The first thing Li An heard after the accident was a voice calling his name from underwater.
It wasn't the voice of a doctor or nurse.It was a whisper low, broken, close enough to brush the shell of his ear.
"Li An… wake up."
Then came the light white and sterile, filtering through his eyelids like the memory of snow. His throat burned when he tried to swallow. Every nerve in his body buzzed with the dull ache of sleep too deep, too long.
He opened his eyes to a ceiling he didn't know.
It took him another minute to realize he was in a hospital.
The air smelled like alcohol wipes and exhaustion. A machine beeped beside him, counting his pulse, reminding him he was still here alive, breathing, trapped in the strange in-between where dreams clung like cobwebs.
He turned his head slowly. Someone was asleep in the chair next to his bed, a woman with dark hair pulled into a messy bun, face pale with worry even in rest. Her hand was still wrapped around his.
"...Jie?" His voice cracked, broken and dry.
Her head jerked up instantly. "Li An?" Her voice trembled, eyes wide and shining. "Oh my God. You're awake, You're—"
She didn't finish. She just reached for him, pressing her forehead against his hand. Her shoulders shook.
Li An tried to speak again, but his lips only managed a small smile. "How long...?"
"Three weeks," Li Mei said, sitting up straight and wiping her eyes. "You were in a coma. The doctors said" Her voice broke again. "They said they didn't know if you'd wake up."
He blinked, the words slow to land. Three weeks, A coma, that explained the way his body felt foreign, weak, like he'd borrowed it from someone else.
"Where's Mom?" he asked.
Li Mei hesitated. That was answer enough.
"She's... she's in Guangzhou with Auntie," she said finally. "She wanted to come, but I told her I'd stay here. I didn't want you to wake up alone."
Li An stared at the ceiling for a while, letting the steady beep of the monitor fill the silence. He wasn't sure what to say. Gratitude felt too small.
His mind felt strange foggy but alive. Beneath the haze, though, was something else. A whisper. A pulse. A faint, heavy presence that made his skin prickle.
He looked toward the window, a faint drizzle streaked the glass, the gray daylight blurred the world outside into shapes and motion, cars crawling through rain, people under umbrellas.
Something about the reflection in that glass made him pause.
For a heartbeat, there were two figures at his bedside Li Mei, and someone standing behind her, face turned slightly toward him.
A man.
Tall. Still. Watching.
Li An blinked, and the second figure was gone.
He shut his eyes tightly, the image burning behind his lids. It felt like the tail end of a dream refusing to fade.
"Li Mei," he said quietly. "Has anyone else... been here?"
She frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I don't know," he murmured. "Just forget it."
Later, when the doctors came, their smiles were professional but relieved. They called him lucky. They said it was a miracle the kind you didn't question.
But Li An didn't feel lucky.
His dreams didn't stop when he woke. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw flashes: headlights slicing through fog, a voice calling his name, and hands, cold, desperate, reaching through water.
When he tried to draw what he saw, his hands trembled. Still, by instinct, he reached for the sketchpad that Li Mei had brought from home.
It was full.
He froze when he saw what he'd drawn. Dozens of sketches filled the pages all the same face. A man's.
Dark eyes. Wet hair falling across his brow. Lips caught between sorrow and something almost tender.
It didn't make sense. Li An didn't remember ever drawing him.
Li Mei noticed his expression. "What's wrong?"
He turned the page carefully. "Did you... touch this?"
She leaned in, curious. "No. That's your book. Why?"
Li An didn't answer. His pulse picked up, a quiet panic fluttering beneath his ribs. Every drawing was detailed, intimate, like he'd known that face for years.
And on the last page, written faintly in pencil, were four words:
"I am so happy you survived."
That night, the rain grew heavier. Li Mei had gone home to rest after staying awake for two nights straight.
Li An couldn't sleep. The world outside his window blurred with light and motion, the city humming distantly. Inside, the room felt too still, too aware.
Somewhere between waking and dreaming, he heard it again the breathing. Not his own. Not the machine's.
He turned his head. The chair beside him was empty. The door was closed.
Then, from the reflection on the windowpane, a shadow shifted.
He sat up slowly, pulse racing.
A man stood there again just beyond the glass, or maybe inside it. Same dark hair. Same calm eyes. Watching.
Li An's breath caught in his throat. "Who... are you?"
The figure didn't answer. He only tilted his head slightly, as if listening to something Li An couldn't hear.
The monitor beside the bed began to flicker slow, irregular beeps filling the silence.
Li An's fingers clenched around the blanket. He tried to call for the nurse, but his voice wouldn't come out.
Then the figure smiled a small, almost fond expression.
And whispered something Li An couldn't hear through the glass.
The lights in the room dimmed, one by one.
Then, just as suddenly as he appeared, the man was gone.
The machine steadied again.
Li An stared at his reflection, chest rising and falling too fast. His hands trembled.
"Ruan... Ye," he whispered suddenly the name coming out of nowhere, falling from his lips like a memory someone else had planted there.
He didn't know that name, and yet, when he said it, his heart ached as if he'd spoken it a thousand times before.
The next morning, Li Mei returned with breakfast and found him staring out the window.
"Bad dream?" she asked, setting the porridge down.
He didn't look away from the glass. "Something like that," he murmured.
"Li An... are you sure you're okay?"
He hesitated before nodding. "Yeah. Just tired."
She didn't press. She never did. Instead, she sat beside him, peeling an orange in silence. The scent filled the room bright, sharp, human.
But the reflection in the glass still showed two figures.
Li Mei's — and the quiet outline of a man standing just behind Li An's shoulder.