Hospitals always carried a peculiar kind of silence—sterile, deliberate, and heavy with breathing.  

The smell of disinfectant lingered in the air, faintly bitter, like something trying too hard to be clean.  

Lilia held the overly ornate fruit box in one hand and her phone in the other, double-checking the room number the nurse had given her.  

Her heels clicked softly against the linoleum floor.  

She walked neither fast nor slow, afraid that hesitation might betray the reason she was here.  

When the elevator doors slid open on the fifth floor, she drew a deep breath before stepping out.  

The hallway lights were pale, flattening every shadow.  

The door to the four-bed room was half open.  

She knocked, lightly. No one answered.  

So she pushed it open.  

The air inside was a mixture of antiseptic and leftover lunch.  

A TV murmured near one of the beds where an old man watched the morning news.  

She hesitated at the threshold—this was not her world: cramped, unguarded, full of human noise.  

Then she saw him.  

He was asleep, the blanket pulled to his waist.  

His leg was encased in plaster; his arm and forehead wrapped in gauze.  

Even the skin on his cheek looked tender, scuffed and bruised.  

He seemed smaller somehow, folded into the white of the bed.  

Lilia placed the fruit box on the side table.  

The scent of apples and pears drifted faintly upward, almost too alive for this place.  

She sat down, eyes tracing the slow rhythm of his breathing.  

*What am I doing here?*  

The question rose and fell like the hum of the fluorescent lights.  

There were reports waiting at her desk, emails she should have already answered.  

She wasn’t someone who made unplanned visits—certainly not to hospital rooms.  

Yet she stayed.  

She pulled a chair closer, its metal legs scraping softly against the floor, and sat.  

The quiet surrounded her—the ticking IV drip, a patient coughing in the next bed, a car horn somewhere far below.  

And somehow, within all that, she felt calm.  

Watching him breathe, she realized the world outside her glass office could still move without her permission.  

Maybe it wasn’t him, she told herself.  

Maybe it was just the habit of his coffee, the morning ritual that had gone missing.  

She folded her arms, as if defending herself from the thought.  

Then he stirred.  

His eyelids fluttered once, twice—  

and opened.  

Their eyes met.  

For a brief, absurd second, he simply stared, unfocused and wide-eyed.  

His mind was foggy, somewhere between dream and memory.  

White walls. Bandages. The faint smell of antiseptic.  

And *her*.  

His first thought was strangely childlike:  

*Am I dead?*  

Then, almost immediately—  

*Wait, no. Heaven wouldn’t have this smell.*  

He tried to speak, but his throat was dry, the words catching like dust.  

“Where… am I?” he rasped.  

Then, frowning, “Oh, hell. Don’t tell me I died.”  

Lilia blinked, momentarily startled, then let out a quiet laugh.  

“No,” she said, her voice softer than she intended. “You’re in the hospital.”  

He squinted at her, slowly recognizing the outline of her face.  

“Ms. Quell?” His voice cracked. “You… what are you doing here?”  

She hesitated, searching for a rational answer.  

“I came to check on you,” she said finally, as if it were the simplest thing in the world.  

He blinked, uncertain whether to be grateful or embarrassed.  

“I—uh—thanks.”  

For a few seconds neither spoke.  

The silence felt new, a little fragile.  

He glanced at the fruit box, then back at her, unsure if this was real or some strange post-accident dream.  

She looked at him again, realizing her own heartbeat hadn’t slowed since she walked in.  

Outside, a siren wailed and faded into the distance.  

Inside, they just sat there—  

a man still healing, a woman still pretending not to care—  

and the world went quietly on.