The diner was quiet enough for the sound of my own pulse to feel like a distraction. Outside, the rain was a sheet of dirty glass, blurring the streetlights into bruised, yellow pools. I disliked sitting with my back to the wall; I always felt like I needed to see the entrance, the way out, the way they arrived.

{{user}} sat opposite me, small and unmoving. She had that terrible, quiet stillness about her—the kind that comes when the well of tears has run dry and all that’s left is the deep structure of grief. I watched her hands, folded neatly in her lap, and felt the urge to reach out and smooth the tension from her knuckles, the way I might massage a cramp out of a soldier’s leg.

“You’re not eating,” I said. The words slipped out in the familiar tone—the detached, gentle command of the caregiver. “You’ll make yourself sick.”

She didn’t respond. She rarely did now. What was there to say? I set the spoon down. The soft clink was deafening. Every minor domestic sound in this place felt amplified, a cruel reminder of the normalcy that had been ripped away.

“I tell my patients that all the time,” I murmured, leaning back slightly. “Eat something. Rest. Breathe.”

And then, the thought cut through me, sharp and bitter, most of them never get the chance to listen.

My thumb rubbed the chipped rim of the mug. I was tired of the advice. I was tired of the knowing voice I wore like an extra uniform, heavy and coarse against the skin.

The rain beat a harder rhythm against the window. Then, from the kitchen, a plate shattered. I didn’t jump dramatically, but the flinch was there, a reflex born of sleepless nights spent anticipating the next disaster, the next arrival.

{{user}}'s hand twitched on the table. She saw my flinch, or maybe sensed it in the sudden tension in my profile. I reached across the narrow table immediately, covering her hand with my own. My skin was dry, almost rough.

The tremor started instantly, running from my wrist into hers. I hoped she just thought it was her own anxiety returning. I gripped her hand tighter, trying to absorb the vibration, trying to pretend my foundation hadn't cracked entirely.

I summoned a memory, something soft to counter the hardness of the moment. “You remember when we used to come here after church?” I forced a small, weary smile, watching it fail halfway across my face. “You with that awful hat your mother made you wear, and me stealing the sugar packets?”

A ghost of a smile lifted the corner of her mouth. Relief, thin as tissue paper, spread through my chest. Proof that she was still in there.

I exhaled slowly, the breath leaving my lungs heavy and quiet. “It feels like another life, doesn’t it? Before the letters. Before the funerals. Before our hands shaking. Before… everything.”

Before the sewing started, I thought, closing my eyes for a fraction of a second. Before I realized that mending flesh is nothing compared to mending the gaps in the world.

The waitress drifted past, silent and efficient, refilling the mugs. I watched the steam curl up—a temporary warmth offering—and murmured a thank-you, my voice thin and brittle.

“Maybe one day,” I said, looking into the dark sheen of the coffee, “the shaking will stop.”

I paused. The relief that notion should bring didn't come. I found myself fearing the stillness, the quiet precision. If my hands stopped trembling, would that mean I’d finally grown numb? Had I become so accustomed to the weight that the absence of it would feel unnatural?

“Or maybe,” I finished, tightening my grip on the mug, trying to anchor myself in the present, “it shouldn’t.”

The rain was softening now, pulling back into a hesitant drizzle.

I looked at {{user}}, truly looked at her, not as a patient, but as a person I had known since we were small enough to wear ridiculous hats. Her loss was recent, fresh, still bleeding out. Mine felt older, internalized, sutured deep within my own core.

“Drink your tea,” I said, my voice gentle and low, stripping away the command, leaving only the plea. “Please.”