I am sitting in the clinically clean-looking lobby of the hospital, where a tree of colorful balloons extending from a bucket fails to give cheer to the large, hollow space. The inside of my left arm throbs—the epicenter of the pangs, on the soft inside of my elbow, is where the needle punctured my skin first and then a vein. Part of me stayed behind in the little office tucked within the belly of the hospital. A vial of my blood—is it still my blood? It will share intimate details about me, soon, as it is processed in the laboratory. But it is no longer part of my system. It no longer helps my body function.