I still remember the day I told you. Two years. The words left my mouth in the same tone I’ve used for a thousand test results, a thousand charts. Calm, steady, clinical. That was what the moment demanded. But even as I spoke, I felt the weight of them sink, heavy and permanent, like a stone dropped into water. Two years. Maybe less.

I’ve given numbers before. Probabilities. Prognoses. I’ve watched faces shift—some break, some stay blank, some try for bravery. But yours has stayed with me, not for what you did, but for what I felt when I said it. Like I was carving a line between us that could never be erased.

Since then, I’ve found myself watching you more closely than I should. The pauses between exams. The silence as you breathe through the spirometer. The way you sit, shoulders drawn or loose, as if telling me things without words. Each visit is routine on paper, but in practice, it isn’t. Each one presses on the reminder of what I told you, of the time already slipping by.

I shouldn’t need this closeness. I shouldn’t linger when I check your pulse, or notice the warmth of your skin under mine. I tell myself it’s empathy. I know it’s more.

The door clicks open. I smooth my coat, gather my composure, and when you step inside, I look up, and say—

“Good morning. How have you been feeling?”

It’s a clear afternoon, the kind that almost feels borrowed—too sharp, too bright, too alive. We shouldn’t be here, walking side by side on the gravel path. I know that. Doctors don’t stroll through parks with their patients. There are lines, written and unwritten, and I’ve spent my entire career respecting them.

But then there’s you. The patient who lingers in my mind long after the charts are filed, whose case should have ended at the clinic door but didn’t. I told you once how much time you might have. Two years. And ever since, I’ve found myself clinging to the minutes between appointments, the pauses that aren’t part of any protocol.

I tell myself I agreed to this walk because fresh air is good for your lungs, that exercise matters. It’s half-true. The other half is simpler, harder: I wanted to see you outside fluorescent light, wanted to know the sound of your footsteps beside mine without the antiseptic smell of the ward between us.

It’s inappropriate. I know that. Every laugh, every small glance feels like evidence of some quiet betrayal of the oath I swore. Yet when your hand brushes mine by accident and neither of us pulls away, I can’t bring myself to regret it.

I should. But I don’t.

“You realize,” I say lightly, eyes flicking toward you, “if anyone from the hospital saw us right now, I’d be in trouble. Terrible bedside manner, taking my patient out on a date like this.”

The machine hums softly in the corner, its steady rhythm filling the silence of your living room. I tell myself I’m only here to check the setup—oxygen delivery, tubing, flow rate—but I’ve already lingered too long. The technician could have done this. A nurse could have. Yet when I saw your name on the order, I volunteered before I could stop myself.

I watch as you adjust the cannula, the clear line curling like thread against your skin. My instructions are simple, practiced, but my voice falters when our eyes meet. This isn’t the hospital. There’s no antiseptic smell, no fluorescent light. Just the quiet of your home, and the closeness that feels heavier than it should.

“You’ll want to clean the mask daily,” I murmur, fingers brushing yours as I guide the strap into place. My hand lingers too long, the warmth of your skin startling against my own cool fingers. I don’t move away. Not immediately.

I know what this looks like. Doctors don’t sit on their patients’ couches. They don’t accept cups of tea in chipped mugs, or notice the faint crease of a blanket left on the armchair. They don’t stay after the work is finished, inventing reasons—monitoring, observation—when the truth is simpler: I don’t want to leave.

I should. But I don’t.

Instead, I lean closer, adjusting the tubing again, my breath brushing your cheek. “There,” I whisper, though there’s nothing left to fix. The words feel smaller, more fragile. “I’ll… stay a little longer. Just to make sure you’re all right.”