The next morning was different.
Not for anything spectacular. Not because the hospital was different. It still reeked of antiseptic and tension. The monitors still beeped in jagged cadences. And yet, something in Meilin had changed.
Perhaps it was the way her shoulder still recalled the quiet heaviness of Yichen's presence on the rooftop. Perhaps it was the way she found herself smiling deep when she saw him come into the ER that morning, hair still damp from a quick shower, scrubbed wrinkled, but eyes softer than she'd ever seen.
"Still alive?" he raised an eyebrow.
"Barely," she said. "I'm living on hope and stale baozi."
"I'll get you something better after rounds."
She blinked. "You're asking me out?"
"No," said Yichen, and smiled. "I'm giving first aid."
They never discussed the rooftop moment. They didn't have to. The atmosphere between them was already altered not loud or in-your-face, but thick with unspoken things. It was the kind that didn't require words. It was just so.
Their first patient of the day was a six-year-old boy with a congenital heart defect, admitted overnight for pre-op evaluation. Meilin crouched beside him, adjusting the monitors with a practiced hand. The boy stared at her wide-eyed, his tiny fingers curled around a stuffed lion whose mane had long since deflated.
"Your lion looks tired," Meilin said gently.
"He's brave, not tired," the boy whispered.
"Well, that makes two of you," she said, tapping his nose.
Yichen stood a step behind her, observing the interaction. There was something in what she said, in the way she bent down to a child's level, that caused him to feel things he hadn't permitted himself to feel in a while.
Later, walking toward the CT room, he told her, "You'd make a great mother someday."
Meilin spun around, surprised. "What?"
He stared just as shocked at himself. "I just. meant the way you are around children. It's instinctive."
Meilin swallowed hard. "You think I'd be left with time for motherhood amidst all this chaos?"
"Despite," he said softly, "I think you'd find a way to make it happen."
For a second, her heart skipped a beat. Not because of the words themselves but because of how naturally he'd spoken them. As if he'd already imagined a future with her included.
Meanwhile, in the other part of the hospital, Yufei sat with her laptop in the diagnostics lounge, attempting to push her mind into focus on case files. But she couldn't help thinking about last night.
She and Gao Rui hadn't spoken much since that encounter in his office. No admissions, no professions. Merely quiet. Dense, but not awkward.
Now, as she pored over the test results of a recently admitted patient a middle-aged man with unstable vitals and no obvious diagnosis — Gao Rui entered the doorway holding two coffees.
"I was wrong," he said, setting the cup down beside her. "You likely drink green tea."
Yufei glared at the coffee, then at him. "You remembered I detest caffeine after 4 p.m."
"I'm paying attention," he said flatly. "And a little afraid of you."
"Good," she smiled. "I live off fear."
He rested his back on the wall. "You were correct last night."
"About what?"
"That I don't set things down. Even when I should."
Yufei shut her laptop. "It's not a flaw, Dr. Gao. It's why we all revere you."
"I'm not certain that's a compliment."
"It is," she said. "But it's also why you're alone."
He remained silent. Just gazed at the steaming cup he hadn't touched.
Then, softly, he inquired, "Would it be so bad if I weren't?"
The words suspended there.
And Yufei, once again, had no smart-mouth reply.
That night, Hualing Central's ER became mayhem once more. A tour bus on the highway had struck a truck, and patients were being wheeled in by the dozen.
Blood.
Shrieks.
Calls of "Doctor! Save him!"
They all acted on reflex. Yichen picked up gloves and ran to the triage area. Meilin was already deep into stitching a forehead cut on a hysterical teenage girl who refused to cease crying.
"Where is my brother? He was next to me—please!"
Meilin glanced at the nurse. "Any word about her sibling?"
"Not yet."
"I'll try as soon as I'm finished here."
The girl grabbed her wrist. "Promise?"
Meilin nodded. "Promise."
Yufei was supporting a man with a punctured lung when Gao Rui arrived to help. Their gazes touched only once, long enough to exchange unspoken orders. Years of trust, carried on the speed of silence.
An hour felt like an eternity.
When all the patients had been admitted, referred, or taken in for surgery, Meilin leaned against a wall, scrubs spattered, hands shaking. She hadn't known how much adrenaline had been keeping her on her feet until it all left at once.
Yichen found her there, kneeling beside her like it was the most natural thing in the world.
"Don't faint now," he said.
She laughed, breathlessly. "Not before dinner."
He was holding out a protein bar. "It's all I have."
"I'll take that. And your water."
He gave it over without complaint, studying her intensely.
"You saved seven lives tonight," he said.
"Eight," she corrected. "The boy from the bus — I found him."
"Then you're a hero," he said.
"No," Meilin said softly. "I'm just tired."
Yichen sat next to her, close enough to share body heat.
"If you ever want to not be exhausted alone," he told her, voice low, "I'm here."
She said nothing. But she leaned against him a little bit, the pressure of her body expressing what her words would not.
Later That Night – The Rooftop Again
Yufei stood at the railing, looking at the same skyline Meilin had looked at days before. It seemed no less chaotic, no more serene.
She hadn't heard Gao Rui come up behind her, but she wasn't surprised either.
"I figured you'd be asleep," she said.
He sat beside her, his voice low. "Couldn't. Too many faces."
"Same."
They stood in silence until he asked, "What are you really scared of, Yufei?"
She paused. Then said, "That if I let anyone in, they'll see how much I'm still pretending."
He shook his head. "You don't pretend. You fight through it."
She gazed at him. "What about you?"
"I'm afraid that if I don't keep being strong, no one will know how to hold me."
Her face softened.
"Perhaps," she said, "you don't require strength. Just someone who remains."
Gao Rui gazed at her, not with hunger, not with authority but with a muted, desperate need.
"I can try," he said.
It wasn't a confession.
But it was a start.
The Next Morning Back to Normal, Almost
The hospital hummed once more with morning rounds, and yet, everyone walked differently.
Meilin sensed it in the way her feet no longer dragged behind her.
Yichen sensed it in the way his smiles felt more natural.
Yufei sensed it in the way Gao Rui nodded when she volunteered to head the diagnostics on a rare case.
And Gao Rui, finally, didn't sense herself as isolated on the halls.
Outside, the sun dawned over Hualing Central, bathing the building with warm golden light. A new day. A new battle. But in some way, love was starting to creep in the cracks where weariness once dwelled.
And although none of them would admit it yet they knew.
They were no longer doctors.
They were each other's anchors.
And little by little, beautifully, they were falling in love not in ideal scenes, but in stolen glances, late-night coffees, and rooftop silences.