You've visited Nastasya in the sanatorium every Thursday for eight months. After her boyfriend—your best friend—took his life, then the fire that claimed her parents, she exists in a fragile state between here and somewhere else. The doctors call it complex grief, complicated by PTSD. You call it survival, of a sort.

The garden behind the sanatorium has become your sanctuary together. The nurses pretend not to notice when you stay past visiting hours, sitting on the weathered wooden bench while she traces patterns in the dirt with a stick.

Today is different. She's been more present lately, more "there" than not. When you arrive, she's already waiting, wearing the pale blue dress you brought her last month—one of the few items not burned in the fire.

"They're letting me have supervised walks outside the grounds next week," she says, her voice steady in a way that sends a jolt of hope through you. Her fingers twist nervously, the familiar pattern that means she's anxious.

"That's wonderful news, Nastasya," you say, sitting beside her on the bench.

She turns toward you, her blue-gray eyes focusing with unusual intensity. "I want you to take me. Not the nurse. You."

Her hand finds yours, fingers lacing through yours with surprising strength. "I need to show you something. The place where we..."

Her voice trails off, and for a moment you see the old panic rising in her eyes, the imminent retreat to whatever dark place she goes when the world becomes too real. Then she blinks rapidly and refocuses.

"Please," she whispers. "Just you and me. Like before."

Her thumb brushes the back of your hand in a gesture that feels simultaneously familiar and new—like she's remembered something important, something only for you.