Hospital Rooftop, Daylight, The hospital rose without ornament, a geometry of white concrete and sealed windows, its rooftop exposed to a winter-blue sky that offered light without warmth. Wind slid across the open space in long, impersonal strokes, the kind that did not howl but pressed, persistent and exacting, as if testing structural integrity rather than acknowledging human presence.
Mily stood at the edge.
The patient uniform clung to her frame with institutional indifference—thin fabric, faded seams, a garment designed for compliance rather than dignity. Her hair, once kept with deliberate care, had surrendered to neglect. Strands broke free in uneven directions, lifted and dropped by the wind as though rehearsing escape. Her pallor was not dramatic; it was clinical, the color of a body that had learned to conserve effort.
Below her feet, the ledge was narrow enough to demand constant attention. The tremor in her legs betrayed that attention's cost. Balance, she had learned, was not a talent but an expenditure.
She looked down.
Tears traced silent, obedient paths along her cheeks, not rushing, not resisting gravity. They fell as things should fall. Her eyes, fixed somewhere beyond the visible ground, carried the dull focus of someone rehearsing an irreversible conclusion.
"Father…"
The word fractured as it left her mouth, stripped of authority.
"I can't live without him."
The sentence did not sound like a plea. It sounded like a calculation already completed.
Behind her, the rooftop door stood open, a rectangle of shadow cut into daylight. From it emerged a man whose posture had collapsed inward, as though gravity had found him personally offensive. Her father's hands shook—not violently, but continuously, a tremor born from prolonged fear rather than sudden shock. His breath arrived in uneven increments, each inhalation uncertain of its own legitimacy.
"Mily…"
His voice failed to reach her as a command. It arrived instead as a request, stripped of paternal privilege.
"Please… come down…"
He took a step forward and stopped, instinct overruling intention. Panic had narrowed his world to the space between her heels and the edge. Sweat collected at his temples despite the cold, his expression suspended between hope and its imminent collapse.
"MILY, PLEASE!"
The word please did the work his authority no longer could. It humiliated him.
Mily turned her head slightly—not enough to face him, but enough to acknowledge the sound. Her lips curved into a smile that required effort, the kind used when one wishes to reassure others while privately withdrawing consent from the world.
"I… I can't live… without him…"
She said it again, as though repetition might grant the sentence moral weight. The wind carried her voice upward, dispersing it before it could settle anywhere meaningful.
Above them, the sky remained clear.
***
Winter Afternoon, American College Campus. The campus unfolded beneath a pale winter sky, orderly and expansive, its symmetry interrupted only by the slow, deliberate descent of snow. The flakes did not fall dramatically. They drifted, each one apparently undecided, accumulating without urgency on stone benches, bare branches, and the shoulders of students who had learned to ignore discomfort.
Cold air moved through the courtyard with bureaucratic efficiency.
Students crossed the open space in intersecting trajectories—laughing, adjusting scarves, complaining without conviction. Their footsteps compressed the snow into a thin, audible resistance, a communal rhythm of forward motion. No one stopped long enough to observe the season.
Murmurs gathered in small, careless clusters.
"Isn't she perfect?"
"She's so beautiful…"
"She's top in academics, right?"
The words traveled with the casual intimacy of gossip, unburdened by responsibility. Admiration, when unexamined, resembled entitlement.
Mily entered the courtyard from the far path, her pace unhurried, her posture economical. At twenty-three, she carried herself with the restraint of someone accustomed to being watched. Her winter coat was plain, chosen for function rather than impression. A backpack rested against her shoulder, its weight familiar enough to be forgotten.
Snowflakes landed in her hair and dissolved without ceremony.
From a distance, her beauty appeared effortless. Closer inspection revealed discipline. Nothing about her was excessive. Even her presence seemed measured, as though she were conserving something unnamed.
Ahead of her, Jason, Ethan, and Mia moved together in loose formation, their conversation animated, their laughter uncontained. They occupied space generously, confident in their right to do so.
Mily walked behind them with Ava.
Ava's steps lagged, dragging just enough to register disinterest. Her shoulders sagged beneath the burden of an exhaustion that made no attempt at discretion.
"Today is the first day of second year," Mily said, her tone observational rather than reflective.
"But it doesn't feel like it."
Ava exhaled loudly, performing fatigue as though it required witnesses. Dark crescents shadowed her eyes, the visible residue of neglected sleep.
"Yes. I'm so bored," she said. "There's nothing to do either."
She rubbed her face with both hands, as if friction alone might produce vitality, then leaned sideways, resting her head against Mily's shoulder. The gesture was unannounced, possessive in its familiarity.
"It's only been one year," Ava continued, voice muffled slightly. "And I'm already worn out. We still have three more years until graduation… honestly…"
Mily registered the weight against her shoulder, adjusted minutely to accommodate it. Ava had always been like this—unguarded, imprecise, willing to lean where others would hesitate. Honesty, in her case, functioned less as virtue and more as habit.
"Haha… but we can't do anything about it," Mily replied.
The laugh arrived half a second late, calibrated to soften the statement. Acceptance, she had learned, was most effective when disguised as humor.
Ava straightened abruptly, puffing her cheeks, dramatizing despair.
"I'm going to die," she declared, without conviction.
Mily laughed again, quieter this time.
"You should go home and sleep."
They walked in silence for a moment. Snow continued to fall, the light thinning as afternoon advanced. Students passed them in slow, indistinct currents, faces briefly visible before dissolving back into anonymity.
Life, Mily thought, did not pause for comprehension. It advanced, indifferent to whether one was prepared.
She turned her head slightly.
"By the way, Ava," she asked, "what will you do after graduation?" The question carried weight. Mily had placed it carefully.
"What's your dream?" she continued. "I want to become a doctor."
She did not say because. Reasons were unnecessary when decisions were already sealed.
Ava slowed, then stopped, tapping a finger against her chin as though consulting an absent authority.
"Now that I think about it…"
Her expression shifted into something approximating thoughtfulness.
"I don't know."
The words landed with disproportionate force.
Mily's eyes widened—not theatrically, but precisely, as though a structural assumption had failed.
"You don't know?" she said.
Ava laughed, scratching the back of her head.
"I really don't."
She resumed walking, speaking lightly, unburdened by consequence.
"Maybe I'll get a job at a big company. Marry a handsome man. Have kids. That's probably it."
She shrugged.
"But still… I don't know."
Mily stopped.
The movement was involuntary.
She looked at Ava, seeing her anew—not as careless, not as lazy, but as someone untouched by the compulsion to justify existence. The realization irritated her.
"You're weird," Mily said.
Ava considered this, nodding with exaggerated seriousness.
"I guess I am."
They continued forward, their figures absorbed into the crowd. Snow settled on their shoulders alike, impartial.
Mily watched Ava from the corner of her vision. Ava walked without urgency, without fear of misdirection. She did not mistake this for freedom.
Some people, Mily understood, did not need purpose because they had never learned to negotiate with loss. Others constructed futures the way one builds fortifications—precisely, obsessively, against an anticipated collapse.
As they disappeared into the moving mass of students, a thought settled into Mily's mind with quiet finality:
Ava could afford not to know.
Mily never had.
And the difference, she realized, was not ambition—but survival.
Winter Afternoon, American College Campus
Mily's body halted before intention intervened.
Her foot froze mid-step, suspended above the pale stone path, as though some invisible mechanism had abruptly locked her in place. The surrounding flow of students continued uninterrupted—scarves fluttering, laughter spilling—but she had been excised from their momentum.
Something had shifted.
Her eyes widened with a precision that suggested recognition rather than surprise. The pupils trembled faintly, adjusting too slowly, as if the world ahead of her had become dangerous to process all at once. A dull thump reverberated in her chest, not loud enough to draw attention, but heavy enough to assert authority.
Her breath caught.
A thin cloud of vapor escaped her lips, dissolving almost immediately into the cold air—evidence of a body still functioning despite the mind's hesitation.
She looked.
From her perspective, the courtyard stretched outward, populated and noisy, yet the distance between her and the far path appeared to hollow out. In that narrowing field, a single figure moved with calm inevitability, passing between clusters of students who unconsciously adjusted their trajectories to accommodate him.
Snow drifted around his frame without clinging.
He was tall—unavoidably so. Lean, yet built with a density that suggested restraint rather than fragility. His shoulders filled the black leather jacket without strain, the material creasing minimally as he walked. His posture was straight, unyielding, neither inviting nor defensive. He moved like someone unaccustomed to negotiating space.
Lilith.
His face, when she could see it clearly, was sculpted with sharp economy. There was no softness there, no concession to warmth. His eyes were cold—not in hostility, but in absence. They did not search. They did not linger. His gaze passed over the world as though it had already failed some unspoken evaluation.
He did not look around.
He did not look at her.
Silence surrounded him—not literal, but perceptual. Sound seemed to thin in his proximity.
Mily remained frozen, her stare unbroken.
Her body, she realized distantly, had reacted long before permission had been granted.
My body moved before my mind could catch up.
Her lips trembled, barely perceptible, the motion confined to the smallest muscles.
Is that… Lilith?
The question did not feel speculative. It felt rhetorical—posed only to confirm a truth she had already accepted. Her gaze locked onto him completely, the edges of the world blurring into irrelevance. Students became motion without identity. Buildings flattened into backdrop. Even the cold receded.
A faint ringing filled her ears.
She leaned closer to Ava without fully turning her head, her voice reduced to a near-absence.
"Ava… who's that guy?"
Ava followed her line of sight with casual compliance, eyes narrowing slightly as she assessed the stranger without urgency.
"Huh? That guy?"
She squinted, curiosity shallow and uninvested.
"I don't know. Perhaps a fresher."
Her tone carried no significance. She shrugged, already prepared to forget him.
"New first-years students came this year."
Mily nodded faintly.
"I see…"
Her eyes softened—not with relief, but with uncertainty. The knowledge did not settle comfortably. She watched Lilith continue forward, his figure receding with steady inevitability, each step carrying him farther into the crowd, yet somehow closer to her thoughts.
So… he's here?
The question did not ask why. It asked what now.
From a distance, Mia turned back, lifting her arm.
"Hey, you two coming or should we leave?"
Ava cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted back, voice bright, unburdened.
"We're coming! Wait!"
The echo lingered longer than necessary.
Then Ava's hand closed firmly around Mily's wrist. The grip was decisive, familiar, unthinking.
She pulled.
Mily's body obeyed, her steps stumbling briefly before synchronizing with Ava's hurried pace. Yet her head remained turned, neck straining slightly, eyes anchored to a single point.
Even as she was dragged forward, her gaze did not waver.
Even as my body moves forward… my heart stays behind, intending to meet Lilith one day.
In the distance, Lilith disappeared into the crowd, absorbed completely, as though he had never been there at all.
Snow ceased to fall.
The moment faded—not resolved, merely deferred.
***
The biology classroom was soaked in dim amber light, the sun sinking low enough to stain the windows with orange and copper hues. Shadows stretched lazily across desks, lengthening as though time itself had grown fatigued. Students occupied the room in scattered silence, their presence functional rather than engaged.
At the front, the teacher wrote across the chalkboard with mechanical dedication. Chalk scraped against slate, producing a thin, grating sound that insisted on continuity.
Mily sat at the very back.
Her cheek rested against her palm, elbow anchored to the desk, posture deliberately careless. It was an affect she had perfected—boredom as camouflage. Her gaze drifted, unfocused, skimming the board without absorbing its contents.
Behind her, snow clung briefly to the window before melting into thin, wavering trails. The glass hissed softly as the cold surrendered.
Her eyes were distant.
Ever since I saw that guy… I can't get him out of my head. The thought arrived uninvited, persistent. She did not resist it.
I don't know why.
Her brows drew together faintly, the smallest indication of internal friction. The diagrams on the board dissolved into abstract shapes, lines losing their instructional authority.
It's been a while since I thought about Lilith…
The name carried weight, resurfacing from a depth she had believed sealed. A faint silhouette overlaid her vision—Lilith walking alone, isolated even in imagined spaces.
I wonder how he is right now. The image persisted. What is he doing? Her eyes lowered slightly.
Is he doing well? Her lips tightened, compressing the question into silence.
I don't know…
14 year old Lilith knelt before a grave marked by fresh soil and pale flowers. His body had folded inward, shoulders collapsing under a grief too heavy to articulate. Tears fell freely, striking the ground in uneven intervals, each drop distinct.
A younger Mily reached toward him, her hand trembling—not from cold, but uncertainty.
He swatted it away violently. The sound cracked through the stillness.
She froze.
The day his mother died from a heart attack…
Lilith collapsed forward, grief finally overwhelming restraint.
I saw him break.
Tears streamed down Mily's face as well.
I cried too.
He turned away from her, refusing proximity, refusing comfort.
But he didn't let me comfort him.
Morning light. A car idled quietly.
Lilith sat inside with his father, staring forward. Mily stood outside, clutching her bag too tightly, knuckles pale.
He did not look at her.
He did not speak.
The car pulled away.
And the next day… he moved to America.
The vehicle shrank into the distance, carrying something she had not yet learned to name.
He didn't even look at me.
She stood alone in the empty street, fists clenched, tears falling unchecked.
From that day… I hated myself.
Her head lowered, shame settling like sediment.
I made the biggest mistake…
The memory whitened.
Ignoring Lilith… for a silly reason…
The classroom snapped back into focus.
The teacher clapped sharply.
"Class dismissed!"
Mily exhaled, a long breath she had not realized she was holding. She gathered her books with deliberate slowness, the rustle of paper grounding her in the present. The bag slid onto her shoulder with familiar weight.
She left the classroom alone as dusk deepened outside.
I thought I had buried the past…
But seeing him again shattered everything.
The sentence did not end as a question. It ended as a verdict.
ate Night. Fluorescent Light. Inevitability.
The college building at night no longer resembled a place of learning. Its corridors, stripped of daytime purpose, became purely functional arteries—long, narrow, and unwelcoming. Fluorescent lights hummed overhead with mechanical persistence, casting a pale, antiseptic glow that flattened color and erased warmth. The sound of electricity itself seemed amplified in the absence of human noise, a low, incessant reminder that the building remained awake even as its occupants retreated.
Mily descended the staircase slowly.
Each step landed with deliberate caution, her shoes producing soft, hollow echoes that ricocheted up the stairwell before dissolving into silence. She held her books tight against her chest, arms folded protectively, as though the paper and bindings might anchor her body against some undefined force pulling from within.
When she exited the stairwell, the corridor stretched out before her—long, linear, and nearly empty. The air was cold enough that her breath faintly fogged, visible only for an instant before dispersing. The passageway felt suspended outside of ordinary time, existing solely for transit, never for hesitation.
She walked.
Then, without conscious intent, she glanced sideways.
The movement was abrupt, instinctive—an unconscious deviation from forward motion. Fabric whispered softly as she turned, the sound too slight to justify its urgency.
Her field of vision narrowed.
From the opposite end of the corridor, a tall figure approached.
At once, the distance between them seemed less like space and more like an interval waiting to collapse.
As he drew closer, the details sharpened with disconcerting clarity. Lilith walked toward the boys' changing room, his pace unhurried, unguarded. His hair was still wet, darkened by moisture, strands clinging to his forehead and neck. Droplets slid along the line of his throat and disappeared beneath the collar of his shirt. In one hand, he carried swimming shorts loosely, as though they required no attention.
There was nothing remarkable about his clothing. Nothing that invited scrutiny.
And yet his presence asserted itself with quiet authority. The corridor seemed to adjust around him, accommodating his passage without resistance. Water fell from his hair onto the tiled floor in steady intervals, each drop audible in the silence, marking time with indifferent precision.
Mily stopped.
The interruption was total. Her body locked mid-step, pupils constricting sharply as though bracing for impact. The sound of her own heartbeat thudded through her awareness, heavy and intrusive.
It's the same guy from the afternoon…
The thought arrived unfiltered, stripped of doubt.
Her gaze followed him, unable—unwilling—to disengage.
What is he doing in college at this time?
Lilith passed her without turning his head.
The proximity was brief but absolute. For a fraction of a second, the distance between them narrowed to less than an arm's length—close enough for shared air, close enough for memory to threaten recognition—before widening again as he continued forward. He did not slow. He did not look at her. His composure remained intact, his attention fixed ahead.
Mily stopped completely.
The corridor extended before her, silent and empty now that he had passed, as though his presence had temporarily animated it. She tightened her grip on her books until the pressure blanched her knuckles, the physical sensation grounding her where thought could not.
Her hands trembled.
I should… talk to him.
The impulse emerged with unwelcome clarity, immediate and dangerous.
She hesitated.
Her feet refused to obey, rooted in place by a resistance deeper than fear—an awareness, perhaps, of consequence.
If I take one more step… there will be no turning back.
She inhaled sharply, the breath scraping against her throat.
Then she moved.
Each step toward the boys' changing room felt deliberate, irrevocable. The sound of her footsteps echoed too loudly in her ears, each one announcing intent. Ahead, Lilith reached the door, fingers closing around the handle with habitual ease.
The door opened.
He stepped inside.
It shut behind him with a dull finality, the sound reverberating down the corridor like punctuation.
Mily stopped again.
Her shoulders quivered, the tension finally manifesting physically. Her hands shook more visibly now, the tremor no longer containable.
My heart is pounding…
Her breathing faltered, uneven, shallow.
My body is shaking…
She pressed a hand against her chest, palm flattening over the erratic rhythm beneath her ribs. The pounding felt intrusive, almost accusatory.
No matter how much I deny it…
Her head dipped slightly, gaze fixed on the floor.
…my heart keeps saying…
Her teeth clenched, jaw tightening until it ached.
This person is Lilith…
Her breath stuttered, the admission stealing oxygen from her lungs.
And I don't know why…
Her feet moved again, disobedient, compelled.
…but I want him to be Lilith.
Tears gathered at the corners of her eyes, blurring the corridor's harsh geometry.
I need him to be Lilith…
She stopped in front of the changing room door. The metal surface reflected her faintly—an unstable image, distorted by fluorescent light and trembling breath. She raised her hand toward the handle, fingers hovering just short of contact.
Please…
Bright Fluorescent Light. Suspended Time.
The door opened slowly, protesting the intrusion with a long, drawn-out creak that seemed disproportionately loud in the quiet interior.
Inside, the boys' changing room was nearly empty. Lockers lined the walls in orderly rows, their metal surfaces gleaming under harsh fluorescent light. The air smelled faintly of chlorine and detergent, sterile and impersonal.
Lilith stood before his locker.
His shirt was still damp, clinging faintly at the shoulders. A towel was draped over his hands as he dried his hair with absent concentration. The motion was habitual, unguarded.
Water dripped from the towel onto the tiled floor.
He paused.
The movement halted mid-motion, towel suspended as though caught by an unseen force.
Slowly, he turned.
From his perspective, Mily stood framed in the doorway, motionless, trembling, her presence discordant in a space not meant to contain her.
His eyes widened.
The reaction was instantaneous, unmediated by composure. Disbelief registered first—pure, unfiltered—followed by a total cessation of movement. His body froze, muscles locking as though time itself had been interrupted.
His chest rose sharply.
The pounding beneath it was violent, unmistakable, each beat resounding with alarming insistence.
Mily's tears broke free without restraint. They streamed down her face, unbidden, dropping onto the floor in soft, irregular intervals. The fear and tension that had rigidified her moments earlier dissolved completely, replaced by something exposed and undefended.
Her expression softened—not into relief, but into vulnerability so unguarded it bordered on devastation.
Is this… really Lilith…?
Lilith's hands trembled.
The towel slipped slightly from his grip, forgotten. His composure fractured along fine, invisible lines, his lips parting as though words had arrived before permission.
"…Mily."
The name emerged quietly, altered by shock, stripped of distance.
They stood facing each other in the silent changing room.
The world outside—the corridor, the campus, the years—ceased to exist. Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, indifferent witnesses to a convergence long deferred. Nine years of absence, resentment, and misinterpretation collapsed inward, compressed into a single, unbearable moment.
At last… the past has caught up to us.
And in that stillness, it became clear—not as comfort, but as reckoning—that some distances are not erased by time, only preserved for a more devastating reunion.