In a hospital room, a patient in bed number five, Qian Xiong, was on the phone with his wife, his tone not very polite.
"Didn't I tell you not to bother Ah Long with something this minor? I said it would've been fine to just get it checked out at the county hospital. It's just appendicitis, yet you had to make me come to City First Hospital. And fine, we came to City First Hospital, but why did you have to tell Ah Long?"
"The doctors in the ER are very responsible. They've already run several tests on me. You really didn't need to tell Ah Long. Now we're just bothering him."
Qian Xiong was in his fifties, a worker who delivered barrels of drinking water. He had always been a proud and stubborn man who hated bothering his relatives.
He had only come to City First Hospital because he couldn't talk his wife out of it. He had wanted to just get some anti-inflammatory treatment and let it heal on its own, with no intention of going under the knife.
