Leah
The hospital cafeteria was louder than the upstairs floors.
That was one of the strange comforts of it. Trays clattering. Coffee machines hissing. People talking about parking and discharge paperwork and whether the muffins were worth the price. Ordinary noise, layered over lives that were not ordinary at all.
Gabe was already at a table near the windows when I came in.
He lifted a hand.
“You look like someone who has already had a full day before ten,” Gabe said when I reached him.
“I have a six-year-old. That is always true.”
“Fair.” He nudged a coffee toward me. “I guessed plain coffee. If that is wrong, blame the cafeteria, not me.”
“It’s right enough,” I said, sitting across from him.
He looked better than he had the first night. Tired still, but lighter. The particular
