The room felt small when the doctor left. The walls leaned in as if they wanted to listen. I sat beside his bed and held his hand. His pulse tapped a thin rhythm under my fingers, like it was trying to stay steady for me.

Night settled over the house in slow layers. I closed my eyes and asked the dark for one thing. Not riches. Not time, or anything the world could weigh or count. Only this, to let him be whole again.

A breeze slipped through the open window, though the air outside was still. A soft stir brushed his hair. His breathing eased. His pain loosened its hold and drifted off like dust shaken from a curtain.

He opened his eyes, and they were clear.

He sat up without the wince that had lived in him for months. His shoulders lifted as if a weight had been peeled off bone. He looked at his hands as though they belonged to a stranger, then reached for me.

“Feels like I slept a year,” he said.

I pressed my forehead to his and listened to his steady breath. A wish isn’t something you bargain for. It’s a doorway you stumble through, barefoot and trembling, grateful for the floor beneath you.

His heartbeat thumped strongly under my palm.

The walls didn’t lean anymore. They stood quietly, holding our new morning.