It wasn't long before Goldie, Maya, Abby, Spinel, Savannah, and Helen had headed out for the hospital, eager to be by Bitsy's side. When they arrived at the hospital, they signed in as visitors for her and then made their way towards the waiting room, where they decided to wait for an update on Bitsy's condition. As it just so happened, Rabbi Cartman and his wife and kids were also there, having already beaten them to it by about thirty minutes.

"Hey, bro," Savannah said. "I see the whole gang's here."

Rabbi Cartman couldn't help but chuckle. "Yep. I asked Yentl and the kids to come with me to help pay Miss Brandenham a visit."

"Couldn't you have gotten a babysitter for them or something?"

"Perhaps, but we couldn't get ahold of any of the usual sitters, especially not Kevin and Alice."

"Okay, I guess that makes sense." Pause. "So how have you guys been lately?"

"Same old, same old. I told you Eileen's going to be attending Brown University this fall, didn't I?"

"Yeah, I think so. Wow, Brown University. That's amazing."

"I know, right?" Rabbi Cartman gave with a sigh. "I can't believe my oldest child's already attending university. Seems like just yesterday when she was born."

"I know. Doesn't time move so strangely?"

Time seemed to just crawl to a halt while they waited and waited. In the meantime, they all decided to pass time by talking amongst themselves. Yentl, in particular, seemed keen on talking about the impending arrival of the youngest Cartman child and how they'd be coming any day now (neither she nor her husband knew what they were having, as they'd decided they wanted to be surprised). Goldie and Maya, meanwhile, couldn't help but be angry with themselves for not realizing sooner that something had been wrong. Sure, Bitsy hadn't quite been herself as of late, but neither of the Diamond sisters had imagined that her mental health had been so dire that she would attempt suicide.

Eileen's younger sister Menorah looked up at her father with a worried look on her face. "Dad, why did Miss Brandenham try to kill herself?"

"She was going through a stressful time in her life, sweetie," Rabbi Cartman replied. "Between dealing with her brother's death for four years and mourning over her friend Whitney, not to mention having her business plans fall through again and having to deal with long COVID, it's just been... a lot for her."

"Thank goodness it didn't work, though," Yentl interjected. "I guess you could say all she needed was a little nudge from heaven, eh?"

Her husband gave a small mirthless chuckle. "I guess you could say that."

After what felt like an eternity of waiting, a nurse finally came out and walked over to them.

"Excuse me, are you loved ones of Miss Brandenham?" the nurse asked them.

Maya urgently stood up out of her seat. "Yes. How is she?"

"Well, she's in stable condition for now, but..."

Maya felt her heart sink. She didn't like the sound of that "but". "But what?"

"Well, in addition to breaking both of her arms, she also fractured some ribs and part of her skull. While we were doing x-rays of her, we also couldn't help but find malignant tumors growing in one of her lungs. Fortunately, we managed to catch them at an early enough stage that we'll be able to treat the cancer with surgery."

Despite her relief, Maya tried to keep her composure together. "Do you know when we can see her?"

"Depends on how the surgery goes. We're going to perform a sleeve lobectomy and then see what happens from there. This could take a while. We'll be sure to let you know when she's out of surgery."

Maya could only let out a meek "Thank you" and watch as the nurse walked away. At least she could rest somewhat easy knowing that Bitsy wouldn't be subjected to the same fate as Sorcha. Losing Sorcha had been hard enough. She wasn't about to lose one of the few honorary aunts she and Goldie had. Somewhat disappointed as she was that Bitsy was going to survive, Helen offered to comfort her ex-girlfriend anyway, which Maya was more than happy to reciprocate.


A void of darkness... the only thing Bitsy could see for what seemed to be miles and miles on end. From a distance, she could hear what sounded like muffled voices, and she felt as if she were floating in an empty ocean that went on and on indefinitely. Any moment, she expected to find herself reunited with Whitney and experience peace for once.

Instead, the voices gradually became more intelligible like something was moving her towards them (or maybe it was the other way around; she wasn't sure), and she had no choice but to fixate on them. There was something about them that stood out to her, but she had no idea what. No matter, as it wasn't long before she recognized one of the voices as...

"Bitsy, are you awake?"

That sounded like... Helen!

It took a few seconds before Bitsy could finally come to, her eyes slowly flickering open. She let out a gasp like she'd momentarily been struggling for air. Soon, her vision began to swim into focus as she saw Helen beside her, holding Shampagne in her arms. Goldie, Maya, Abby, Spinel, Savannah, and Rabbi Cartman and his family were also by her side, practically hovering over her.

Maya breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, thank the stars you're okay!"

"What—" Bitsy took a moment to articulate herself, just as confused and terrified as anyone else in her position. "What the hell? What's going on?"

"You tried to kill yourself and failed, remember?"

"Oh God, I'm such a dumkopf!" Bitsy flopped back down onto her hospital bed. "I can't even die right!"

"Well, you got two broken arms and a skull fracture for your troubles, so there's that," Helen could only reply.

"That doesn't help!" Bitsy cried. "When can I go home?"

"Should be as soon as Monday."

"I should hope so. I don't know how much longer I can take it here."

Silence proceeded to follow for the next few minutes.

Yentl then proceeded to gingerly ask, "So... how are you feeling?"

"Fine, fine..." Bitsy replied.

"You don't sound fine."

"Well, I am! What do you care anyway?"

Yentl defensively held up her hands. "Okay, just making sure. Honestly, though, after what you did the other night, we're actually worried that you might try to kill yourself again. So from now on, you're going to be on suicide watch."

"What?! Are you shitting me?!"

"Miss Brandenham! Not in front of the children!"

A fire, a burning flame, lit up in Bitsy's eyes. "You can't put me on suicide watch! I'm Bitsy Brandenham!"

Yentl was unperturbed. "Well, that's too bad. If that's what it takes to get you to appreciate life, so be it."

Bitsy couldn't be inclined to respond to that and just started trying to go to sleep.

"So... I guess we'll come back later, then?" Yentl asked, again with no response. "Okay..."

With that, everyone except Helen and Shampagne headed off to the hospital cafeteria to eat.