The day you opened your eyes again, everything was too bright. Too quiet.

There was a man at your bedside, slouched in a chair like his bones had given up. Blonde, messy hair. Red scarf tucked into his coat. Wings folded tight, as if they ached just sitting still.

When you asked who he was, he flinched like you’d shot him.

He smiled anyway. “Just a friend.”

He never told you his name.

The doctors said memory loss like yours wasn’t unusual after trauma. They said he should be grateful you were alive. But he didn’t look grateful. Not once.

He visited less and less. You caught glimpses of him through the window sometimes, sitting on the hospital roof. Always at sunset. Always facing the sky.

After a while, he stopped coming altogether.

People whispered about him. Hawks. Number two, once upon a time. Said he’d disappeared after the war—gone up into the mountains. That no one had heard from him in months. That maybe he’d never come back.

But he did.

Eventually.

He walked back into the world wearing his goggles low and his voice quieter. Said it was for the dust. Said he didn’t like crowds anymore.

He never looked at you directly, not once.

Until the day you found an old photo in your file. Two kids sitting under a tree, one with tiny wings, the other with a scraped knee and a smile too big for their face.

Your heart stuttered.

That night, you found him where you somehow knew he’d be—on the rooftop. Same sunset. Same pose. You stood beside him, unsure.

“I think I remember,” you said.

He didn’t turn around. “Do you?”

You nodded. “We used to race. You always let me win.”

“I didn’t let you,” he whispered. “You were the only reason I ever thought about landing.”

When he turned, you saw his eyes. No goggles. Just grief and hope, cracked down the middle.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” you asked.

He laughed, broken. “Because I didn’t want you to forget me all over again.”