At 2:15 a.m., the silence in Ayusari's house was shattered in a horrifying way. The heavy thud of something falling in the master bedroom, followed by ragged, labored breathing, jolted Ayusari out of a deep sleep.
Ayusari shot upright in bed. Her heart pounding, she leaped to her feet and sprinted toward her mother's room without stopping to turn on the hallway light.
The sight Ayusari feared most was unfolding before her eyes. Mom Tita was suffering a severe complex partial seizure. Her seventy-six-year-old body was rigid with tension, both hands clenched tightly over her chest, while her eyes rolled upward in a blank stare. Choked moans came from between her tightly pressed lips as she struggled to breathe.
"Mom! Mom Tita!" Ayusari cried, her voice trembling with panic. She immediately climbed onto the bed and tried to turn her mother's body onto its left side, making sure her mother's airway wasn't blocked by saliva or her tongue falling backward.
Ayusari's screams sent the bathroom door and the back bedroom door flying open. Putri and Yasa rushed in, their faces deathly pale. Yasa, who was only sixteen, let out a shriek the moment she saw her grandmother's rigid body.
"Mom! What's wrong with Grandma?! Is she having another seizure?!" Yasa screamed hysterically, tears instantly streaming down her cheeks.
"Putri! Get a clean cloth from the kitchen and some eucalyptus oil! Yasa, get Mom's phone from the table! Call the neighborhood chief or find a rideshare right now! We have to take Grandma to the hospital ER!" Ayusari ordered loudly, fighting desperately to hold back her panic so she wouldn't completely lose control of the situation.
Putri ran out of the room, while Yasa struggled to operate her mother's phone with violently trembling hands. But misfortune seemed to have descended on the night. The rideshare app on Ayusari's phone repeatedly failed to find a driver because heavy localized rain had begun soaking the streets outside. Yasa ran out of the house to the neighborhood watch post at the end of the alley, but it was completely deserted because the night guards had taken shelter at a distant food stall.
"Mom! No rideshare driver will accept the request! The neighborhood chief isn't answering either!" Yasa sobbed from the bedroom doorway, shaking her head in frustration.
On the bed, Mom Tita's condition grew more alarming. Her partial seizure had lasted more than two minutes, and a faint bluish tinge had begun to appear around her fingertips and lips from the lack of oxygen. Ayusari held her rigid mother's shoulders, warm tears dripping onto her mother's cheeks.
"Grandma... hang in there... Ayu's here... Putri's here..." Ayusari whispered hoarsely, her soul shaken by the overwhelming fear of losing the mother she loved so dearly.
With the emergency at a complete dead end, Ayusari took the phone from Yasa's hands. Her trembling fingers moved through the call history. Without thinking any further, driven by the desperation of a daughter fighting to save her mother's life, Ayusari tapped the contact at the very top of the list: Max.
The call rang only twice before it was answered.
"Hello, Ayusari? What's wrong? Is there a problem?" Max's voice sounded clear and alert on the other end, as though he hadn't been asleep at all.
"Max... please help me..." Ayusari whispered. Her voice broke beneath the sobs she could no longer hold back. "My mother... my mother is having a terrible seizure... There's no vehicle at home... Please help me, Max..."
"Give me your full address right now, Ayu! I'm leaving immediately!" Max replied firmly without asking twice.