Chapter 2

"Mister nurse, why are there so many hearts in here?"

Fluorescent lights began to flood the room after he flipped the switch. Soobin had let the girl come in ahead of him before he slid the door close.

The room was exactly just as they'd left it three years ago; in which Soobin never let anyone, himself included, enter it since. Just being here alone made his body feel like it was being torn through a time warp. Inhaling a deep breath, his eyes finally flickered up to take in his surroundings.

It wasn't anything different from other hospital rooms. The bed was perfectly made. The sheets were white—so were the pillows, the floor, the ceiling, and just about anything else. Almost the entire room was adorned in white. Nothing was unordinary.

Except, for the masses and masses of origami hearts—all in different colours—filling the entire space to the brim everywhere one would look. Colours rippled in bright paper hues through his field of vision; left to right, up to down. It was taped on the wall, much so that there was barely room for the white paint to peek through. Strings and strings of them were hung up across the ceiling in multiple rows, criss-crossing like bedroom lights decoration. It was by the bed; on the nightstand, on the pillow, and carefully spread out on the sheets.

Soobin could perfectly recall how he was right there, taping the hearts onto the wall, tying the strings, scattering them on the sheets—three years ago, like it was just yesterday.

The little one carefully sat down on the chair right by the bed, but Soobin lifted her up and put her on the mattress. Her tiny frame was huddled by the sea of origami hearts on the sheet; the sight was oddly endearing, but heart-wrenching to him for reasons the male would rather not address.

The nurse sat himself down on the bedside chair, pulled it closer, and handed the child a random heart he picked up. Then, he started. "Have you ever heard about the origami hearts tradition in the hospital?"

Taking the heart, the child excitedly inspected it, nodding in glee. "Yes! My mama told me that when someone leaves the hospital to go to heaven, we all fold a paper heart for them! Like this, like this!"

"That's right," chuckled Soobin. The pure, innocent excitement of a child almost single-handedly brightened the morbid ambiance of this room, something that no one was able to accomplish for countless years to come. Soobin found it highly ironic. "But do you know how it started?"

The girl shook her head, handing her paper heart to the Peitero duck so they could inspect it together. This alone tugged at Soobin's heartstrings.

"Well, then. I'll tell you a story." He cleared his throat, and the child looked up at him with the brightest eyes in the world, waiting for him to go on with her lips shaped into a perfect 'o'.

I wonder if you sent her into my path. As a sign.

"It started here, in this room. From a boy who used to fold a paper heart every day for his lost love, hoping each one he makes will take him closer to the day those eyes would open again."

Unfortunately for him, that day never came.