Dr. Saunder's POV

Sundays were supposed to be quieter.
No new admissions, no court updates, no calls from the city clinic — just check-ins and follow-ups with the outpatients who'd been cleared to live on their own again.

That was the idea, anyway.

I'd been at the facility since just after sunrise, the winter light leaking in pale and cold through the blinds. The staff knew the routine by now: coffee first, file review second, patient rounds before the morning reports started.

But habit had a way of turning into instinct.
And instinct sent me down the west hall before anything else.

Sparky's hall.

I could hear the faint sound of the nurses doing their early rounds — doors clicking open, soft greetings, the shuffle of carts.
His room was near the end. It always felt longer walking there than anywhere else.

I paused at his doorway, tapping once before stepping in.

He was awake, sitting on the edge of the bed with his head bowed, the morning light outlining the dark curl of his hair. The circles under his eyes were darker again. Sleep hadn't been kind to him lately.

"Morning, Sparky," I said quietly.

He looked up — slower than usual, sluggish from the meds. "Hey."

"Rough night?"

He gave a humorless laugh. "That's the only kind I have anymore."

I nodded, pulling up the chair near his bed. "The staff said you didn't finish breakfast."

"Didn't feel like it."

"Because you weren't hungry," I asked, "or because you didn't want to be seen?"

He hesitated, then shrugged. "Maybe both."

I studied him for a moment.
The isolation was starting to press in — I could see it in the way he hunched, the way his answers had shrunk from full thoughts to fragments.

The medication was helping control the voices, yes — but it was also dulling everything else. Too much quiet can be its own kind of torture.

"I'm thinking we might start supervised rec again," I said finally. "Controlled setting. Maybe art or music therapy, something that keeps your mind busy. Isolation helps stabilize you for a while, but it can't be permanent."

His eyes flicked up at that. "So I'm not getting worse?"

"No," I said honestly. "You're steady. Which is what we need. But steady isn't living."

That earned a faint, tired smile — the closest I'd seen in days.

I stood, setting his file on the small table. "I'll check back later. I've got outpatient visits all morning, but I want you to rest. Try to eat, even just half the tray. And if the voices come back, tell the nurse immediately."

He nodded, voice soft. "I don't like being the only one here anymore."

"I know," I said, and I meant it. "We'll get you through the isolation, Sparky. One step at a time."

When I left the room, I stood in the hallway for a moment, exhaling slowly.
He was right. He was alone here. The last high-risk patients had been discharged months ago, and the silence had begun to echo.

If we didn't find a way to reconnect him soon, we'd lose more than his progress — we'd lose the small flicker of humanity that was keeping him fighting.

I straightened my notes and headed for my office. The outpatients would start arriving soon — Tuck Santos among them.

And as much as Sparky worried me, I couldn't shake the feeling that the real challenge today would come from the boy still learning what it meant not to break.

The first file of the day wasn't new. It was worn, edges soft, tabs replaced twice over the years. Violet Hale.
She'd been an outpatient for nearly three years now — longer than most of my recurring patients — and though she'd made enormous strides, I'd learned never to assume time meant distance from pain.

When she walked in, hoodie half zipped and purple hair spilling forward, she looked the same as she always did: alert, careful, pretending to be fine.
"Morning, Violet," I said, motioning her toward the chair across from my desk.

"Hey," she murmured, sitting down and curling her legs beneath her.

"It's been a while since our last check-in," I said. "How's school? Still keeping up with classes?"

She gave a half-shrug. "I guess. Teachers keep hovering. Guess they think I'm gonna break again."

I smiled faintly. "You've held together better than most people would after what you've lived through."

Her eyes flicked down at that, and her fingers tightened around her sleeves.
"Yeah, well. Some days are still bad."

"I imagine the last few months haven't helped," I said gently. "Ahri's loss, the shooting... you two were close."

She froze, gaze locked on the floor. "Can we not? Please?"

"Of course." I kept my voice calm. "I only ask because grief has a way of reopening old wounds. Have you been coping safely?"

A pause. Then a small, defensive laugh. "You think I started cutting again."

"I think I've known you long enough to notice when you're hiding your hands," I said softly.

Her mouth tightened. She stayed quiet for a long time, then muttered, "Just once. A few weeks ago. It didn't even bleed much."

"That's still once too many," I said. "You know what that means."

"Yeah." She sighed. "That I'm not invincible."

"No one is."

She pushed her sleeve up just enough for me to see faded scars and a single healing line. "It's not like before, Dr. Saunders. I didn't want to die. I just... wanted it to stop."

I nodded. "That's honest. That's progress. But you know the rule — if it starts happening more than once, you come back in. You don't get to fight this alone."

"I won't," she promised, quiet but certain. "I don't want to go backwards."

"Good," I said. "You've built too much of a life to lose it to the past."

Her shoulders eased a little. Before she stood to leave, she asked, "Do you think Ahri would be mad at me? For still being messed up?"

"No," I said. "Ahri knew how hard it is to heal. She'd just want you to keep trying."

That earned a small, uneven smile — the kind that never quite reached her eyes, but still mattered.

When she left, I wrote a short note on her chart:
'Stable. Minimal self-harm relapse. Continue outpatient care. Encourage school counselor follow-up.'

The clock on the wall ticked quietly as I closed Violet's file and set it aside. Her session lingered in the air — the hesitation in her voice, the way she tried to hide her arms when I asked if she was cutting again. Progress, yes, but fragile. It always was.

I took a breath, turned to the next folder in the stack, and kept going. There was never enough time to sit with the weight of one story before the next began.

Derrick Meyers was first after Violet. Eighteen, tall, quiet, with the kind of eyes that hadn't seen real rest in months. Post-traumatic stress disorder — his best friend had died in a car crash, and every night he heard the brakes again.

When Derrick Meyers stepped into my office, he looked like he hadn't slept in days. Shoulders slumped, eyes sunken, hands trembling even when he tried to hide it. He smelled faintly of motor oil and coffee — the two things keeping him functional since the accident.

He didn't say hello. He just sat down, elbows on his knees, and stared at the floor.

"Rough week?" I asked gently.

He let out a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. "Same dream, every night. Same crash. Same sound."

I nodded. We'd been through this pattern before — the recurring nightmares, the way he woke up feeling like his chest was caving in. "Still seeing the road?"

"Yeah," he whispered. "And the glass."

I leaned forward slightly, keeping my voice even. "Would you be open to trying something new today? Something different from talking through it?"

His gaze flicked up, wary. "The eye thing again?"

"Yes," I said. "The eye thing again."

He shifted, uncomfortable. "Feels stupid."

"It might," I agreed. "Most healing things do, at first."

He sighed, rubbed his palms together, and nodded once. "Fine."

I turned the small desk lamp toward him, then lifted my hand — two fingers held upright, steady, in front of his eyes. "Alright, Derrick. Just follow my hand, nothing else. Keep your head still. If it feels too heavy, we stop. You're in control."

His breathing quickened, but he nodded.

I began to move my hand slowly from side to side, my eyes watching his, making sure his focus tracked the motion. Back and forth. Back and forth.

"Tell me what you see," I said quietly.

"The road," he murmured, voice trembling. "It's raining again. The tires— I hear them sliding."

Back and forth.

"What happens next?"

He flinched, his body tightening like a bowstring. "The headlights— his car— it's too close—" His breath stuttered.

I slowed my hand but kept the rhythm. "Stay with it, Derrick. You're safe here. What happens now?"

He swallowed hard. "He's yelling— no, laughing— I can't tell— then—" His words cracked apart. "I hear the brakes. It's so loud."

Back and forth.

"What do you feel?"

"Guilt," he choked out. "I told him to go faster. It was my idea to race."

The movement continued, steady, controlled. I didn't speak for a few seconds — just let the moment breathe. Then, softly: "What would you say to him now, if you could?"

Derrick's jaw clenched. "That I'm sorry."

"And what would he say back?"

He hesitated. Then his eyes shifted, his face changing. "He'd say it wasn't my fault."

The tears came quietly after that. Not violent. Just a slow release, like a dam cracking under years of weight.

I lowered my hand and let the silence settle, giving him space to breathe again.

"That's the process," I said gently. "Your brain's starting to put the memory where it belongs — in the past, not the present."

He nodded, wiping his eyes with the back of his sleeve. "Feels weird," he muttered. "Like I just watched it happen again but from far away."

"That's how it's supposed to feel," I said. "You're reprogramming the way your body holds the memory. Over time, the panic fades. The guilt loses its grip."

He looked up at me for the first time since the session began. "You really think it'll help?"

"I know it will," I said simply. "If you let it."

He was quiet for a while. Then: "Guess I'm tired enough to try weird."

I smiled — small but genuine. "That's all I need from you."

By the time Derrick left, the light through my office window had shifted — softer now, filtered through the faint winter clouds. I had fifteen minutes before the next appointment, just enough time to reset the room: fresh tissues on the table, two mugs of tea cooling beside the window, soft instrumental music playing low.

Routine mattered. It wasn't just for the patients; it was for me.

The next name on my schedule was Renee Teller. Thirty-two, postpartum depression, seven months since giving birth to her second child. She'd been in my care since week three — fragile, exhausted, drowning under the guilt that she didn't "love her baby enough."

When she entered, her posture was better than usual, but her eyes were still glassy. She sat carefully, like the world might break if she moved too quickly.

"Hi, Renee," I said, offering the tea. "How's sleep this week?"

She gave a shaky laugh. "You mean the thing I used to do before diapers and panic attacks? It's fine. I'm—" Her voice cracked. "I'm trying."

"That's good," I said gently. "Trying counts here."

She nodded, fiddling with her ring. "Sometimes I think I'm getting better. Then I'll look at him—my son—and I'll feel... nothing. Just tired. I used to think I was a good mom. Now I don't know who I am anymore."

I let the words hang. Guilt and exhaustion lived side by side for most new mothers with depression — two voices feeding each other until neither felt separate.

"You're not broken," I told her softly. "You're healing. The fact that you're here means the part of you that wants to live is still louder than the part that's hurting."

Tears welled in her eyes. "My husband says I should just 'be happy.' That plenty of moms would kill to stay home with their babies. But I look at the monitor, I hear him crying, and I just want to run."

"That doesn't make you a bad mother," I said firmly. "It makes you human. Depression lies. It tells you you're failing at something that's already hard."

She swallowed, her hands shaking slightly as she set down the tea. "When does it stop?"

"When your body and mind stop fighting each other," I said. "You're exhausted because you've been surviving on guilt and instinct. The medication will help regulate the chemistry, but it's the therapy—the truth—that'll bring you back."

Her gaze lifted, meeting mine. "You really think I'll feel like myself again?"

"I think you'll find a new version of yourself," I said. "One who knows how strong she already was."

Renee let out a breath that trembled on its way out. She nodded slowly. "Okay."

We talked for a while longer — small steps, grounding techniques, her plan for the week. When she finally stood to leave, she smiled, just a flicker of light behind tired eyes.

"Same time next week?" I asked.

"Yeah," she said softly. "Thanks for not giving up on me."

"I never do."

The door closed behind her, leaving the faint scent of chamomile tea in the room.

For a moment, I sat there in the quiet, fingers tapping absently against her file. Every session was different — grief, trauma, exhaustion — but they all shared one truth: people came here hoping I could pull them back from whatever edge they were standing on.

And sometimes, I could.

I looked at the clock — nearly three. The next name was familiar.
Tuck Santos.

The folder was worn now, pages thick with years of notes. His progress had been steady but recently... something was shifting again. Missed doses. Mood instability. Fear he didn't voice but couldn't quite hide.

I sighed and stood, stretching my back before stepping to the door.
He'd be here any minute.

And with Tuck, every minute mattered.