THE ROOM BETWEEN BREATHS

I never knew this was how a story begins…

The ceiling is the first thing I see. Big white tiles, a hairline crack running like a river between two of them. There’s that hospital hum—lights, vents, some unseen machine somewhere keeping time better than I am. My heart is already racing before I even remember why.

A family member.

That’s the first thought that lands. Not a name, not a face—just that raw pull in my chest like a cord leading under a closed door. Someone I love is in trouble. I know that much. The rest is fog.

I sit down in one of the plastic chairs arranged in the open aisle—thin cushion, stiff back, pretending to offer comfort. Off to the side, a low coffee table holds a messy fan of old magazines, the kind people flip through without really seeing. My hands rest on my thighs, palms flat on my jeans, the way they always do when I’m trying to keep myself steady.

I tried to breathe the way they taught us in rehab—four in, hold for four, six out—but my lungs don’t quite cooperate. Still, the rhythm keeps my mind steady enough to keep from slipping.

A clock hangs on the wall opposite me, big and round with a red second hand. 2:17. I can’t tell if it’s morning or afternoon. I can’t even trace how I ended up in this room.

Faint memories drift back—the smell of antiseptic, someone saying my name, the echo of a hallway that feels half-remembered. A wave of dizziness rises from the floor up through my chest. That strange sensation you get right before you pass out, like the world steps back from you all at once.

I blink hard. Whoever’s behind those double doors needs me firm, not soft. I tell myself that’s what this is—a family emergency. Someone I love is in trouble. The knot in my chest tightens again, and I reach for a name that refuses to come.

“Rough day?”

Startled, I turn. I don’t remember anyone walking in. God, I can’t even remember if he was here before I sat down. Yet there he is: pressed jeans, a soft shirt, sleeves pushed up to his forearms, hands folded calmly on his lap, looking entirely at ease. I shake my head a little, trying to catch up with myself. “I’m sorry,” I say quietly. “I didn’t realize you were there.”

“That’s all right,” he says. “You’ve got a lot on your mind.”

There’s something about his face. Nothing obvious, but a familiarity I can’t place. The way his expression softens, the slight tilt of his eyebrows, something quiet in his eyes. It’s the feeling you get when you meet someone who reminds you of home without knowing why. Oh.

That’s it.

Family—

“You here for someone?” he asks.

“Family,” I say.

“Close?” he asks.

“Very,” I say, my throat tightening around the word.

He studies me for a moment, his eyes dropping to my hands. I didn’t even realize I’d started rubbing my palms against my jeans again, like I’m trying to erase something I can’t name.

“You care a lot,” he says. “You always have.”

I exhale through my nose. I guess I do.

That’s… odd.

Maybe I look like the kind of man whose heart stays too far outside his chest.

“Do you know how they’re doing?” he asks, slower now. “The doctors haven’t come out to talk to you yet?”

“No. Nothing yet.” I glance at the clock—still 2:17. “Feels like I’ve been here for hours.”

“It can feel that way,” the stranger says. “Waiting stretches time.”

“It’s strange,” I murmur, eyes still on that unmoving red second hand. Everything feels too fast… and not at all… at the same time. I see pieces, but they don’t line up.

“Pieces of what?” he asks.

I blink, startled. “Was I… saying that out loud?”

I clear my throat, embarrassed. “Sorry. I sometimes whisper to myself when I’m thinking.”

He gives a slight nod, nothing more.

Pieces.

The word hangs there inside me.…

COME ON!

You know the pieces. You know what happened. You remember—the arms under your arms, the struggle through the doors, the nurse calling your name. You remember. It’s more than fragments.

My stomach tightens.

I grip my knees.

This one… I can’t erase.

My memory’s still spotty. I don’t understand. Nothing’s clear.

A sudden whisper of air brushes my arm, and I look up just as a nurse sweeps by, not glancing at either of us. The silence that follows lingers in her wake, as a faint echo of some remembered past.

The stranger watches her go.

I release a breath I didn’t know I was holding and glance back at the clock.

For the briefest moment, the red second hand jerks—

the clock jumps to 2:18—

And the hand begins to spin.

Fast.

Too fast.

A blur.

Like time was racing to catch up to something it lost.

“You love them very much,” he says.

“Of course I do,” I snap, sharper than I intended. The anger is a reflex, an old defense. “It’s my family.”

“There’s more than one way to be family,” he says, unbothered. “But yes. I know.”

I turn fully to him now. “Do we know each other?”

He smiles like I’ve told a private joke. “We do,” he says. “In a way.”

“That’s helpful,” I grumble, but the edge is gone. There’s something about his presence that keeps pulling the jagged bits out of me and smoothing them down.

The stranger looks up at the ceiling for a moment, as if searching for the right words somewhere among the tiles.

“Sometimes,” he says, “you stand on one side of a door and everything you love is on the other. And you think that wall is the whole world. All you can feel is the weight of it.”

The stranger glances at the closed double doors across from us as he says it. They’re the kind that swing both ways, with little rectangular windows near the top. I can’t see anything through them. Just light. Maybe movement. Maybe my imagination.

“That’s where you are now,” he continues. “At the door. That’s all.”

“You talk like you’ve been here before,” I say.

He looks straight ahead. “More than I cared to.”

I shift in my seat. “So… who are you waiting for?”

The stranger smiles. “You.”

I never knew this was how a story begins.