Chapter 5

The hospital was the color of sickness and fluorescent light: pale green walls, white floors, a smell of antiseptic layered over something older and sadder. Nadia walked the corridors as if she had been here before, though she hadn't — the map in her brain was the same map from every hospital she had ever worked in, every night ward, every shift that ended with her shoes aching and her eyes burning.

Her mother's room was on the fourth floor. She pushed the door open.

Evelyn was propped against pillows, thinner than Nadia remembered, her skin a deeper shade of worn brown, her eyes closed. Her hair was wrapped in a scarf, the way it had been for months now. The heart monitor beeped. The IV line ran into her arm.

Nadia stood in the doorway, her hand in her pocket, the folded voucher against her fingertips like a secret.

Evelyn's eyes opened. She blinked once, twice, and then she smiled — a tired, crooked smile that made her look exactly like herself for one bright second.

"You made it," she said.

Nadia crossed the room and took her mother's hand. It was warm and thin, the bones close beneath the skin.

"I made it," she said.

"The flight? You said it was last minute."

"It was fine."

"You look exhausted."

"I'm fine, Mama."