The bedroom was dark, the kind of dark that came just before dawn, when the city was still asleep and the only sound was Sofia's soft breathing through the monitor. Elena lay curled on her side, her hand tucked under her pillow, her face peaceful in the dim light from the window. She was dreaming of something gentle—the sea, maybe, or the horizon she had been painting.Alexander lay beside her, still as stone. He had not slept.His eyes were open, fixed on the ceiling. The ceiling was white, ordinary, the same ceiling he had stared at for hours. But he wasn't seeing it. He was seeing another ceiling. Another room. Another morning.The morning he woke up in the hospital.---The memory came without warning, the way memories always came now.He was lying in a narrow bed, tubes in his arms, a bandage around his head. The room was white, sterile, smelled of antiseptic and fear. His mother was in a chair beside him, her face drawn, her eyes red. She was holding his hand."Alexander," she w
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