It was a cool summer evening when I was  sitting in my room  reading Where The Red Fern Grows, one of my favorite books,  when I heard the phone ring. “Bring, bring” it kept ringing as I raced into the living room  to pick it up but unfortunately,  my mom beat me to it.
      “ Mom!” I cried  as she reached for the phone, “ I was about get that!”
      “ Sorry sweetie!’ she exclaimed in her most charming voice. I grumbled as I walked back to my book. My friend  was supposed to call me and tell me where the Math Olympiad practice was tomorrow before  the competition,  and with my mom keeping a close tab on the phone I wasn’t able to do that. Seriously! She  was literally  stalking it.
      I was halfway up the stairs when the loud sounds of talking hushed into whispers as the door opened revealing my dad. As soon as he stepped in his smile turned upside down as my mom whispered something to him. Now I was interested! I creeped downstairs, so I could listen in, but I could not  get close enough. ‘Oh well’ I thought and decided it  was  some boring  topic my parents were discussing about.         
     “Sweety, can you come here for a second” my mom cried as I was heading back upstairs. Without saying a word  I quickly descended the stairs and rushed into the living room to find my mother crying.
     “ What’s wrong?” I asked them concern evident in my voice.
     “Sweety..” my mom started “ I….. you need to know...uh”
     “What she is trying to say” my dad cut her off. “ Is that… you know how you love your grandma’s food so much?”
      “Of course!” I exclaimed as I  thought back to all those times I visited India . Grandma would always feed me Indian delicacies like gulab jamun or biryani.
       “ Well...it seems she has been eating too much of her own tasty, but unhealthy food and she has built up a lot of cholesterol in her heart.So… she is going to have an operation to remove the cholesterol in her heart. A major operation,”   he trailed off while staring at the ground.The last words he said echoed in my mind. A major operation, a major operation it kept repeating. Time seemed to go to a standstill. Slowly the words began to make sense.
      “ What?”  I exclaimed, while my heart was beating faster than Usain Bolt could run.
      “ Don’t worry sport, everything will be okay,” my dad said as he patted my back.
      “ Oh yeah I almost forgot. There is just one more thing I need to tell you,” mom said as she looked around nervously.

       All too soon I was seated in a car headed for the airport.No one talked at all. I could  feel the  tension in the atmosphere. I fidgeted with my seatbelt as I thought back to the events of last night. Mom had told me that she was taking the very next  plane to  India to help grandma with her surgery and after that, my parents went racing through the house preparing for my mom’s departure while I just sat there dumbstruck. I was too shocked with the current events to do anything.  I realized what the aftermath of a surgery could  lead to. Death.

      As  we reached the security gate of the airport I gave my mom one last  bear hug and told her everything will be alright.
     “I hope so” she whispered to me before disappearing into the crowd. After a while of watching her, my dad finally spoke up.
     “ Come on sport, let’s go home” he said as my mom gave us one last wave before walking away towards her departure gate.

      Today was the day that could possibly change my life forever. It’s been three days since my mom went to India but it felt like a lifetime!  My mom called last night and told  me that the operation was being done today.  For some reason, my body racked racked with nervousness which never happened before. It was probably just the stress of the operation getting to me.
       Earlier that day my dad and I were watching The Nightmare Before Christmas in the living room  when  the phone rang. I cringed as it continued to ring. These past few weeks the phone  always beared bad news starting with my grandma’s operation news so, I wasn’t too keen on answering it.  I checked who it was from and immediately picked it up when I noticed it was from my mom.
      “ Hi sweetie” she called when I answered the phone. Before I even got a chance to reply she started giving me status updates of my grandma’s heart operation.
      “So far so good” she said. “The veins were replaced,and the doctors are  stitching her chest back  together,” she said. I patiently listened while sitting in the dining room as she kept reporting the doctor's every move. I so badly longed to tell her how much I missed her but, it seemed to me that if I interrupted her  it would add to her anxiety even more so, I patiently listened.  Suddenly  I heard a gasp and  the phone dropped on the other line.
     “ Mom?” I whispered. “ Mom?!” I called a little louder. There was no answer on the line. My heart rate sped up to about one thousand miles per hour and I felt like I couldn’t breathe. What if something went wrong? Is grandma hurt? Is mom okay? These questions repeatedly played in my mind as I  tried keeping my composure while waiting for a response on the other line. It felt as if the world stopped spinning. My head pounded continuously as I pressed the phone against my ear .
     “ Hello?” I bolted up as a croaky voice called from the other line.
     “ Mom!!” I shouted. “ What happened?”. There was a silence on  the other side before she answered .

      “The heart monitor stopped working.” that’s all I heard. My mind  wouldn’t comprehend what she was saying. It didn’t want to. I couldn’t believe it. I wouldn’t believe it. ‘Grandma is not dead!’ I yelled in my mind.

      “ Sweety,” my mom’s voice rang through the other side of the phone. “ Sweety!” she called again. “ She is still alive.” Relief washed over me as she said those last words.
       “Then what happened?” I whispered back curiously.
       “ Just a little mix up in the heart monitor. Really nothing to worry about.” she said     with a tint of relief.
       After the incident, mom stopped giving me status updates and I went back to watching a movie to get my mind of things.Within a few hours mom called again but this time  with extremely good news.
       “Operation surgery successful” she yelped.”     
       “What a relief !” I remarked as I broke into laughter thinking about how such a tricky situation turned out to be okay. I was jubilant that the surgery was successful and prayed  no one would ever have to go through that situation again.I perked up instantly after I finished talking to mom  and started running to the study room  to deliver the good news to my dad.