Knowing
It was almost ten when I reached the hospital. I had run from the parking lot, still wearing the clothes I had worn to work that morning, my laptop bag knocking against my hip with every hurried step. The office had kept me later than expected—one meeting becoming another, one urgent task breeding three more—and by the time I looked at the clock, guilt had already settled heavily in my chest. I had promised her. I’ll take over tonight. Go home. Get some sleep. My sister had been at the hospital for two days. Two nights beneath fluorescent lights. Two days of vending-machine coffee, half-eaten meals, and waking at the slightest movement of the ICU doors. So I expected her to be angry when I arrived. Instead, I found her sitting alone at the far end of the waiting room. She was facing the window. Beyond the glass, the city was scattered with lights, tiny and distant, as if there were another world out there where people were still ordering dinner, laughing at t...
