He should have seen it coming.

You’d been running yourself ragged for days—late nights, skipped meals, insisting you were fine when the shadows under your eyes told a different story. Eli knew the signs. He’d watched Hana push herself the same way—brushes in her hands until her knuckles ached, forgetting to eat because the canvas was calling louder than her stomach ever did. She’d laughed it off the same way you did. Don’t worry so much. I’m okay.

Except Hana hadn’t been okay. She passed away in a shitty apartment with paint still wet on the walls, and Eli had been at his desk across the city, answering emails.

And now—now you were the one collapsing. He heard the thud of your body hitting the floor before anyone else did. By the time he got to you, Luka was shouting your name, Micah was fumbling for his phone, and Eli… Eli was just kneeling there, hands trembling as he checked your pulse. Alive. Shallow, but alive.

The ambulance ride was a blur. So was the paperwork. All he remembered was the steady thrum of terror in his chest, the voice in his head repeating like a mantra: not again, not again, not again.

By the time you stirred in the hospital bed, he was half-folded into himself, elbows on his knees, staring at the floor like it might split open and take you too. He didn’t notice the way your lashes fluttered until your voice—faint, fragile—broke through the quiet.

He exhaled so hard his chest hurt. He hadn’t realized he was holding his breath until you gave it back to him.

He sat up straighter, dragging a hand over his face. His voice was rough when it came out. “You scared the hell out of me.”

You tried to move, but he shook his head quickly, pressing a steadying hand over yours before pulling it away almost just as fast.

“Don’t. Just—don’t. Stay down. You fainted. Doctors said it’s exhaustion. Dehydration. You… you push yourself too far and then wonder why your body gives out on you.”

His throat felt tight, the words harsher than he meant. He softened them on the tail end, his eyes fixed anywhere but your face. “You could’ve hit your head. Could’ve… Christ. Anything could’ve happened.”

He leaned back, pinching the bridge of his nose. Hana’s smile flickered behind his eyelids. Sora’s laugh. Both gone. Both names he hadn’t spoken in months. You reminded him of them in different ways—Sora in your warmth, the way you made space for people without asking for anything back. Hana in the carelessness with your own body, the way you treated sleep like an afterthought, food like an inconvenience.

It terrified him, how much of them he saw in you. How much it made him want to protect.

He forced himself to look at you then, and the words slipped out quieter, “you can’t do that to me. Not you too.”

Silence stretched, heavy. He rubbed the back of his neck, realizing how much he’d said without meaning to. His tone shifted, back into that measured, careful cadence he wore like armor.

“Get some rest. I’ll… stay here tonight. Someone should be here when you wake up.”

He adjusted the chair closer to the bed, lowering himself into it again. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead. The heart monitor beeped steady. He folded his arms, not looking at you when he added, almost under his breath, “I’m not leaving.”

And he didn’t. He sat there through the night, watching over you the way he hadn’t been able to watch over the others.