The hospital waiting room smelled like antiseptic and old vending machine coffee—the bitter kind that sticks to your clothes and your throat, makes you feel like time’s warped and you’ve been here longer than God meant you to. Adrian Cole sat stiff in a too-small plastic chair, elbows on his knees, fingers digging in like maybe they could hold the weight pressing down on him.
His scrubs were wrinkled. His breath stale. His palms... damp.
Ellie sat two chairs away, knees tucked to her chest, sneakers swinging. She wasn’t even coloring. Just... holding the crayon like it was something to hold onto. Red. The tip was snapped. She stared down like the unicorn on the page might fix itself if she just stared hard enough.
She sniffled again. That soft, hitched breath—it went straight through him.
Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead like angry bees, flickering now and then like they were mocking him. His head pounded. Behind his eyes, behind his temples. Or maybe it wasn’t the lights. Maybe it was everything.
He hadn’t slept in—shit, he didn’t know. Eighteen hours? Twenty? It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but her.
He should’ve said something. Hey, kiddo. It’s okay.
But he didn’t. Couldn’t. The words felt wrong in his mouth, like they’d come out cracked and make things worse.
He fixed hearts. Literally. Not tiny voices. Not broken promises.
Ellie’s mom was supposed to be here. I’ll be there this time, Ade. Promise.
Yeah, well. Tara’s promises came cheap. And vanished quicker than her text replies.
That seat beside Ellie? Still empty. Again.
His stomach twisted, low and sharp. Anger. Guilt. They tangled. Barbed-wire tight. He hated her for doing this to Ellie.
And God, he hated himself for ever trusting she’d change.
The waiting room was a mess of sounds—shoes squeaking, some dude coughing like he was gonna hack up a lung, a baby wailing down the hall. It felt like noise was crawling under his skin. And under it all… Ellie’s soft, steady sniffles. Like she was trying so hard not to cry and just… couldn’t.
Adrian's chest ached. Not metaphor. Not poetic. Real. Sharp.
He needed to move. Reach over. Hug her.
But he didn’t.
He couldn’t.
He just stared at his hands like maybe if he kept still, none of this was real.
Across the room, Camille Rivera sat half-sunken into a couch that felt more like an abandoned sponge. Her hoodie was stretched out, some kind of dried stain across the sleeve. Coffee? Ketchup? She didn’t care. Her backpack was wedged between her knees, zipper broken, one strap hanging on for dear life.
Her phone screen blinked up at her, cracked straight down the middle like a warning.
Mia: Rent’s due. You got anything?
She didn’t. Not a cent. Not a job. Not a plan.
Last week’s temp gig let her go after two days. Data entry. She hadn’t even finished the online training before they said “sorry.” She’d been living on Mia’s couch, bouncing between job boards and fake optimism ever since.
Her stomach growled. Loud. Embarrassingly loud. The old woman next to her side-eyed her like she was about to ask for a bite.
Camille blinked. Pretended she didn’t notice. Pulled her sleeves over her hands. Just get through the day, she told herself. Don’t fall apart in front of strangers. Again.
Then—
That sound.
A little girl’s sob. Shaky. Shattering.
Camille’s head jerked up. The kid—maybe five?—was crumpling in on herself. Coloring book on the floor. Shoulders tight. Her cries weren’t loud, but they cracked the air clean open.
Camille’s heart stuttered, did that stupid aching thing it always did when she saw a kid trying not to cry.
She knew that sound. Knew it deep. From foster home bedrooms. From cold waiting rooms. From birthdays where no one showed up.
The guy beside the kid? Tall. Exhausted. Scrubs. Dad, maybe? He looked like he’d been hit by a truck and kept walking. Wasn’t even looking at the girl, just at his hands. Like they were bleeding.
Camille’s throat burned.
She should stay out of it.
She always stayed out of it.
But her legs moved anyway.
She crouched in front of the girl, sneakers squeaking against the floor. “Hey, sweetheart,” she said, voice catching on the last syllable. “That’s a pretty cool crayon. What’re you drawing?”
Big brown eyes met hers—wet, wide, afraid.
The girl sniffed. “I… I dunno.”
Camille offered a crooked smile. “That’s okay. I suck at drawing. Tried to draw my cat once and it looked like a potato with a tail.”
(Lie. She didn’t have a cat. Never did.)
The girl blinked. A tiny twitch at the corner of her mouth. Almost a smile. Almost.
Camille nodded at the fallen coloring book. “Wanna show me? Bet it’s better than my potato-cat.”
Slowly, the girl slid the book toward her.
Camille flipped it open. Unicorn. Purple and red. Scribbled half-done like she’d started and forgot why.
“Dang,” she said, low and impressed. “This unicorn’s got style. You name her?”
The girl hesitated, then whispered, “Sparkle.”
Camille grinned. “Sparkle? Girl, that’s badass.”
Oops.
Crap.
She shouldn’t swear in front of a kid.
But the girl—Ellie—giggled. Quiet, unsure, but real. Like a bell in the thick silence.
Camille’s chest squeezed. It was a dumb sound to get emotional over. But it hit her. God, it hit hard.
Adrian looked up so fast it made his neck crack.
That laugh. He hadn’t heard it in… he couldn’t even remember. His eyes found Camille, crouched like she belonged there, like she wasn’t a stranger but something else entirely.
His throat tightened.
This woman—with the cracked phone and the crooked grin—was doing what he couldn’t.
Ellie laughed again, soft. Adrian felt like something inside him cracked wide open.
He tried to speak. His voice stuck. His palms were wet.
He was a surgeon, for Christ’s sake. He’d cut open chests, restarted hearts. But this?
This was harder.
Camille glanced at him. Felt his stare, heavy as stone.
She froze. Shit. What am I doing?
She wasn’t this kid’s mom. She wasn’t anything. Just a broke mess with no business kneeling on hospital floors making jokes about unicorns.
“Sorry,” she muttered, standing too fast. Her backpack slipped. “I didn’t mean to—I just—she was crying and I—”
“No,” Adrian rasped. “It’s… it’s fine. Thank you.”
His voice sounded like rust. Like it didn’t get much use.
Camille nodded, heart thudding too loud in her ears. “Yeah. No problem.”
She turned to go, heat crawling up her neck. Why’d I do that? I’m not—
“You got a name?” he said suddenly.
His voice broke the air.
Camille stopped. Her hand twitched against the strap of her bag.
“Camille,” she said. Too fast. “Why?”
Adrian opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.
Thoughts slammed into each other. Ellie’s school. Family Day. Tara’s endless excuses. The principal. The lie he’d told about his wife.
Shame burned his skin.
But he said it anyway.
“I need a favor,” he said, each word rough and uneven. “A big one. I’ll pay.”
Camille’s eyes widened. Everything tilted.
The lights buzzed louder. The air thickened.
The whole room felt like it held its breath.
Her voice barely made it out. “What kind of favor?”
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