The hallway outside OR 47-B hadn’t settled, not even after the code had ended nearly ten minutes earlier. The air still carried the remnants of everything that had unfolded inside—alarms fading but not gone, the metallic skid of the crash cart someone had left slightly crooked against the wall, the faint chemical burn of cautery drifting into the corridor like it was clinging to the tiles. Nurses moved in hushed, clipped motions, the kind that told him they were still halfway inside the adrenaline rush. Adrian stepped out last, fingers pushing the mask down from his face in a slow, controlled sweep, the exact kind of motion he used when he didn’t want anyone to see how badly his hands wanted to shake. His shoulders rose with a breath that caught halfway, a stutter in his chest he forced himself to ignore.

He didn’t get far before he had to stop walking. His body needed a moment—not to think, not to recover, just to stand somewhere that wasn’t bright and sterile and echoing with the sound of a failing pulse. He placed one hand on the doorframe as if grounding himself against something solid might slow the thrum in his blood. It didn’t. The hallway buzzed faintly, the overhead lights humming in their usual way, but tonight it grated against him more sharply. Maybe it was the quiet that came after a code, the kind that rushed in too fast like a wave before the brain caught up. Maybe it was the face of the patient, too young to be on that table, too scared when they’d brought him in. Or maybe it was the look exchanged between the OR nurses—quick, worried, then immediately buried. No one wanted to name a close call, especially not with him watching.

He tried to regulate his breathing, matching each inhale to the beat he was supposed to feel steady in his fingertips, but the rhythm felt off, like his lungs had misfired. He could almost hear the attending he’d trained under years ago—Control your hands, Cole. Control starts in the breath. He did not want to think about that voice. Not tonight.

He had barely pushed himself off the frame when footsteps echoed from the far end of the corridor. Quick ones. Familiar ones. Even without looking, something in him shifted—tightened, braced, maybe even hoped, though he’d deny that last part. Elara rounded the corner with a speed that didn’t match the exhaustion smudged under her eyes. The fluorescent lights caught on the loose ends of her ponytail, on the wrinkles that had formed in her scrubs over fourteen straight hours, on the stack of charts pressed firmly against her ribs like she needed them to stay upright. She looked like she had run the last stretch of hallway, and like she hadn’t realized it.

Her eyes went directly to the OR door behind him. Then they jumped to his face, and something sharp passed through her expression—fear? Anger? He wasn’t sure. He only knew it was the kind of look that meant she already suspected the worst and was daring him to prove her wrong.

“What happened.”

Not a question. A demand shaped like a question.

“The case is over,” he said, voice kept flat by force. “That’s all.”

“That’s not an answer, Adrian.”

A nurse slipped between them on her way out, head down, eyes red-rimmed. She didn’t say a word. Elara’s fingers tensed around the charts, her knuckles whitening for a fraction of a second. That was all she needed to understand too much.

“Tell me if he made it,” she said. “I’m not asking for the full report.”

He followed her gaze down the hall. A family sat in the waiting area, huddled close together, eyes darting between the floor and the OR doors, pretending not to watch him. He straightened his shoulders—automatic, practiced, almost surgical in precision.

“He’s stable,” he said. “For now.”

“For now,” she repeated, softer, like the phrase itself hurt. “Right.”

She stepped closer. Not into his space, but near enough that he could feel the shift of air between them, the tension that always formed when she came close enough to see through him.

“You paged the code from my ER bay,” she said. “You know that, right?”

“Doesn’t make him your patient.”

“It makes him someone I saw alive before he came upstairs.” Her voice was steady, firm without being loud. “That counts.”

He exhaled once, slow and deliberate, as if letting out the breath could reset the moment. It didn’t.

“You’re exhausted,” he said. “Go back downstairs.”

“And you’re not?”

He didn’t meet her eyes at first. He didn’t want her to see the flicker of something he hadn’t managed to bury. But when he finally looked, her gaze was unwavering—bright, searching, and entirely unwilling to let him hide behind protocol.

“This isn’t about me,” he said. “It’s about preventing the next collapse.”

“Funny,” she murmured. “People usually say that right before they collapse.”

A monitor chimed faintly from inside the OR, a soft electronic reminder that life—and machines—moved on whether anyone was ready or not. The lights hummed. A cart squeaked somewhere down the hall. The world went on, indifferent.

“Elara,” he said, and her name came out rougher than he meant.

She lifted her chin a fraction. “Say it.”

He couldn’t. If he said the truth—any truth—there wouldn’t be a way to stop the rest from spilling out. And he couldn’t afford that. Not here. Not tonight.

So he said nothing.

The silence stretched long enough for her expression to shift—first frustration, then something deeper, something that tightened beneath her eyes like disappointment trying to stay hidden.

“Fine,” she said. Her voice was quiet, but not weak. “You don’t want to tell me, don’t. But don’t shut that door on them when they ask what happened.”

She turned, steps steady but sharp.

“Wait.”

She froze, shoulders going rigid. But she didn’t face him.

He swallowed the words he wasn’t supposed to say, the ones he’d been fighting off since he stepped out of the OR.

“You should… wash the blood off,” he said quietly. “They’ll need you downstairs.”

A breath escaped her, something between a laugh and an exhale—thin, frayed, not really either.

“Yeah,” she said. “That’s what I do.”

She walked away before he could respond. Her strides were measured, almost too controlled—the kind of control a person used when breaking would be too easy.

He let his gaze follow her until she disappeared around the corner. Only then did he realize he’d been holding his breath the entire time.

He released it slowly, the air leaving his chest in a long, quiet unravel.

Still breathing.

Barely.