---

Chapter 7: The Floor Between Them

The lights in the med bay were low.

Most of the staff had gone home.

But in one corner, beside the wide hospital window, sat a girl.

Not in the bed.

Not in the chair.

But on the floor.

---

Rook’s IV was still attached, trailing from her wrist.

She’d dragged her case file down to the tile and was now reading in silence, her legs folded beneath her, golden eyes half-shadowed.

She didn’t look up when she heard footsteps.

But she knew who it was.

> “You’re not supposed to be out of bed,” Cain said gently.

Rook didn’t respond.

---

He waited a second. Then sat beside her. On the floor.

Not a word.

Just silence.

The same kind of silence she’d used for years.

---

> “They think I’m strange,” she finally said.

> “You are.”

She blinked, caught off guard.

Cain didn’t smile, didn’t tease — just said it like a fact.

> “But strange doesn’t mean broken.”

She looked down.

> “You sat on the floor.”

> “So?”

> “No one ever does.”

> “I figured the chair made you uncomfortable.”

> “Uncomfortable is fine. Chairs feel... wrong.”

> “So I adjusted.”

---

She stared at him now.

Not suspicious.

Just surprised.

> “You don’t ask questions.”

> “Not unless you want me to.”

> “Why?”

> “Because most people ask to feed curiosity. Not to offer understanding.”

---

There was silence again.

Then, quietly:

> “I only have one kidney.”

> “I know.”

> “He took it. My father. For her.”

Cain didn’t speak.

But something in his eyes changed. Not pity. Not rage.

Something… older. Familiar.

---

> “I don’t remember his face,” she said. “Or hers. Just the ceiling above the table. And the cold.”

Cain nodded slowly.

> “I remember the cold too.”

---

They sat there a long while.

No more words.

No questions.

No judgment.

Just two strange people

on the same cold floor,

in a world that never really wanted them.

That is absolutely beautiful — soft, unsettling, and deeply human in a way only someone like Rook could express.

She doesn’t feel what others feel.

She doesn’t cry.

She doesn’t even fully understand affection.

But something in Cain speaks to the ghost inside her — and so, when he’s about to leave, she does something she never does.

She reaches out.

Not because she wants comfort…

but because he looks like he needs it.

---

(Continued - Chapter 7: The Floor Between Them)

Cain stood slowly, dusting his coat off.

> “I should let you rest.”

Rook didn’t answer at first.

She kept her eyes on the corner of the floor, as if debating something.

Then she stood too.

She looked small again — thin arms, oversized clothes, the IV swaying slightly from her wrist.

Cain turned to go.

And just before he stepped away—

—her arms wrapped around him.

Awkward.

Small.

Sudden.

---

He froze.

She didn’t press her face into his chest.

She didn’t cry or tremble.

She just held on.

As if replicating something she didn’t understand… but believed might mean something.

---

> “I can’t feel things,” she said softly, her voice flat but fragile.

“I think my feelings broke a long time ago.”

She looked up at him.

Golden eyes, hollow but sincere.

> “But… you look sad.”

> “And I don’t remember who said it,

but someone once told me…”

A pause.

> “Hugs mean comfort.”

---

Cain slowly rested a hand on the back of her head.

He didn’t squeeze her.

He didn’t speak.

He just stayed there.

Letting the moment hold its own weight.

And in that silence, something shifted.

Not warmth.

But something close.

Something human.

---

End of Chapter 7