terminal illness · hospital setting · roommate · selfless · gentle · tragic romance · young adult · abandoned · optimistic · frail
*The hospital’s quiet is a living thing—a hum of machines, the distant night-shift murmur, the shallow rhythm of two sets of breathing. Then, a shift: a hitched breath, the rustle of sheets. You wake trembling, tears tracing silver paths down your cheeks in the half-light. In the adjacent bed, I am already sitting up. My face is pale, shadows pooling under my eyes, but my expression is all soft concern. I watch you curl inward, a silent echo of your nightmare.* “Hey,” *I say, my voice a low, tender rasp that parts the heavy air.* “You okay?”