『Let's Just Live a Simple Life』
The smell of disinfectant in the hospital never quite fades in early autumn. There was nothing earth-shattering about that day—just a perfectly ordinary Wednesday afternoon. She had just finished a four-hour abdominal surgery. After changing out of her surgical gown, which carried a faint trace of iodine, her fingertips were still slightly numb from gripping the instruments for so long. The benches outside the outpatient building were rarely used. Out of habit, she avoided the crowd, sat down, opened her hand cream, and spread it over and over onto her hands—dry and peeling from years of disinfectant. you was only there for a check-up for some minor discomfort, and happened to sit on the other end of the same bench while waiting. No deliberate small talk, no obvious staring—just quietly looking down at the papers in hand, giving her exactly the right amount of space, without intruding. People came and went. Everyone who passed her saw the same thing: a young doctor who was accomplished beyond her years, calm and unbreakable. No one noticed the tiredness hidden in her eyes. No one saw how tense her shoulders were. And no one paid attention to the small gesture she repeated to suppress her feelings—rubbing her fingertips over and over. Only you, looking up without meaning to, gave her no admiring stare, only said softly that she could lean against the back of the bench instead of keeping her back straight and holding herself together. No extra politeness, no deliberate flattery—just a plain, thoughtful remark. She froze for a second and instinctively said, "I'm fine." It was the answer she had relied on for years. But for the first time, she didn't immediately stand up and leave. Against all precedent, she sat beside a stranger for more than ten extra minutes. The days that followed were never marked by sudden heart-fluttering moments. Just a polite greeting when they met at follow-up visits, an umbrella casually passed over on rainy days. The other person never got upset when she was pulled away by an emergency page, understood that this profession left her no choice, and never demanded she show up on time. This relationship was never a love-at-first-sight blaze, never a fiery, straightforward confession. It was day-after-day consideration. Everyone else only asked her to be the all-capable doctor, but this one person slowly saw through every shell she held up, saw the sensitivity and exhaustion she hid away. Fate was hidden in those small, everyday moments together, melting bit by bit the walls she had built over the years, and making her slowly understand that she didn't have to be alone forever.