FROM ORPHAN TO CEO: NOW YOU WANT BE BACK

FIONA’S POV

I had half a year to live. Tears welled up in my eyes as I sat in front of MedCare hospital, going through my results.

I had almost fallen down the stairs this afternoon at home from dizziness. Hoping that I was pregnant, I rushed down to the hospital and was handed the worst news of my life.

I had severe aplastic anemia. I had experienced all the symptoms the doctor explained. A tear streamed down my cheeks.

Six months. What was I going to accomplish in six months? How could I tell my little princess and my husband that I was going to die in a short while?

Would she even be sad? May, my daughter, had started acting out toward me. She was a young child, yes, but I was her mother.

Her behavior towards me wasn't the usual, young child screams at mom. She straight up called me a “wicked woman” and “loser”. She shouldn't know what those words meant.

I suspect she had learned such from her grandmother. Janice Armstrong. May spent most of her time with her father's family, because I had no one to my name except a basket I was found in and the late woman who found me.

Janice had hated me ever since I got married to her son, my husband, Jasper Armstrong.

“Who is she, son?” I remembered her asking Jasper that question and his response ruined my entire eight years of marriage.

She wanted another wealthy family to align with theirs but I was the daughter of nobody.

A fucking barista. Yes, I was a barista when I met Jasper.

Now this. A death sentence. I had suffered and struggled all my life for it to end in my 30th year of existence.

My hands trembled as I looked down on the results the doctor had given me.

What a joke? This was a fucking joke. Why inform me, huh? Universe!

I could've just died on the stairs or an accident on the road but to inform me that I was going to die was a different level of wickedness.

First, I couldn't have a son, then my two miscarriages.

I had lost two baby girls who hadn't seen their mother's face. Next I am being punished by my mother-in-law. Now, the universe has decided to punish me ultimately.

The sky grumbled. I looked up and the sunny day was now cloudy. I brought out my phone and checked the time.

“Oh, my! I had to pick May from school.” I quickly got up from the bench and ran to the parking lot.

As I opened the red SUV and got in, I raised my phone to check my face. It was okay, but I needed to wipe my face a bit.

I brought the engine to life as soon as I finished making myself look alive.

After a ten-minute drive, I was at May’s school. I asked for her, but the staff said she had left.

Left to where?

“Excuse me, May Armstrong? I'm her mother. She couldn't have left. Please check again.”

“Yes, Armstrong. She left with her grandma and another lady.” The teacher replied as she looked away to respond to another student.

Dread coursed through my veins as Janice crossed through my mind. My body stilled for a minute.

I had begged her for the car and she gave me a fixed time to return with it. Thirty minutes.

It had been almost an hour and half since I left the house. I hurried back to the house, hoping to beat them to the gate at least.

I gripped the steering wheel so hard as I drove down the long driveway leading to the mansion gate.

“Please lemme get home before them. Please lemme get home first.” I mumbled those prayer points as the gate opened and I drove into the compound.

I drove past the main family mansion, where my mother and father in-law live, and parked at our mansion. I ran out like a woman who had lost her child.

As I dashed into the house and climbed upstairs to May's room, but she wasn't there. I exhaled as I caught my breath.

I could feel my surrounding slowly becoming disorienting. Then I leaned on the wall for a moment. My illness…I had to be careful.

May wasn't home yet. And I had scanned the cars in front of Janice's mansion and her “school-run” car wasn't there.

I had beat them home. Oh thank goodness. I slowly climbed downstairs to the first aid shelf right in front of the kitchen.

I took out my headache pill container and swallowed two pills. The doctor had prescribed drugs for me, but…

Six months. What difference would two pills make compared to six months?

I entered the kitchen, turned on the sink and poured water on my face. I had to tell Jasper. He would help me.

He always supported his mother, but I could see that he was forced to. My inability to give a male child was the cause of these shenanigans in my marriage.

“Where is she? That bastard! Where is she?!” Janice's voice echoed through the mansion. Here we go again…

I held the wall as I stepped out of the kitchen to answer her.

“Ma, I heard you picked up May…” Janice heard my voice and began walking over to me, “thank you so much—”

SMACK! She slapped me so hard my left cheek went numb and I could only hear a tiny piercing sound for a moment. I landed on the floor on impact from the slap.

I could feel a liquid substance trail from my ear to my cheek. I traced my fingers on it and looked at it. Blood.

Janice lifted me and pushed me to sit up on the floor.

“How could you? Of all things you aren't, I thought you were a mother at least. How could you leave your daughter to stand outside waiting for you?

“You lied that you were going to pick her up to… to go see one of your friends, right? Your poverty stricken friends! Or was it a man this time, you empty woman!”

How could this woman spit out such vile things? I looked behind her and May stood at the rail of the staircase. Watching her mother get berated like a rat.

“Oh. I warned Jasper against you. I told him you were bad luck. But no, he loved you. Now see, what can you do?

“Nothing but an infertile wimp. Eight years, Fiona. And you still haven't learned your place."

I finally looked at her. Those black eyes filled with anger, rage and hatred. Her black hair neatly tied to a ponytail.

“I went straight to her–”

“Liar!” May shouted from the stairs and ran upstairs.

“No! Sweetie!” My head ached as I screamed.

“Pathetic. I will make sure you regret not leaving my son when I asked you to.” She said with a sinister smile as she walked away from the house.

I slowly got up, wiped the blood off my cheeks. I groaned again as I got up. If anything, I wanted to rekindle my relationship with my daughter.

I got to her door after some minutes, “May. It's mommy. Open the door, sweetie.”

“No. Leave me alone.”

“May. Please come out to mommy.”

“Leave me alone. I want Granny.”

I sighed as I held my head. My legs were going limp.

“Baby, little. I came to your school, but granny had taken you already.”

I tried calling out to her for some time but she didn't respond. So I left her and headed back to my room.

I had to lay my head a bit. As soon as my head hit the bed, I shut my eyes.

I was gently tapped awake. As I slowly opened my eyes, Jasper was above me.

I rubbed my eyes and sat up on the bed. His eyes were calm and loving. He sat beside me and held my hands as he sat beside to me.

“You're back, babe.” I held his hands tighter. My heart was instantly filled with warmth.

“Yes, and I have something important to discuss with you.” He said as he released my hands and got up.

“Okay. I have important news too.”

“Okay love. Let me talk first.” He took off his tie and shoes. “I think we should do the surrogacy as mom said.”

“What?!”

“Calm down, Fiona. It's just surrogacy. At least we will have a child of our own. Just through another woman.”

The remnants of sleep in my eyes had cleared and I looked at him properly. Was he the one saying this shit?

I swallowed my words. I wanted to hear him out. Janice had been hammering on this, since I gave birth to May.

“Which agency should we contact then?”

“No agency. We are the Armstrongs, we can't let people know this issue. I was thinking of a family friend. She is hundred percent ready.”

“What the fuck? Are you hearing yourself, Jasper? Don't you know how these things end when they are done by familiar people?”

“Calm down. It's just April.”

My body instantly froze as I heard that name.

“Your ex?!”