"Henry, do you have any idea who's lying on that table?"
I was just about to reveal it was his mother when he snapped, cutting me off. "Rules are rules, no exceptions. Unless you're staff here, you don't get special treatment."
I let the silence hang before icily replying, "So you'd rather let Vivian butcher this surgery than bend your precious regulations?"
"Why so desperate? Someone you care about in there?" Henry's voice dripped with condescension as he narrowed his eyes. "One apology, just admit you were wrong, and I'll reinstate you this second. You could scrub in right now."
"Pass. Like I said, nobody important," I said, tearing off my surgical cap with deliberate slowness. "Wouldn't dream of breaking the sacred rules, since they're absolute, right?"
The tense standoff shattered
