Chapter 53: The Mysterious Patient (3)
"You see, there are many conditions to fulfil to qualify as my friend and it's usually a long and a strenuous process. But considering your identity, I will give you some leeway and skip to the last point. Is this still fine with you?"
Her voice was light filled with amusement. Jason Herondale chuckled once again. It had been a while since he last had such an amusing day. The girl was simply too good to be real. She even copied his thoughts of skipping to the last test. He was intrigued to know her last test, thus, he quickly nodded at her, gesturing for her to continue. However, unlike his expectations, she turned completely serious and her playfulness was gone in a second.
"I consider 'Friendship' a commitment which carries a heavy weight. So my test is nothing but an honest promise that I give and expect to be given back. That is, a promise to not lie and be true to each other. I don't expect you to tell me secrets or anything: if I ask something I am not supposed to, it's completely fine if you ignore my question. But, I would rather you not answer me at all than to lie to me. I can promise you the same thing and if you were serious about being friends I hope to receive the promise back." She took a breath and with her playfulness kicking in she chuckled, "However if you were joking about friendship, it's completely fine too. After all, I can still be cocky that the most influential man has joked with me."
Jason couldn't help but smile at her: he never thought she will take the matter of friendship this seriously. But when she did, he was more than satisfied and grateful for her reply. It might sound dumb to others, but for people like him, who were in the highest standing, trust was something hard to come by. And, here, this girl was earnest to become a true friend, and even gave him a way to reject her with her final statements. Huh, as if he would miss obtaining the gem.
"Then I promise to be truthful in our friendship, Siana."
His sincere smile caught Siana off guard. She truly thought he was going to admit that he was joking, who would have thought that the man would truly agree?
A bright smile crept its way to her face. It took the breath off of the people in the room. Even the stoic bodyguards were taken aback.
"I promise the same, so happy friendship!"
Jason's son on the side had a complicated look on his face. It should be known that his dad usually never trusted anyone but he so easily had put his trust in this little doctor. What was his dad thinking? Was she truly so different?
Sia was naturally the first one to recover from the situation. More appropriately, she wasn't even affected by it despite being the main mastermind. Turning to Dr Brown, she inquired extremely seriously,
"So, what's the situation and why do you need my help?"
Noticing all the attention in the room, Doctor Brown quickly sucked in some fresh air and said with an air of professionalism,
"Mr. Herondale has a mass in his pineal gland. I have already explained why I cannot personally take action. As for the other neurosurgeons, as the location is extremely tricky, I recommended you to be the lead surgeon during the operation. I am retiring this year and you are going to become the head neurosurgeon in a month anyways so it's only right for you to take the job."
His quick answer, filled with tinges of regret, explained why they wanted her to be the one to operate. After all, it was no secret anymore in the hospital that Dr. Brown was suffering from bounds of dyskinesia. If it wasn't for Siana's fast action the last time, his loss of control of his own hand movements would have cost them the patient's life. That's why, these days, he did not take any jobs personally, but rather supervised the others' work.
Even though Siana was the most junior in terms of age, her dexterity and technique was the most accurate among all the neurosurgeons in the hospital. After all, technical excellence could be considered a moral requirement in neurosurgery: having good intentions was not enough when the difference between tragedy and triumph was defined by a few millimetres.
Sia nodded her head in contemplation: the most important question still remained unanswered.
"So we don't know the grade of the tumour..." she muttered but because of the quietness of the room everyone heard her.
At the moment, Mr Jason chuckled at her serious look.
"So am I going to die?"
Sia turned to his side with widened eyes and said with a chuckle of her own,
"Do you have so little trust in your newfound friend, mr. Jason?"
However, the next moment the quiet man on the corner suddenly talked in his monotonous voice.
"I haven't introduced myself before: I am Mark Herondale. Dr. Illes, what are the chances of treating my dad?"
Sia turned to look at the man who just talked. Others would have marvelled at his handsome looks that would have shaken many women's hearts, but all Sia could at the moment was a concerned family member of the patient. Therefore she needed to do the second job the surgeons were most adept at: the talking.
"This is a straightforward operation and the surgery itself is not the problem."
Looking at her expression Mark asked worriedly,
"You mean to say the problem lies in the type of tumour?"
Sia knew that these men would have already done their research and she didn't have the habit of hiding the truth from her patients patients anyway.
"It's too early to speculate about the type of the tumour. It can be a completely benign pineocytoma that can be removed completely during the surgery. But, there is also a chance of it being cancerous. Thus, we will have to wait until the surgery to send a sample for the labs to analyse."
"What are the chances of my dad's survival? And how confident are you about the surgery?"
Sia smiled at Mark's question. In her few years of intensive training as a surgeon, the one thing she understood was that hospital was no research hall where statistics were to be disclosed. It was irresponsible of the doctor to be more precise than he/she could be accurate. She chose her words carefully,
"There are risks involved in every surgery, and all I can do is list them for you and give you the time to read the consent form which your dad would need to sign one if he wants me to start the surgery.
As for the recovery and subsequent survival, it will all depend on the type of the tumour we are facing, so I can't give you definite answers. What I can tell you though is that even if it is a grade four pineoblastoma there are still other available ways to deal with it besides surgery."
Their question-answer session continued for a while. Siana gave concrete answers where appropriate, such as explaining the differences of the four grades of tumours, however, she would avoid answering whenever he asked anything related to Kaplan Meier curve of survival.
Seeing that his son was trying to coerce Siana into answering statistical questions that he himself was not so much interested in, Jason finally interjected in their conversation.
"Siana, can we proceed today with the surgery?"
Sia furrowed her brows a bit. She had other surgeries planned for today and these patients had been waiting for their turn to be operated for weeks now. She couldn't simply tell them that they should come another time. Suddenly, a thought struck her, and after quickly analysing the expressions of the people in the room she finally voiced her opinion.
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