The hospital ate color. Outside, noon burned on chrome and river; inside, everything was white and humming.
Gu Ze Yan stepped through the doors with the calm of a man who taught his body not to make noise. His reflection flickered across the glass, his shadow slid down the tiles.
Dr. He Ming met him at the elevator. Mask loose, pen behind one ear. "CT's clean. Concussion, bruising. She's unconscious, but stable. We moved her to a private room."
Nothing shifted on Ze Yan's face. Somewhere under his ribs, something did.
They rode upward in silence. The doors opened to a fluorescent corridor. He Ming walked ahead, pushed open a door with one knuckle.
Inside: a white island of bed, machines ticking in soft grammar.
Lin Qing Yun lay turned toward the window, bandage clean at her temple, hair spread like ink over the pillow. The hospital cotton made her look smaller, but not fragile—only quiet, as if the world had pressed pause.
Ze Yan stopped at the foot of the bed. He didn't touch the bandage. He didn't speak. He only looked.
She was paler, thinner. The face he remembered—still startling, even now.
He pulled out a chair, the scrape loud in the small room. His jacket slid onto it. He poured warm water into a paper cup, set it down. The cup trembled once before steadying.
Her hand lay open on the sheet, fingers curved mid-gesture, as if she had paused and forgotten to finish. He covered it with his own.
Warm.
The monitor kept time. Breath filled the air. Somewhere in the hall, a nurse laughed and was hushed.
His thumb traced a slow circle across her skin.
Memory leaked in uninvited.
—The smell of broth and soy, a bell above a small shop door that rang too often.
—Her balancing two bowls in one hand, telling strangers to please enjoy, making them smile without trying.
—Red bean soup pressed into his hands like punishment and comfort at once.
His lips curved and faded. He had spoken so many words to her once—on bridges at midnight, in bookstores at closing. On the night she left, they had been useless.
Five years had passed, and still the hand under his felt like the only language that mattered.
The monitor's green line climbed and fell. He stared at it until the world narrowed to two truths: the sound of her pulse, and the warmth beneath his palm.
Then—her finger twitched.
His head lifted.
For a moment he thought he imagined it. But then it happened again, faint as a thread pulled through cloth.
The pulse under his hand quickened.
He leaned closer, voice low, steady, betraying nothing but the words themselves.
"Do you remember me?"