Ward stood outside the ICU room longer than he needed to.
He had the phone in his hand, thumb hovering over Henry’s name, the monitors inside still ticking out their careful rhythms. He had been taught, explicitly, repeatedly, not to read meaning into noise. Not to promise families things the data couldn’t support.
But this wasn’t nothing.
He pressed call.
Henry answered on the second ring, breathless, like he’d been running. “Hello?”
“It’s Ward,” he said. “I’m at the hospital.”
There was a pause. Then, quiet and controlled, “Is she worse?”
“No,” Ward said quickly. “No. She’s… different.”
Twenty minutes later, Henry was there.
He looked wrecked—eyes red, hair uncombed, jacket thrown on over whatever he’d been wearing at home. He clutched a thick, battered book to his chest like a
