I followed her gaze. Her name was there. Sophie Carter. Her birth date, a string of numbers, and beneath them an abbreviation for a department I didn’t recognize.

When she finally spoke, her voice was barely louder than the hum of the fluorescent lights. “Ethan. You weren’t supposed to find out like this.”

The hallway seemed to narrow. A nurse passed behind me pushing a cart, its wheels squeaking against the polished floor, but the sound felt impossibly far away.

All I could hear was Sophie’s uneven breathing.

I knelt in front of her, because standing over her felt wrong. Because standing felt too much like leaving.

“Find out what?” I asked.