The kettle began to whisper before anyone spoke. That's how you know morning is honest.
Seraphina arrived on the whisper with a paper bag in one hand and a narrow thermos in the other. She set both down on the counter with the sound of decisions that do not require discussion. Her hair was the kind of neat that implies nothing has ever been permitted to tangle her attention. She looked me over the way a mechanic listens to an engine—kind, precise, uninterested in theatrics.
"Pain scale?" she asked.
"Annoying," I said.
"Acceptable," she said, which did not mean she had stopped paying attention. She turned the flame down one degree without looking; the kettle's whisper settled into the quiet of someone who has been heard.
She opened the paper bag. Rice, ginger, scallions, a small jar of something that looked plain and would refuse to be boring. "Congee," she said, already rinsing the rice. "The patient food."
"I'm not a patient," I said.
