He’s older than me, maybe by ten years, maybe less. He has broad shoulders I can’t help but pay attention to, and his eyes are hauntingly perfect. “Are-are you hungry?” he asks me again.
“I’ve ordered,” the woman on the bed beside me pipes up and says.
“Y-yes, I-I have y-yours here.” He pulls out a tray and takes it over to her side table and wheels it up to her. I watch their exchange, she smiles and her cheeks turn a slight pink.
“Thank you,” she replies.
Fluently he replies, “You’re welcome.” As if he doesn’t have a stutter. “For you?” He smiles at me, and his warmth travels the entire length of my body. My arms erupt into goosebumps, and the hair on the back of my neck rises in anticipation of his next words.
“No, nothing for me, thank you,” I respond, but I want to keep him here and pamper myself with the sound of his smooth drawl.
“Y-you have to e-eat.” He stands tall and looks at me.
I look over to the woman sitting on the bed beside me and actually notice her. She’s possibly slightly older than me, with wiry dark hair and blackened circles beneath her eyes. I look back at him then back to the woman. “I’m not allowed,” I whisper, hoping the words are loud enough for him to hear, but not her.
He stands still for a few seconds. Maybe he’s trying to decipher the words I said and in what context I meant them. He takes the few steps over to the separating curtain and draws it closed between the beds. The way he’s quietly done it is not scary or intimidating to me. It’s like he’s protecting me, not allowing another to see the broken part of me.
“A-are you h-hungry?” he asks as he sits in the chair beside the bed. I don’t say anything to him, I just wrap my arms around my chest and find a sudden chill touching me. It’s not cold in the room, but he’s unnerved me in a way I’ve never experienced before.
“I think so,” I answer honestly, as I continue to look into his almost black gaze.
He looks at me, and his stare travels to my left hand where he sees my thin wedding ring on my finger. “The d-doctors n-need you to eat before they dis-discharge you,” he whispers as he sits forward and rest his elbows on his thighs and looks down at the floor.
I look behind me, but the curtain is masking my view of the lady in the bed beside me. “I’m not allowed,” I softly sigh, almost like it’s a guarded secret only a few highly trained operatives have the privilege of knowing.
He looks up at me, and in that one intense second, in that simple and plain exchange, I see it. His eyes hold pity for me. They’re so consumed with tenderness and warmth, but I know he’s looking at me with disgust and trying to mask it, so I feel something other than the useless, ugly girl I am.
“Please, don’t,” I mutter in the smallest of voices. “I’ve never been one who enjoys sympathy.” I look down to the blanket and move my hand to pick at a loose thread. He doesn’t say a word. He just keeps his eyes on me, watching me, seeing something no one has ever noticed before. My hurt. My pain. My imperfection.
I’ve lived a life of hiding. Hiding behind the exterior others see, hiding inside myself, just being one in a universe filled with many. But the way he regards me, tells me he’s seeing something I never want the world to know.
“Please,” I whisper again, trying with all my might to raise each and every one of my walls.
The seconds draw out, time has stopped. I fidget because his stare is uncomfortable. He sees through me, as if I’m made of a thin, exquisite piece of paper originating in the fourteenth century. His focus penetrates directly through to my soul. “Please.” A teardrop escapes and it reminds me just how stupid I am. Why would he be concerned for me? Why would he even bother? He sees a dumb, ugly girl who’s nothing but damaged and alone.
“M-my name is M-M-Max, p-pl-pleased to meet you.” He waits for me to tell him my name.
“Lily,” I answer him, though I know the moment he leaves, he’ll have forgotten me as quickly as he would seeing the first fall leaf drift from the tree, baring its soul as it awaits winter.
Max doesn’t extend his hand to me. He doesn’t do anything else except stand and walk over to his food trolley. Why would he? I’m less than nothing. He takes a tray out, brings it over to me and places it on my bare table.
I look up to him and tilt my head to the side. “I’m not allowed to eat,” I say in a quiet voice. He gives me the most sincere and gentlest smile before turning to walk away. “Max.” He stills the moment his name flickers past my lips.