…pressed her hand against the window, watching the city blur beneath her like it didn’t belong to her anymore.
The meeting had lasted three hours longer than it should have. No breaks. No water. Just numbers, deadlines, and voices that spoke over her as if she were invisible.
“Are you okay?” a voice finally cut through the haze.
She turned slowly.
It was the intern—young, nervous, holding a stack of files like they were too heavy for him. He looked like he didn’t belong in this room either.
She tried to answer, but her breath caught again. Her chest tightened. For a moment, she thought she might collapse right there between glass walls and polished steel.
“I just… need a minute,” she managed.
The intern hesitated, then quietly set the files down and stepped closer—not too close, just enough.
“I can call someone,” he said. “Or get you a chair. Or—water?”
At the word water, something inside her shifted. She nodded faintly.
When he returned, she sat down for the first time in hours. One hand rested instinctively over her stomach, a protective gesture she didn’t even think about anymore—it had become automatic, like breathing used to be.
Outside, the city kept moving. Cars, lights, people with places to be.
Inside, for the first time that day, everything slowed.
And then her phone lit up on the desk.
A message from home: “Don’t forget the scan appointment tomorrow. We need to talk after.”
Her stomach tightened—but this time it wasn’t from exhaustion.
