold your breath... don’t move,” a disembodied voice crackled through the intercom speaker.
Click. Whir. Buzz.
The machine captured image after image of my skeleton, peering through flesh and muscle to map the damage inflicted by Judith’s malice.
Following the X-rays, they wheeled me into the CT scan suite. The cylindrical white scanner loomed above me like a futuristic tunnel. As the bed slid me into the narrow tube, the machine began to thrum with a deafening, rhythmic clatter. Magnetic fields shifted around me, scanning every internal organ, every millimeter of bone, and every subtle tear in my tissue.
While I lay trapped inside the machine, my mind raced back to Sunday mornings at Judith’s house.
For three years, I had tried to fit into their immaculate, suffocating world. I had endured the snide remarks about my career in graphic design, the constant comparisons to Graham’s ex-fiancée, and the subtle, psychological erosion designed to make me feel small, dependent, and eternally grateful for the crumbs of affection Graham threw my way.
And now, down a flight of basement stairs, Judith had tried to graduate from emotional destruction to physical elimination.
When the scan concluded, the technician wheeled me back to Examination Room 4.
The rain outside had turned into a relentless downpour, lashing against the reinforced glass of the hospital window with a rhythmic fury. Graham was no longer standing calmly in the corner. He was pacing back and forth, his loafers squeaking against the polished floor tiles, his thumbs flying across his smartphone screen in a frantic blur of typing. I caught a brief glance of his phone screen as I was wheeled past: a group chat titled The Hayes Family, with messages flashing back and forth at lightning speed.
“What’s taking so long?” “Did she talk?” “Graham, fix this immediately.”
Graham slammed his phone into his pocket the second he saw Dr. Mercer enter the room carrying a heavy manila folder and a series of digital tablet displays.
Dr. Mercer’s face was a mask. There was no warmth left in his expression. Instead, his eyes carried a heavy, solemn gravity—the look of a physician who had just uncovered something undeniable, something sinister that could no longer be brushed under the rug.
He pulled his rolling stool close to my bedside, ignoring Graham entirely, and set the tablet down.
May you like
Then, he turned his gaze slowly toward my husband.
“Sir,” Dr. Mercer said, his voice dropping an octave. “I’m going to need you to wait outside.”
