The hospital’s fluorescent lights hummed faintly as Alliah sat by the window, a blanket wrapped loosely around her shoulders. Morning had not yet fully broken, but the sky carried a pale pink glow, as if the world was gently easing itself into another day. She watched the horizon with quiet eyes, feeling the calm pulse of dawn despite the heaviness in her body.
Her treatments had stretched into weeks, then months, each phase of her journey marked with new discoveries, new procedures, and new adjustments. She had learned the rhythm of nurses moving in and out, the steady beeps of machines, the sensation of blood tests and IV lines. And though each day was different, a common thread ran through them: Jamiro was always there.
He arrived with coffee in hand, the scent preceding him like a pr
