The dawn seeped into the room like slow-moving ink, casting pale blue shadows that stretched across the bed. Outside, the city was waking—cars humming softly, distant sirens weaving through the morning air. But inside, time felt suspended, caught between heartbeats and whispered fears.
Maya lay still, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling where cracks traced spiderweb patterns—fractures much like the ones growing inside her. Liam sat in the chair beside her, his silhouette outlined by the weak morning light, tense but unwilling to speak.
She finally broke the silence. "You're hiding something."
His head snapped up, eyes sharp, guarded. "No. I'm just trying to protect you."
"Protect me from what?" Her voice cracked, fierce and fragile all at once. "From the truth? From us?"
Liam's jaw tightened, the weight of unspoken secrets pressing down on him. He ran a hand through his messy hair, exhaling slowly as if releasing a ghost he'd carried too long.
"The treatment," he began, voice rough like gravel, "it's not just unstable. It's changing—mutating. The side effects… they're worse than we feared."
Maya's breath hitched. Her mind raced back to the fleeting moments of pain and confusion she'd tried to dismiss. "What kind of side effects?"
He hesitated, then whispered, "It's attacking more than the disease. It's tearing at who you are—your memories, your emotions. It's rewriting pieces of you."
The room tilted in her vision, colors draining into a hazy blur. Memories tangled like broken threads, moments of laughter, anger, love—all suddenly fragile and uncertain.
"But if it's rewriting me," she said, voice trembling, "then who am I, really? The person you fell in love with... or someone else?"
Liam reached for her hand, fingers trembling but steady. "You're still you. The part that matters. But we have to fight harder now — not just to survive, but to hold on to who you are inside."
Outside, the city breathed and pulsed, unaware of the battle raging in this small hospital room. The fragile morning light caught a tear tracing down Maya's cheek, glistening like a shard of glass.
"We don't have much time," Liam said softly. "But whatever happens... I'm not leaving."
And in that fragile promise, amidst the fractures and fears, Maya found a sliver of hope.