I had just returned from a specialized fellowship abroad, stepping out of the operating room after successfully completing a complex organ transplant. The air still buzzed with the aftermath of intense focus. But then, Dr. Chloe Davis, my husband’s intern, blocked the hallway. She looked smug, arrogant, and stopped me dead in my tracks. Her voice, sharp and loud enough for everyone to hear, sliced through the quiet. “Who gave you permission to use Operating Room 3? Effective immediately, you’re suspended!” I froze for a split second, then a smirk touched my lips. “Oh? And who, exactly, gave *you* that authority?” She scoffed, a cold, harsh sound. Right in front of me, she snatched the departmental schedule from the nurses’ station and ripped it in half with a dramatic flourish. “The Director did,” she spat, tossing the shreds onto the floor. I nodded slowly, pulling out my phone. I immediately shot a text to Patient 001’s private contact. “Apologies, my surgical privileges have been revoked. It seems I won’t be able to perform your wife’s tumor surgery.”
I instantly opened my husband, Dr. Brandon Miller’s, SnapChat. “Brandon Miller, get to the hospital. Chloe Davis is trying to suspend me.” Chloe glanced at me, then burst into a shrill, mocking laugh. She grabbed the surgical plan I’d just laid down and, with a vicious tear, ripped it in two. My eyes narrowed, watching her arrogant display. That plan was for the mayor’s pre-op tomorrow. Brandon himself had emphasized its critical importance. What truly baffled me was the reaction of the surrounding medical staff. Not only did no one intervene, but someone even eagerly offered her a paper shredder. My brow furrowed. Had I been away from the hospital for so long that Brandon’s strict protocols had become utterly meaningless? No way. I knew him. He never compromised on patient safety. Chloe savored my expression, a sneer on her face, and triumphantly scattered the shredded paper onto my face. “What’s wrong, Dr. Hayes? Surprised?” She sank into a nearby chair, idly playing with her manicured nails. “Your era is over,” she declared, her voice booming. “Brandon said that effective today, the VIP wing is entirely under my command. As for you, you’re relegated to night shift nurse duty.” The head nurse standing nearby immediately chimed in. “Exactly! Dr. Davis is a specially approved international talent, brought in by the Director himself!” “Some people occupy a Head of Department position for two years without doing any real work. How dare she show her face back here?” It was clear. In the past two years, this hospital had lost its way. I snatched a patient file she was about to pull away. “Chloe Davis, listen up. I am Brandon Miller’s legal wife, and a lifetime honorary professor at this hospital!” “Professor?” She burst out laughing, turning to the bewildered crowd. “Do you know how she got that professor title?” She roughly tore down my specialist profile photo from the hallway display. “A glorified trophy wife who got her title by clinging to her Director husband? She thinks she can pull rank on me?!” Chloe straightened her spine proudly. “I, on the other hand, am a Harvard Medical School Ph.D. personally mentored by Brandon! He used a special talent fund, dropped millions to poach me as a cardiothoracic specialist!” Suddenly, she grabbed the instrument cart a nurse was pushing, sweeping my dedicated surgical instruments to the floor with a loud clang. “Now, get on your knees and pick these up.” “Are you insane?” I stared at the scattered precision instruments for heart surgery. “These are sterile…” “Kneel! And! Pick!” She enunciated each word, her eyes gleaming with contempt and malice. The people around us suddenly erupted. “Kneel already! Why act so high and mighty?!” “Does she really think she’s still the legendary heart surgeon? Dr. Davis has been carrying this department for the past two years!” I clenched my fists, my nails digging deep into my skin. “For the past five years, 87% of all heart transplant surgeries in this hospital were performed by me. That’s verifiable data.” “Without those successful cases, this hospital would never have been accredited as a National Center of Excellence, let alone acquired the latest medical equipment.” A young doctor I had personally mentored stepped forward. A warmth spread through me. Someone still remembered. But the next second, he brutally stomped on my stethoscope, crushing it. “Professor Hayes, don’t push your luck!” “Dr. Davis is being merciful by telling you to kneel!” “Exactly! Kneel! Now!” The shouts around me grew louder and louder. Just then, the fire exit door burst open. I saw Brandon Miller’s figure, and a tiny sigh of relief escaped me. He arrived faster than I expected. Amid Chloe’s triumphant smirk, I looked at Brandon and said, “Brandon, Chloe said…”
*SMACK.* A brutal slap across my face. The force sent me crashing into the test tubes behind me. Glass shattered, scattering across the floor. I clutched my stinging cheek, looking up at Brandon’s hand, still suspended in mid-air, a look of utter disbelief on my face. “Amelia Hayes! Who gave you the audacity to treat Chloe like that?!” He snatched my ID badge and threw it to the ground. “She’s the Chief of Cardiothoracic Surgery whom I spent a fortune to poach from the Mayo Clinic! She’s the medical expert I cultivated with five years of painstaking effort! What right do you have to defy her?!” “It’s just an operating room, isn’t it? If Chloe says you can’t use it, you can’t. Now, get on your knees and apologize to her immediately!” Brandon’s face, contorted in rage, suddenly felt incredibly alien to me. Wait, what did he say? Mayo Clinic? I looked closely at Chloe Davis, and a realization hit me. Wasn’t she that nurse who sold counterfeit drugs five years ago and was jailed for six months? How did someone with barely a middle school education become my peer, let alone a chief of surgery? Brandon suddenly turned, his voice soft with concern as he spoke to Chloe. “Why aren’t you wearing the gloves I got for you? These spilled instruments will get on you.” “And next time, if you want to suspend someone, don’t get all worked up yourself. Don’t let it happen again.” Chloe immediately took off her mask, letting out a few fake tears. “Brandon, maybe I should just resign. With Dr. Hayes like this, how can I possibly lead the heart transplant surgeries?” Brandon’s voice instantly shifted back to a furious roar directed at me. “Apologize to Dr. Davis right now! If you dare to obstruct her work again, you’ll be transferred to laundry duty in the maintenance department!” The surrounding area fell silent. The watching medical staff immediately began whispering. “Dr. Davis is the Director’s pet!” “Exactly, she’s a genuinely talented, highly educated expert!” “Unlike some people who have no real skills, only relying on being the Director’s wife.” “Shameless!” I stared at Brandon Miller, the man who once swore he’d always support and love me unconditionally, now publicly humiliating me. But he still wasn’t done. He pointed at me. “Effective today, you’re demoted to a physician’s assistant. You’ll do rounds at 5 AM every day, and handle all departmental night shifts, patient records, and autopsy reports.” “Once you’ve reflected enough and learned how to be an assistant, then we’ll talk.” He grabbed the white coat Chloe had just taken off and tossed it at me. “Now, handwash Dr. Davis’s scrubs!”
*Ha.* I burst out laughing, a hollow sound. My mind flashed through countless nights of collapsing in exhaustion at the operating table. The bloodshot eyes from perfecting my techniques, the thousands of papers I’d devoured to push the limits of surgery… All just to ensure every operation was safe, to make Harmony Medical Center’s stellar reputation shine even brighter. I practically lived in the on-call room and the library, sacrificing countless moments we could have shared. Even starting a family was constantly postponed because he always said: “Amelia, our hospital’s development has just begun.” And now? Now, after I’d just completed the nation’s first transcatheter mitral valve repair, anticipating an embrace from him, I walked in on him holding hands with the intern he was supposed to be mentoring. I watched Chloe lean against his white coat, her face streaked with tears that couldn’t hide a triumphant smile. I watched Brandon look down at her with a tenderness and indulgence he had *never* shown me. This relationship, it should have ended a long time ago. I took off my stethoscope and tossed it onto the desk. “Let’s get a divorce.” Brandon remained utterly calm, not even a blink. He pulled two documents from his desk. The first, a ‘Research Project Lead Change Request,’ had my name neatly crossed out. The second, a ‘Physician Practice Location Change Consent Form,’ was already signed with his full name. “Sign it,” he said, slapping the papers onto the desk. “Once you sign, go to medical administration and transfer Patient 001’s tumor surgery team to Chloe.” “Why should I?!” “I spent a month preparing this surgical plan, staying up night after night.” “Yours?” He suddenly laughed, his hand pointing sharply at the ‘Hospital Management Regulations’ posted on the wall. “Amelia Hayes, please open your eyes and read the hospital bylaws clearly. All medical teams and research outcomes belong to the hospital’s legal representative. Participating physicians only retain the right to be credited.” My eyes widened in shock. I stared, utterly fixated, at the familiar signature on that ‘Physician Practice Change Consent Form.’ Back then, during a crucial phase of the hospital’s restructuring, Brandon had held that document, his fingers slightly trembling beneath his white coat. “Amelia, you know the risks involved in hospital reform. This agreement is just to satisfy the state medical board’s inspection. If our accreditation fails, it will at least protect your practice license.” His eyes were red-rimmed as he gripped my hand. “And those conservative old guard on the board… they need a clear statement. Trust me, it’s just a piece of paper, do we really need this between us?” “I love you, and I don’t want to drag you down.” At that time, I was completely swept up in Brandon’s so-called fake love, even touched by his supposed thoughtfulness. That thirty-page professional document… I hadn’t even bothered to scrutinize the fine print clauses. I, the person who could spot a 0.5mm nodule on a CT scan, had ironically missed the malignant tumor growing in my own life. How incredibly ironic… Amelia Hayes, nicknamed the living atlas of cardiac surgery, whose most frequent advice during mentorship was to meticulously study every single word of a pre-op surgical plan. My heart and soul, poured into my medical career, even rejecting top-tier offers from international institutions. Now, it had all culminated in betrayal, leaving me with absolutely nothing.
The surrounding medical staff immediately started whispering, their voices laced with sarcasm and mockery. “I heard even the patent for the heart valve she developed belongs to the hospital now.” “Serves her right. Someone needed to humble her arrogance.” I unpinned my ID badge and dropped it onto the floor. “Brandon Miller.” “I’ll sign it.” “As you wish, I’ll leave.” I turned, my white coat brushing against a bottle of iodine, sending it tumbling. Brandon’s voice instantly rang out. “Stop right there!” I paused, but didn’t turn back. “Amelia Hayes, you think resigning is the end of it?” “You haven’t completed your handover yet!” “Tomorrow’s community outreach clinic, you’ll show up and do your work, no questions asked.” “If you dare to skip, I’ll make sure the entire medical system knows that the esteemed cardiac surgery specialist refused to even take a poor old man’s blood pressure.” I slammed to a halt, utterly incredulous. Stealing all my credit wasn’t enough? He wanted me to stay and be publicly humiliated even further? A cold smirk played on Brandon’s lips. “Perfect, Chloe just won the Golden Scalpel Award for Young Physicians. She needs an assistant who’s familiar with the procedures. Starting today, you’re in charge of her award ceremony preparations.” He slapped a patient chart against my chest. “If anything goes wrong at the awards ceremony…” “You know what the Medical Malpractice Investigations Unit has been looking into lately.” Chloe immediately smiled, her eyes sharp as knives. “Don’t worry, Brandon. I’ll make sure to ‘guide’ Assistant Hayes properly.” The next few days were pure hell. I became her speechwriter, even her awards gown alteration seamstress. Every time she wanted to humiliate me, she chose the daily general meeting, making the entire hospital staff watch as she tossed away the research materials I had organized overnight, treating them like trash. On the day of the awards ceremony. The host’s voice boomed, inviting Chloe Davis to the stage to deliver her speech. Chloe, beaming with smug satisfaction, strutted onto the stage in her high heels. “Thank you to all the esteemed fellows and leaders for your guidance! This breakthrough in minimally invasive cardiac surgery, first and foremost, I must thank my fiancé, Mr. Brandon Miller.” That was fast. The divorce cooling-off period wasn’t even over, and she was already wearing an engagement ring. She gazed deeply at Brandon, who was seated in the front row, prompting a round of applause from the entire audience. Suddenly, she changed her tone, bringing up a set of data charts. “To be honest, leading this nation’s first transapical mitral valve repair surgery, I was quite apprehensive.” “You see, in the preliminary research, the traditional surgical approach had a 30% risk of valve displacement.” “If it weren’t for our team discovering the risk of valve anchor detachment during the surgery and promptly switching to traditional suturing techniques…” She casually dismissed my decade of hard work as a potential medical accident, subtly implying that she had stepped in to save the day. The hall immediately erupted in whispers. “So, Amelia Hayes’s patent was that dangerous.” “No wonder Patient 3 had reflux after surgery last time.” “Dr. Davis truly has a compassionate heart.” After the meeting, she cornered me by the elevator, holding out her hand. “Hand over the USB drive. Patient 001’s surgery, I’m the lead surgeon now. Give me his private contact information. I need to personally discuss the surgical plan. As for you…” She scoffed disdainfully. “You can go to HR and pick up your resignation forms.”
So that’s it. I stared at the surgery approval form in Chloe Davis’s hand, stamped with the red designation “001.” It suddenly clicked. Their target, all along, was Madam 001’s heart transplant surgery. This was the kind of elite surgery that could immortalize an entire medical team and secure national special grants. I slowly lifted my head. Chloe’s eyes were filled with pure greed, while Brandon Miller, standing nearby, wore a cold expression, clearly condoning everything. This was their trap. No wonder they waited until now to divorce me, no wonder they were only just now kicking me out. Because there were regulations stating that once a surgery of this caliber was completed, the lead surgeon would directly qualify for an academy fellowship nomination. They probably thought that if they dragged it out past the public announcement period, that honor would be securely placed on Chloe’s head. I burst out laughing. Brandon’s face turned grim. “What are you laughing at? Chloe Davis is a top expert trained at a world-renowned university! She’s performed surgeries for multiple important U.S. figures! Her abilities are a million times stronger than yours!” “Amelia Hayes, without Harmony Medical Center, you are nothing. The title of national master surgeon will soon be Chloe’s.” I smiled, handing over the encrypted USB drive. “Dr. Davis, I wish you a smooth surgery for Patient 001.” I couldn’t wait to see how someone who had faked her way into the medical system would pass Patient 001’s pre-operative review. I’d forgotten to tell them: Patient 001’s medical file was personally established by my father back in the day. That night, a black sedan slid silently to a stop. The window rolled down, revealing Professor Maxwell’s eyes – wrinkled, yet still sharp. He was the Head of Patient 001’s Security Detail, and my beloved mentor.
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