Filed To Story: Cheating with My Boyfriend's Best Friend Novel Read Online (Olive & Aaron)
Rock made the assessment, his face extremely serious. “We must immediately transfer her to a warm place. Let’s go! Hurry down the mountain!”
Rock’s words felt like a judgment upon me. I immediately released the tension, taking a deep breath. After the bone-chilling cold, my body rapidly warmed up, filled with inexhaustible strength.
I immediately took one end of the stretcher, wishing I could transport Olive to the medical room at McMurdo Station in an instant.
“Stay calm,” Rock patted me on the shoulderand looked back at Thomas, “Bring the luggage.”
“Got it.”
We, as a group, rushed down the mountain with lightning speed.”Be careful, I just touched your daughter’sleg, and it seems to be broken,” Rock’s reminder was like a blade stabbing into my heart.
The pain rendered me speechless, and I nodded in agony, trying my best to steady my actions.
“Wait…” Suddenly, Thomas called out frombehind, “Looks like someone else is over there!”
…
The harsh, pale incandescent lights rhythmically s wept overhead, accompanied by the quick and chaotic footsteps around. Within my line of sight, there was only the pale face wr*pped on the gurney, along with nurses and doctors bustling around.
The doors of the operating room closed, shutting me out. Soon, the lights on the door illuminated.The surgery began.
I stood still, staring blankly at the illuminated “In Surgery” sign, feeling as if my body had lost control.
When Olive was urgently brought back to the research station, Rock and the emergency doctors had given a clear diagnosis – severe hypothermia, extremely low heart rate and breathing rate, and inability to self-generate heat. Currently, they could only resort to ECMO for rescue. But…
“Chris!” Kristy’s voice called out frombehind.
I turned to look at her, tears instantly streaming down my face.
“How is she?” Kristy rushed over and huggedme, her face equally pale. I had never seen her so flustered before.
“”…I don’t know…” I held her tightly, withthe image of the first sight of that orange pack constantly flashing in my mind.That image kept gnawing at my nerves. “Kristy, I’m so scared… When I found her,her body was as cold as ice…”
In front of the operating room, Kristy and I tightly embraced, crying our eyes out.
After an unknown amount of time, the doors of the operating room opened, and a nurse hurriedly came out.
“How is she doing inside?” Kristy and Iimmediately approached her.
“We’ve installed the ECMO, and her heartrate and breathing have been restored to a safe range,”
the nurse spoke rapidly. “Luckily, you found her in time. Otherwise,given her condition, she probably wouldn’t have made it this far.”
That was the best news I had ever heard in my life!
“Thank you!” Kristy burst into tears again.”It’s still early to thank anyone. She istemporarily out of immediate danger, but considering the prolonged hypothermia, multiple fractures, and contusions all over her body, we are still not sure if she can wake up and recover.”
The nurse’s words hit us like a heavy hammer, brutally striking our hearts.
“It’s all my fault… It’s all my fault…” Kristyslumped to the ground.
Olive’s POV:
“Mom, Dad, you promised me.” The 11-year-old girl held her phone, gazing at the family photo on the desk, tears silently splattering onto the floor. “In a couple of days, it’s my elementary school graduation ceremony, and you said you would come…”
This was a small bedroom with only a single bed, a wardrobe, and a desk with a chair. There was nothing else.
But I was familiar with everything here.
This was the room in my host family’s house. Since I was 6 years old, when my parents sent me to a boarding school, I would stay with this host family during long holidays.
My parents had completely disappeared from my world. Even the family photo in the frame was just taken shortly after I was born.It was our only family photo.
Throughout all these years, I had grown up relying on this photo alone.
“Sorry, Olive, we have an injured penguinhere, and we can’t make it back,” Kristy’s voice on the phone lacked any emotional fluctuations. “As a fix, I’ve signed you up for a summer camp. You can have a free and happy summer holiday in Hawaii.”
“I just want you to come back and see me.”The 11-year-old me cried, tears falling like broken pearls.
I stood by the bed, staring blankly at everything, my heart throbbing.
However, strangely, everything before me felt unfamiliar. Was this what happened during my elementary school graduation?
Why did I have no recollection at all?
I was lost in thought, frowning as I tried to remember.In my memory, I did go to Hawaii for a summer camp after graduating from elementary school. But the memories of that summer were extremely vague.
“Mom, Dad, do you love me?” The 11-year-old girl spoke astonishing words while holding the phone.
“Why do you always give up on me every time you have to choose bet**en me and others?”
“Don’t you miss me?”
My heart seized up, as if tearing open a deep wound, and every nerve in my body throbbed in pain.
I finally felt a sense of familiarity.
This feeling of being immersed in sadness was all too familiar!
I would never forget this feeling. It was how I had spent every single day in the past ten or twenty years.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. We do miss you verymuch. But we really can’t make it in time…” I couldn’t hear what Kristy said later. Perhaps the younger me had stopped listening.
“I see.” She hung up the phone, lowered herhead, and stood there in a daze.
There was no trace of sunlight penetrating through the curtains, and the dim room felt hot and silent.
I silently watched my 11-year-old self.
She remained motionless in the room, shedding tears silently.
Why would an 11-year-old child bear such heavy sorrow? Tears welled up in my eyes, my nose tingled, and a sharp pain surged throughout my body.
It felt as if I had been run over by a truck, especially in my legs.
“Wait, why am I here?” I finally realizedsomething was wrong.
I lowered my head to look at myself, and tomy surprise, I discovered that I had no physical form!
I was… transparent!
What happened?
I tried to recall, and finally, under the reminder of pain, a series of images flashed through my mind: Antarctica, fierce winds, a deviation, mountaineering, rape, struggle, avalanche, a second avalanche, cries for help…
“Am I dead?” I murmured in confusion.
After all, I didn’t know what it would feel like for a person after death. But amidst the commotion, there seemed to be a low crying sound. This piqued my curiosity.
I wanted to know where I was right now. Why was someone crying? Could it be that someone was holding a funeral for me?
Perhaps my curiosity was too strong, as everything before me started to distort. Then,suddenly, I felt a void beneath my feet, and I plummeted downward, experiencing free fall.
Again?!
Before I could utter a curse, I landed heavily on solid ground.
In the next moment, an overwhelming wave of pain flooded my brain. I was in such agony that I wanted to scream, but my body was weak and completely out of my control. Thus, I could only hear myself groaning in pain.
“Sweetie! Can you hear me? I’m your mom!”Kristy’s voice came closer and then farther away.
Perhaps because I had just returned to that summer afternoon when I was 11, when I heard this voice again, my heart throbbed painfully as if it were soaked in acid. Sorrow rapidly engulfed every cell in my body.
My tears overflowed uncontrollably, streaming down my cheeks.The sound of weeping became more distinct.
“Sweetie, I am sorry! I was wrong! Please, ifyou wake up, I’ll do anything you ask!”
“Me too,” Chris’s voice followedimmediately.
By now, I could probably confirm that I hadn’t died.
I was saved.
But I was so weak that I didn’t even have the strength to open my eyes. However, my strength was gradually returning—after a fierce struggle with my eyelashes, I finally managed to open my eyes.
A white ceiling, air mixed with the scent of disinfectant, and… two people.
New Book: Returned To Make Them Pay
On her wedding anniversary, Alicia is drugged and stumbles into the wrong room—straight into the arms of the powerful Caden Ward, a man rumored never to touch women. Their night of passion shocks even him, especially when he discovers she’s still a virgin after two years of marriage to Joshua Yates.