I shook my head immediately.
“No.”
Ethan looked at me calmly.
“Mom, listen.”
“No. We’re talking about treatment, not what happens after you die.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t talk like that.”
He reached for my hand.
“I don’t want what happens to me to be the end of my story.”
I couldn’t answer.
He continued quietly.
“If my heart can keep someone else alive, then maybe a part of me gets to keep going.”
I started crying.
“You’re my son. I don’t want pieces of you going to strangers.”
He smiled sadly.
“Maybe they won’t be strangers to you forever.”
I didn’t understand what he meant.
At the time, I thought it was simply something a frightened nineteen-year-old said while trying to make sense of his illness.
I was wrong.
Months later, Ethan’s condition deteriorated rapidly.
Eventually, doctors told us there was nothing more they could do.
He was still conscious.
Still joking.
Still asking whether I had eaten.
The night before he died, he asked me to sit beside his bed.
“Mom?”
“Yes?”
“Promise me something.”
“What?”
“Don’t spend the rest of your life being angry at the world.”
I squeezed his hand.
“I can’t promise that.”
He laughed softly.
“You always were stubborn.”
Then he closed his eyes.
“I want you to live.”
Those were the last words my son ever said to me.
He died the following morning.
And somehow, the world continued moving.
Cars still drove down the street.
People still went to work.
The sun still came up.
But my world had stopped.
At the funeral, I barely heard anything.
People came.
They hugged me.
They told me Ethan was in a better place.
I nodded because I didn’t know what else to do.
Then, just as everyone was beginning to leave, a woman approached me.
She was probably in her forties.
Beside her stood a young woman who looked about eighteen.
The girl was crying.
The woman held an envelope in both hands.
“Are you Laura?”
I nodded.
“My name is Rebecca.”
She swallowed.
“This is my daughter, Lily.”
The young woman looked at me.
Her hand was pressed against her chest.
I stared at her.
Something about that gesture made my stomach turn.
Rebecca held out the envelope.
“Ethan asked us to give you this.”
My fingers went cold.
“Why would Ethan know you?”
Rebecca started crying.
“Because your son saved my daughter’s life.”
I couldn’t understand.
“What are you talking about?”
Rebecca looked at Lily.
Then back at me.
“Lily was eighteen months old when she was diagnosed with severe heart disease. Doctors told us she might not survive long enough to receive a suitable transplant.”
I looked at the girl again.
She was alive.
Standing.
Breathing.
Her hand still resting over her heart.
Rebecca continued.
“Your son was listed as an organ donor.”
My knees almost gave way.
“Ethan’s heart…”
She nodded.
“It’s inside my daughter.”
I covered my mouth.
For a few seconds, I couldn’t speak.
The girl stepped forward.
“Mrs. Carter…”
Her voice trembled.
“I never knew his name until recently.”
I looked at her.
She was crying now.
“Your son’s heart has given me almost two years that doctors said I might never have.”
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