Loop 2.
Time Remaining: 180 Days (approximate).
Status: Critical Failure Imminent.
Ethan hits the ground.
He doesn't stumble this time. He collapses. His knees slam into the pavement with a bone-jarring crack.
The world is spinning. A kaleidoscope of pink petals, blue sky, and the glaring sun.
He retches. Bile burns his throat, splashing onto the pristine sidewalk of the park.
"Whoa, buddy!" Someone steps back. "You okay? Need a medic?"
Ethan wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. He is shaking. Violent, unstoppable tremors that rattle his teeth.
His mind is split in two.
Part of him is still in the ICU, listening to the high-pitched whine of the flatline, smelling the antiseptic death.
The other part is here. Under the cherry blossoms. Breathing in air that smells like sugar and life.
It's too much. The juxtaposition is a psychic break waiting to happen.
Get up, he orders himself. Get. Up.
He forces his body to move. He drags himself to his feet, using a lamppost for support. He sways, dizzy with time-sickness.
3:47 PM.
He knows the cue.
He turns his head.
There.
The fountain. The girl. The fall.
It plays out like a recording he's watched too many times. She lowers the camera. She smiles that radiant, devastating smile. She steps back. Her sneaker slips.
Ethan moves.
There is no grace in it this time. No romantic sweep. He charges like a linebacker. He is angry. He is furious at the universe, at the gravity, at the physics that demand she fall every single time.
He grabs her arm hard—hard enough to bruise. He yanks her back from the edge with zero finesse.
Violet yelps, spinning around. She crashes into him, but he doesn't hold her. He steadies her, then immediately steps back, putting three feet of distance between them.
He can't touch her. Touching her brings back the sensation of her cold hand in the hospital bed.
"Hey!" Violet rubs her arm, her eyes wide with shock. "Ow! What is your problem?"
Ethan stares at her.
She is vibrant. She is healthy. She is oblivious.
She has no idea that she died in his arms ten seconds ago.
The unfairness of it chokes him. Why is he the only one carrying this weight? Why does she get to be innocent while he drowns?
"You were falling," Ethan says. His voice is a croak. Rough. Scraping.
"I slipped," she corrects, narrowing her eyes. "I didn't need a dislocated shoulder. Who are you? The Fountain Police?"
Ethan looks at her.
He considers the script. Shiny shoes. Coffee. Art. The list. The slow burn.
He imagines doing it all again. The playful banter. The coy text messages. The first kiss on the roof.
And then he imagines watching her die again.
He can't do it.
He simply does not have the emotional bandwidth to woo a ghost. He needs to skip to the end. He needs to solve the problem, not play the game.
"I need you to listen to me," Ethan says. He takes a step toward her. He ignores the passersby staring at the crazy man in the suit. "And I need you to not run away, even though everything I'm about to say will make you want to."
Violet takes a step back. She clutches her camera. Her heterochromatic eyes flash with instinctual fear.
"Okay," she says slowly. "Stranger danger. I'm leaving."
"You have a grade four glioblastoma," Ethan blurts out.
Violet freezes.
She stops mid-turn. Her back is to him. She goes rigid, like a statue.
"It's wrapped around your brainstem," Ethan continues, listing the facts like bullets. "You were diagnosed two months ago. You did one round of radiation. It made your hair fall out, which is why you cut it and dyed it purple to hide the uneven growth. You stopped treatment six weeks ago because you wanted quality of life."
Violet turns around slowly.
The color has drained from her face. She looks like she's been slapped.
"Who are you?" she whispers. "How... who did you talk to? Dr. Wells? Lily?"
"You get dizzy spells," Ethan presses on. He feels like a monster, but he has to make her believe him. Fast. "You cover them up by humming. Mmm-hmm-hmm. Three notes. B-flat, A, G."
Violet brings a hand to her mouth. Her eyes are filling with tears—not from sadness, but from violation.
"You have a sister named Eleanor who thinks you're fine," Ethan says. "You haven't told her because you don't want to ruin her freshman year at Stanford."
"Stop it," Violet gasps.
"The tumor is growing," Ethan says relentlessly. "Faster than you think. In my timeline, you died in September. We tried to make you happy. We painted murals. We went to the beach. It didn't work. Happiness is not a cure."
He steps closer. He is intense, vibrating, terrifying.
"We wasted time falling in love," he says. "We wasted weeks playing house. I am not doing that this time. I am not going to buy you coffee. I am taking you to a hospital in Zurich. I have a jet on standby. We leave tonight."
He reaches for her hand.
"Come with me. Please. We have to start now."
Violet looks at his outstretched hand.
Then she looks at his face.
She sees the madness in his eyes. The desperation. The utter lack of boundaries.
She screams.
"Get away from me!"
She doesn't just step back. She scrambles. She turns and sprints into the crowd, swinging her heavy camera bag like a weapon to clear a path.
"Violet!" Ethan shouts. "I'm trying to save you!"
"Help!" Violet screams at a mounted police officer near the gate. "This guy is stalking me! He has my medical records! Help!"
The officer turns his horse. He spots Ethan—disheveled, wild-eyed, vomit on his chin.
"Sir! Stand down!"
Ethan freezes.
He watches Violet disappear into the throng of tourists. She is running for her life. Running from him.
He stands alone in the falling cherry blossoms.
Calculation Error.
He treated her like a variable. He treated her like a problem to be solved, bypassing the human element.
Logic dictates that saving her life is more important than her feelings. But Logic forgot that you cannot save someone who thinks you are the danger.
The police officer dismounts, hand resting on his baton. "Sir, I need to see some ID."
Ethan closes his eyes.
He raises his hands slowly.
He just lost the entire loop in four minutes.
Two Hours Later.
Ethan sits in a holding cell at the 4th Precinct.
It smells of ammonia and stale sweat.
He was released relatively quickly—being Ethan Cross, Senior Analyst with clean record and expensive lawyers, has privileges. His lawyer, a bewildered man named Goldstein, is currently finalizing the paperwork at the desk.
"Family dispute," Goldstein had argued. "Mental strain. Misunderstanding."
The police let him go with a warning: Stay away from the girl.
Ethan sits on the metal bench. He stares at the concrete floor.
He failed.
It's humiliating. In Loop 0, he was her lover. In Loop 1, he was her rock. In Loop 2, he is her stalker.
He has burned the bridge before he even walked on it.
"Mr. Cross?" Goldstein opens the cell door. "You're free to go. But seriously, Ethan... maybe take a vacation? You look like hell."
"I'm fine," Ethan says tonelessly.
He walks out of the precinct. The sun has set.
He checks his phone. It's 7:00 PM.
In Loop 1, right now, he was at the ramen shop with her. They were laughing about greasy food.
Now, she is probably at the bakery, barricaded in her room, telling Lily about the psycho who knew her darkest secrets. Lily is probably sharpening knives.
Ethan gets into his black Audi.
He grips the steering wheel until his knuckles turn white.
He cannot restart. He cannot reset the loop unless she dies. He has to live in this ruined timeline for the next six months, watching from a distance as she dies alone, terrified of him.
No.
Ethan Cross does not accept defeat. If Plan A (Romance) failed, and Plan B (Radical Truth) failed... he needs Plan C.
He needs an intermediary.
He starts the car. He drives toward the Arts District.
He parks a block away from Knead & Feed. He sees the lights on in the upstairs loft. He imagines them up there—Violet shaking, Lily raging.
He cannot go up there.
But there is someone else.
Someone who holds the key to the medical lock.
Ethan puts the car in gear and drives toward the hospital district.
He is going to Dr. Amara Wells.
And he isn't going to ask nicely this time.
8:30 PM. Dr. Wells' Private Residence.
Ethan has never been here. But he knows her address from the donation paperwork in the last loop.
It's a brownstone in a quiet neighborhood.
He rings the doorbell.
Dr. Wells answers in sweatpants and a silk robe, holding a glass of red wine. She looks surprised.
"Mr... Cross? Ethan Cross?"
She recognizes him from the news, from the business pages. Not as a patient's boyfriend. To her, he is a stranger.
"Dr. Wells," Ethan says. He stands on her stoop, rain beginning to drizzle on his shoulders. "I apologize for the intrusion. I need to hire you."
She frowns, tightening her robe. "It's Saturday night. If you need a consult, call my office on Monday."
"I don't have until Monday," Ethan says. "I need you to look at a file. Violet Aurora."
Dr. Wells stiffens. "Patient confidentiality laws prevents me from confirming—"
"I know she is your patient," Ethan interrupts. "I know about the Grade 4 GBM. I know about the decision to stop radiation. I know she's your favorite 'lost cause' case."
Dr. Wells' eyes narrow. "Who are you?"
"I'm the funding," Ethan says. "I'm the grant. I'm the endowment."
He pulls a check from his jacket pocket. He wrote it in the car. It is for ten million dollars.
He holds it out.
"This is for your research foundation," Ethan says. "Unrestricted funds."
Dr. Wells looks at the check. Her eyes widen slightly, but she doesn't take it.
"And what do you want in exchange, Mr. Cross?"
"I want you to call her," Ethan says. "Tonight. I want you to tell her that a new donor has funded a private, anonymous trial for patients fitting her exact profile. I want you to tell her that the treatment is free, non-invasive, and starts immediately."
"There is no such trial," Wells says slowly.
"We will create one," Ethan says. "I will hire the team. We will use the experimental protocols from Tokyo. But she won't accept it from me. She hates me. She thinks I'm a monster."
His voice breaks, just for a second.
"She trusts you. You have to be the face."
Dr. Wells looks at him—really looks at him. She sees the wet hair, the haunted eyes, the posture of a man hanging by a thread.
"Why?" she asks. "What is she to you?"
"She's everything," Ethan says. "And she's dying."
Dr. Wells looks at the check. Ten million dollars could save hundreds of lives. It could build a wing. It could fund research for a decade.
She looks at Ethan.
"This is unethical," she says. "Lie to a patient? Construct a fake study?"
"Is it unethical if we save her?" Ethan counters. "Or at least... give her a chance?"
Dr. Wells sighs. She opens the door wider.
"Come inside, Mr. Cross. It's raining."
Ethan steps into the warmth of the foyer.
Plan C is active. The Proxy War.
He can't be the hero this time. He has to be the ghost in the machine. The invisible benefactor.
He sits at her kitchen table while she pours him a glass of water.
"So," Dr. Wells says, sitting across from him. "Tell me about this Tokyo protocol you seem to know so much about."
"It involves Optune fields and customized viral vectors," Ethan recites from memory—memory burned into his brain during sleepless nights in Loop 1.
"That's theoretically sound," Wells admits. "But the FDA hasn't approved the combination."
"I don't care about the FDA. I care about the biological timer."
Ethan leans forward.
"I need you to call her. Tomorrow morning. Tell her the 'Donor' insists on anonymity. I cannot be mentioned."
"Because you're the one she called the police on?" Wells guesses. She's smart.
"News travels fast."
"Police scanner app," she explains dryly. "And she called me. Twenty minutes ago. Hysterical. Asking if I leaked her file."
"What did you tell her?"
"I told her I didn't. Which was the truth."
"Good."
Ethan drinks the water. His hand shakes.
"If we do this," Ethan says. "If we hide me... will she take the treatment?"
"Violet wants to live," Wells says softly. "She plays brave, but she is terrified of the dark. If I offer her a ladder, she will climb it. As long as she doesn't know the ladder belongs to the 'stalker'."
"Fine," Ethan says. "I'll be the villain. As long as she climbs."
Two Weeks Later.
It works.
Ethan sits in his penthouse, watching the video feed.
It's not a spy cam in her house—he respects some boundaries now. It's a secure link to the private clinic he bought and staffed within forty-eight hours.
On the screen, Violet sits in a comfortable chair. She's wearing a headset device—the Optune cap. It looks like a sci-fi helmet.
She's painting. A small canvas on her lap.
Lily is sitting next to her, reading a magazine.
"This rich guy is a mystery," Lily says on the audio feed. "Ten million bucks? And he doesn't want a plaque? Or a tax write-off?"
"Dr. Wells said he lost his daughter to GBM," Violet says, adjusting the cap. "He wants to save someone else's daughter."
Ethan flinches. That was the lie Wells came up with. It stings.
"Well, I'd like to bake him a cake," Lily says. "Even if he is a ghost."
"A ghost with a checkbook," Violet smiles.
She looks healthier. Or maybe it's just hope. Hope has a way of flushing the skin, brightening the eyes.
Ethan touches the screen. He traces the line of her jaw.
He misses her. God, he misses her.
He misses the smell of vanilla. He misses her humming. He misses the way she made fun of his shoes.
Now, he is just an observer. A guardian angel who is forbidden from landing.
"Keep fighting, Vi," he whispers to the screen.
He spends his days managing the "shadow trial." He micromanages the doctors. He analyzes the blood work results before they even reach Wells. He adjusts the medication dosages based on research papers translated from German and Japanese at 3 AM.
He is running her survival like a corporation.
But he is lonely.
He sleeps on the couch in his office because the bed feels too big. He eats protein bars because cooking reminds him of pancakes and failed attempts.
He is erasing himself from the narrative to save the protagonist.
Status Report: Week 12.
The treatment is... pausing the decline.
The tumor hasn't shrunk, but it hasn't grown. Stability.
"It's a stalemate," Dr. Wells tells him during their clandestine Tuesday night meeting. "We bought time. But not a cure."
"How much time?"
"Hard to say. Maybe two extra months. Maybe until Christmas."
Christmas.
Ethan imagines Violet in snow. He imagines her wearing a scarf he bought her, unaware it came from him.
"But," Wells warns. "She's depressed, Ethan."
"She has Lily."
"She's lonely. The treatment is isolating. She sits in the chair six hours a day. She misses... life. She misses the connection."
Ethan stares into his coffee.
He saved her body, but he left her heart alone in a sterile room.
"I can't go to her," Ethan says. "She has a restraining order."
"Yes," Wells sighs. "You painted yourself into a very lonely corner, my friend."
October 14th.
Ethan breaks.
He can't just watch the screen anymore. He needs to see her in 3D.
He knows she goes to the park on Tuesdays when she feels well enough.
He puts on a hoodie. Sunglasses. A baseball cap. He dresses like someone hiding, which makes him look exactly like the stalker he's been labeled.
He stands across the street from the park entrance.
It's autumn now. The cherry blossoms are long gone, replaced by fiery red maples. The leaves crunch underfoot.
He sees her.
She's sitting on their bench by the pond. She has the headset on—portable battery pack in her bag. She's sketching.
She looks thin. Frail. But she's there.
She isn't humming.
Ethan watches her for an hour. He just breathes the same air, trying to filter the vanilla scent through the distance.
Suddenly, a gust of wind blows her sketchbook shut. A loose page flies out.
It flutters across the grass, landing near the path.
Violet struggles to stand up. The headset wires tangle slightly. She's slow.
Ethan moves before he thinks.
He walks over, picks up the paper.
It's a charcoal drawing.
It's a drawing of a man. In a suit. With intense eyes and hands outstretched.
But she's drawn him as a shadow monster. Dark, looming, scary.
Ethan stares at his own villain portrait. It hurts more than the car crash.
Violet looks up. She spots him.
Even with the hood, even with the glasses.
She freezes.
"You," she breathes.
Ethan stands there. He holds the drawing.
"I just wanted to see if you were okay," he says. His voice is muffled by the scarf he's wearing.
Violet stares at him. She doesn't scream this time. She looks at the man who terrified her in the spring.
"You're him," she says. "The frantic guy."
"Yes."
She tilts her head. The amber eye studies him.
"Dr. Wells acts weird whenever I ask about the donor," Violet says slowly. "She gets this look. The same look she had when she told me you were arrested."
Ethan goes still. She's smart. Too smart.
"Go away," Ethan whispers. "Go back to your life."
"It's you, isn't it?" Violet steps closer, dragging her medical equipment with her. "The money. The trial. The Tokyo protocol. It's you."
Ethan doesn't deny it. "Does it matter?"
"Yes! It matters!" She is angry now. "Why? Why did you scare me away and then spend millions to save me? What is wrong with you?"
"I told you," Ethan says, lowering the sunglasses. "I've seen the end. I wanted to change the beginning."
Violet looks at his exposed eyes.
She sees the exhaustion. The red rims. The hollowness.
She doesn't see a stalker anymore. She sees a ghost.
"You're in pain," she observes softly.
"Inefficient emotional regulation."
She steps closer. She is three feet away.
"You said... in your timeline... we were in love."
"Yes."
"Did I love you back?"
Ethan looks at the red maples. "You did. You put a gold thumbprint on my heart."
Violet looks down at her hands. They are clean today.
"I don't know you," she says honestly. "But I feel like... I feel like I missed something important."
She holds out her hand.
"Hi," she whispers. "I'm Violet. I have a brain tumor and a very weird guardian angel."
Ethan looks at her hand.
If he takes it, he breaks the rules. If he takes it, he risks hurting her again.
But she is offering.
Ethan reaches out. He takes her hand.
It is warm.
And the loop holds its breath.