⸝⸝ IF TOMORROW NEVER COMES 「 n.riki 」
COMA . After waking from a devastating car accident with no memory of the last three years, you remember everyone—except the man who loves you most. As Niki fights to make you fall in love with him again, the truth behind the night of the crash begins to unravel.
♯ angst-heavy. amnesia. established relationship. mystery. psychological drama. hurt/comfort. protective niki. memory loss. crime subplot. hospital scenes. emotional slow burn. devotion. happy ending.
The first thing you became aware of was the sound.
A slow, rhythmic beeping echoed somewhere above you, steady enough to convince you that time was still moving even though yours felt frozen. It blended with hushed voices, the squeak of rubber soles against polished floors, and the constant hum of machines you couldn't yet identify. Every inch of your body felt impossibly heavy, like you had been pulled from the bottom of the ocean after holding your breath for far too long. Even opening your eyes seemed exhausting.
When you finally managed to blink them open, an unforgiving white light flooded your vision. The brightness made you flinch immediately, squeezing your eyes shut before cautiously trying again. This time the world came into focus little by little—the sterile ceiling tiles, pale hospital curtains, unfamiliar faces dressed in blue scrubs moving around your bed. Someone noticed your eyes opening because the room suddenly became louder.
"Easy... don't overwhelm them."
A woman wearing a nurse's badge leaned over you, her smile warm enough to cut through the confusion clouding your thoughts. She gently lifted your head and guided a straw toward your lips. The cool water soothed the fire burning in your throat, though swallowing still hurt enough to make you wince.
"Can you tell me your name?" she asked softly.
You frowned, searching through the fog inside your head. At least that answer came easily.
"Very good," she replied encouragingly. "Do you know where you are?"
Your gaze drifted around the room again, lingering on the IV pole beside your bed and the heart monitor that continued its relentless beeping.
Your mind searched desperately for an answer that simply wasn't there. It felt as though someone had ripped an entire page from your memories, leaving behind only blank space where certainty should have been.
The nurse didn't seem surprised. She only gave you another reassuring smile before jotting something down on her clipboard. Moments later a doctor entered the room with several more nurses trailing behind him. A small flashlight shone briefly into your eyes while they asked you a series of questions—your birthday, your parents' names, whether you could move your fingers and toes, whether you remembered what had happened.
All you found were fragmented flashes that disappeared the moment you reached for them.
A road disappearing into darkness.
Bright headlights rushing toward you.
"It appears the accident caused some retrograde amnesia," the doctor explained quietly to someone standing behind him. "That's not uncommon after trauma of this severity."
The word barely registered before another voice interrupted from somewhere near the doorway.
Something about that voice was different.
Your eyes instinctively turned toward the entrance.
A young man stood frozen just outside the room. He couldn't have been much older than you. His black hair looked unwashed, falling messily across exhausted eyes rimmed red from what looked like days of crying. Dark circles stretched beneath them, and the oversized gray hoodie hanging from his frame was wrinkled enough to suggest he'd been sleeping in it. Clutched tightly in one trembling hand was a bouquet of white lilies, though several petals had already begun to wilt.
The moment your eyes met his, his entire expression changed.
Relief washed over him so suddenly that his knees almost seemed to buckle beneath him. His eyes filled instantly, tears gathering faster than he could blink them away. For a second he simply stood there, staring at you as though he couldn't quite believe you were real.
"You woke up..." he whispered.
The doctor stepped aside, giving him room to enter.
He approached your bed slowly, every step hesitant, almost fearful. It was the way someone might approach a dream they were terrified of waking from. When he finally reached your bedside, he stopped completely, unable to tear his gaze away from your face.
For several long moments, neither of you spoke.
The corners of his mouth lifted, but the smile never quite reached his eyes.
You looked back at him politely, waiting for the feeling that should have come.
An uncomfortable knot formed in your stomach.
"I'm sorry..." you murmured carefully. "Do... do I know you?"
The silence that followed felt almost violent.
The color drained from his face so quickly you thought he might collapse.
His smile disappeared inch by inch, replaced by an expression so heartbreakingly devastated that your own chest tightened in response.
His lips parted, but no words came out.
Finally he let out the smallest, most broken laugh you had ever heard.
He searched your face desperately, as though hoping you'd suddenly laugh and tell him you were joking.
You wished you could give him the reaction he was looking for.
You wished you could remember why simply looking at you seemed to be breaking him apart.
But no matter how hard you searched your mind, he remained a complete stranger.
"I'm sorry," you whispered again, guilt settling heavily in your chest. "I don't remember you."
The doctor's voice gently broke the silence.
"The memory loss appears selective. It's possible certain portions of their long-term memory have been affected while others remain intact."
"But..." the young man interrupted, his voice cracking around the single word. "They remember their own name."
"They remember how to speak."
"So why..." He swallowed hard, his eyes never leaving yours. "...Why don't they remember me?"
There wasn't an answer to give.
The room fell silent again, save for the steady beeping of your heart monitor.
He looked down at the bouquet still clutched in his hands before quietly placing it on the table beside your bed. His fingers trembled the entire time.
"You don't have to apologize," he finally said, forcing his voice to remain steady despite the tears threatening to spill. "None of this is your fault."
He paused, blinking rapidly.
His shoulders sagged beneath the weight of words he couldn't bring himself to say.
"I thought I got you back."
This one hurt even more to look at.
The silence that settled over the room felt heavier than the cast wrapped around your arm and the bandages circling your forehead. No one seemed to know what to say after that. Even the doctor quietly excused himself, leaving only the faint beeping of the heart monitor to fill the empty space between you and the stranger who apparently wasn't a stranger at all.
Your parents lingered near the foot of the bed, exchanging worried glances every few seconds. Your mother looked as though she was trying not to cry again, while your father had folded his arms tightly across his chest in the way he always did whenever he was overwhelmed. Seeing their familiar expressions was strangely comforting. You remembered family vacations, birthday dinners, your mother's habit of singing while cooking, and the way your father always insisted on taking pictures even when everyone complained. Those memories came naturally, untouched by whatever had happened to your mind.
Which only made one thing impossible to understand.
If your memories were still there...
Why was there absolutely nothing when you looked at Niki?
He stood quietly near the window now, giving you space you hadn't even asked for. The bouquet he'd brought rested beside your bed, its white lilies drooping slightly after spending days without fresh water. He hadn't touched them since setting them down. Instead, he kept his hands shoved inside the pocket of his hoodie, his gaze lowered toward the floor as though afraid that looking at you for too long would somehow make things worse.
Your mother finally broke the silence.
"Do you... remember telling us you were moving into your first apartment?"
"The beach trip last summer?"
"Dad got sunburned because he refused to wear sunscreen."
Your father sighed dramatically.
"I told you that story wasn't funny."
For the first time since waking up, everyone laughed.
Your mother's smile quickly faded again as she carefully asked the question she'd been avoiding.
"And... who was with you during that beach trip?"
You searched your memories.
Your smile slowly disappeared.
The beach itself appeared vividly in your mind. You remembered collecting shells near the shoreline, eating seafood from a tiny restaurant overlooking the ocean, watching fireworks after sunset...
But every memory contained an empty space beside you.
Someone should have been there.
There were conversations you couldn't hear anymore.
Laughter without a face attached to it.
A hand you remembered holding, but not whose it belonged to.
Your mother's eyes immediately found Niki.
"I know someone was there."
You squeezed your eyes shut, trying harder.
"But... I can't see them."
His voice remained impossibly gentle despite the heartbreak woven into every syllable.
"You don't have to force it."
You looked toward him again.
His answer came without hesitation.
"I'd rather you forget me than blame yourself for something you can't control."
Something about the way he said it made your chest tighten.
Yet every word he spoke carried a strange warmth.
Like someone who had spent years learning exactly how to comfort you.
The doctor returned not long afterward carrying a thin tablet tucked beneath one arm.
"We've completed the preliminary scans."
Everyone turned toward him.
"The good news is that there doesn't appear to be any permanent structural damage. Physically, your recovery is progressing remarkably well."
Your mother visibly relaxed.
"And the memory loss?" your father asked.
The doctor's expression became more cautious.
"That's much harder to predict."
He pulled up several brain scans.
"Traumatic amnesia varies significantly between patients. Some recover memories within days. Others take months."
"And if they never come back?" Niki asked quietly.
The room became painfully still.
The doctor didn't answer immediately.
"...That is also a possibility."
The words seemed to echo long after they'd been said.
The possibility settled over everyone like an approaching storm.
You found yourself glancing toward Niki almost instinctively.
He hadn't reacted dramatically.
He simply nodded once, accepting the answer with a heartbreaking calmness that somehow hurt more than if he had broken down completely.
The doctor excused himself once again, promising to return later with additional information. After he left, your parents stepped into the hallway to speak with one of the nurses, leaving you unexpectedly alone with Niki.
The silence between you felt different now.
You noticed him staring absentmindedly at the bouquet before finally walking over to replace the water inside the vase.
"You didn't have to do that," you said.
"They were your favorite."
"...I guess they still are."
"You always bought them whenever you were having a bad day."
A small laugh escaped him.
"You used to tell me buying flowers for yourself was cheaper than therapy."
Despite everything, you laughed.
"You said a lot of things."
His smile grew just a little.
"You also couldn't keep houseplants alive."
"You once killed a cactus."
"I don't even know how that's possible."
"I asked you the same question."
Another laugh slipped out before either of you realized it.
For the first time since waking up, you saw his shoulders relax.
But it was enough to make the room feel lighter.
"You smiled," he said quietly.
The silence returned, though this time it wasn't uncomfortable.
Curiosity eventually got the better of you.
The question caught him completely off guard.
For a moment he simply stared at you.
Then he laughed softly, shaking his head.
His smile became something warmer.
"It means we'd argue over what movie to watch for forty minutes..."
He looked toward the ceiling, remembering.
"...then spend the whole movie talking instead."
A tiny smile tugged at your lips.
"They looked comfortable."
"And you let me keep them?"
"I never won that battle."
You found yourself smiling without realizing it.
Listening to him describe someone you couldn't remember felt strangely surreal.
It was like hearing stories about another version of yourself.
Someone who apparently shared a life with him for three years.
You searched for the right word.
"You once threw a pillow at my head because I ate your fries."
"You cried over a dog video at two in the morning."
Every sentence he spoke carried the quiet confidence of someone who knew you better than you knew yourself.
It should have been unsettling.
It made you wish you remembered.
Your gaze drifted toward the silver chain hanging around his neck.
The ring attached to it caught the afternoon sunlight spilling through the hospital window.
"I noticed that earlier."
His fingers instinctively rose to touch it.
For just a second, something unreadable crossed his face.
He carefully slipped the chain over his head before opening his palm.
The ring rested there, simple and silver, worn slightly around the edges.
"It belonged to my grandfather."
He turned it over between his fingers.
"He told me to keep it until I found someone I couldn't imagine living without."
Your eyes remained fixed on the ring.
Something stirred deep inside you.
Like standing outside a locked room while hearing familiar voices behind the door.
His answer was almost inaudible.
The room fell silent once more.
Before either of you could say anything else, the hospital room door creaked open.
A man wearing a dark suit stepped inside.
He wasn't dressed like a doctor.
A leather folder rested beneath his arm, and a badge flashed briefly as he stepped forward.
His eyes settled on you first.
"It's good to see you're awake."
Then they shifted toward Niki.
Something about his tone immediately changed the atmosphere in the room.
Niki's expression hardened.
The detective glanced toward you before lowering his voice.
"We've received new evidence regarding the crash."
The detective looked between the two of you carefully.
"We're no longer treating it as a traffic accident."
The room fell deathly quiet.
"There is reason to believe..."
He placed a photograph onto the bedside table.
"...that someone deliberately forced your car off the road."
For several long seconds, no one moved.
The photograph lay face-up on your bedside table, yet no one seemed willing to reach for it. It was as though touching it would somehow make the detective's words real.
Someone deliberately forced your car off the road.
The sentence echoed endlessly inside your head.
The word barely escaped your lips.
The detective stepped farther into the room, closing the door behind him until the click of the latch sounded impossibly loud. The professional calm written across his face did little to ease the sudden knot forming in your stomach.
"We didn't want to discuss this until you regained consciousness," he explained carefully. "Initially, we believed the crash was caused by poor visibility and heavy rain."
"However... that changed yesterday."
Niki's expression remained unreadable.
"The traffic camera footage."
The detective slid another photograph from the folder, placing it beside the first. It showed the mangled remains of your car wrapped around a roadside barrier, emergency lights illuminating twisted metal beneath sheets of rain. Looking at it made your chest tighten.
Or what had once been your car.
You stared at the image, unable to reconcile the wreckage with the fact that you were somehow still alive.
"The original footage was difficult to recover because of the storm," the detective continued. "But forensic technicians managed to restore several missing frames."
He opened the folder again.
"It shows another vehicle following yours for approximately eleven minutes."
"Maintaining a constant distance."
"No attempt to overtake."
"No attempt to turn off."
Your mother instinctively reached for your hand beneath the blanket.
"Eventually," the detective said quietly, "that vehicle accelerated."
"...Contact?" your mother whispered.
"It struck the rear driver's side of your vehicle."
He tapped the photograph lightly.
"Hard enough to send the car into the guardrail."
Not because you remembered it.
Somewhere inside your mind, those eleven minutes had vanished completely.
No memory of someone chasing you through the rain.
The detective slowly shook his head.
The answer landed like a stone.
You looked down at your hands, still marked by bruises and healing cuts.
Had wanted this to happen.
Someone had watched your car in the rain.
Then driven into you on purpose.
A chill crawled slowly down your spine.
"Did you identify the driver?"
"So you don't know who did this."
"The vehicle appears to be a dark-colored SUV. Unfortunately, the license plate remains unreadable."
Frustration flashed across Niki's face.
"The investigation is ongoing."
"We're reviewing nearby businesses, surveillance cameras, and eyewitness reports."
The detective looked directly at you.
"Until we know more, we'd like you to remain cautious."
"If this wasn't random..."
He chose his next words carefully.
"...there is a possibility you were specifically targeted."
The room suddenly felt much smaller.
Your heartbeat pounded loudly against your ribs.
You couldn't think of anyone who would want to hurt you.
Not anyone you remembered.
The detective seemed to read your thoughts.
"We understand this is overwhelming."
Overwhelming wasn't the word.
Everything had changed in less than an hour.
You'd woken up believing you'd simply survived a terrible accident.
Now someone was telling you that another person may have tried to kill you.
That wasn't even the most confusing part.
He hadn't taken his eyes off the detective once.
His jaw remained tightly clenched.
His hands were balled into fists so tightly that his knuckles had turned white.
The realization slipped out before you could stop it.
Niki didn't answer immediately.
"The doctor asked me not to."
"They didn't want unnecessary stress while you were waking up."
Part of you appreciated that.
Another part wondered what else he hadn't told you.
The detective excused himself shortly afterward, promising to return once additional evidence became available. Before leaving, he handed your father a business card.
"If either of you remembers anything..."
He looked directly at you.
"No matter how insignificant it seems."
The door closed behind him.
Your parents quietly stepped into the hallway once again, wanting to speak with the detective privately.
Neither you nor Niki tried to stop them.
You remained staring at the photograph of the destroyed car.
The sentence came out strangely flat.
The room became quiet again.
After several minutes, curiosity finally outweighed hesitation.
Something in his voice made you look up.
For the first time since meeting him, he looked genuinely uncomfortable.
His gaze dropped to the floor.
"I honestly don't even remember anymore."
"I just realized it wasn't important."
He rubbed the back of his neck.
"You left the apartment angry."
The information hit you harder than expected.
You had shared a home with this person.
You had apparently built an entire life together.
Yet now he felt no more familiar than a stranger passing you on the street.
"What were we fighting about?"
"You said I was being overprotective."
"You thought I worried too much."
"What happened after we argued?"
He looked toward the hospital window.
"I figured you'd cool off."
His voice became quieter.
"I was going to apologize."
His fingers tightened around the edge of the chair.
"I bought your favorite cake."
"You were bringing it home."
"I was halfway back when my phone rang."
The silence stretched painfully.
"The police officer asked if I knew the owner of your car."
It wasn't really laughter.
"I thought it was a parking ticket."
"...I actually complained before they finished talking."
He looked down at his hands.
He mimicked his own voice from three days ago.
"'Can't this wait? I'm driving.'"
"They told me to pull over."
"When they said your name..."
His voice disappeared completely.
You didn't know why, but tears began gathering in your own eyes.
Not because you remembered.
Because you could hear the regret living inside every word he spoke.
"I should've been with you."
His whisper barely reached your ears.
"If I hadn't let you leave alone..."
"You couldn't have known."
"I promised I'd always protect you."
He laughed bitterly again.
"And look what happened."
For a long moment, neither of you spoke.
Finally, you asked the question lingering in your mind.
"...Did you really love me that much?"
He looked genuinely confused.
"There wasn't really an 'as much.'"
The simplicity of the answer stole your breath.
"I wasn't keeping score."
He looked at you with eyes carrying three years' worth of memories you no longer shared.
Just three quiet words that somehow carried the weight of an entire lifetime.
Because something inside your chest hurt.
You had no memories of this man.
No late-night conversations.
It was as if someone had taken scissors to your life and carefully cut him out of every single memory.
You hated not remembering.
You hated the sadness in his eyes every time you looked at him.
You hated the growing feeling that you were grieving someone you had never met.
Just then, a soft knock interrupted the silence.
A young nurse peeked her head through the doorway, smiling apologetically.
"There's someone downstairs asking for you."
The nurse checked the note in her hand.
Something changed in Niki's expression.
So subtle that your parents, who had just returned, didn't seem to notice.
For the briefest moment...
He stood slowly from his chair.
He offered you a reassuring smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.
"It'll only take a minute."
He left the room without another word.
The door clicked shut behind him.
You stared after him for several seconds before turning back toward the window.
Outside, the evening sky had begun to darken, rain clouds gathering once again over the city.
Down in the hospital parking lot, a black SUV sat idling near the entrance.
Its headlights remained fixed on the building.
And from the driver's seat...
Someone was watching Niki.
The moment Niki disappeared through the hospital room door, the room felt different.
Not because he had been talking—if anything, he had spoken less than anyone else since you'd woken up—but because his presence had somehow become comforting without you realizing it. It was strange. You couldn't remember loving him, couldn't remember meeting him, couldn't even remember hearing his name before today, yet the thought of him walking away left behind an emptiness you couldn't explain.
You found yourself staring at the closed door longer than necessary.
"He'll be back," she said gently, smoothing a hand over the blanket covering your legs.
You looked away almost immediately, embarrassed that she'd caught you looking.
"I wasn't waiting for him."
She smiled knowingly but didn't argue.
Instead, she adjusted the flowers sitting beside your bed, carefully removing one of the wilted lilies before replacing the water inside the vase. "He's been doing that every morning," she murmured absentmindedly. "Changing the water. Replacing the flowers whenever they started to die."
"He refused to leave for more than twenty minutes at a time."
Your father leaned against the wall with a tired sigh. "I kept telling him to go home and shower."
"He even argued with the nurses."
Your mother laughed quietly through her exhaustion.
"They had to convince him to sleep."
"Did he... really stay here the whole time?"
Neither of your parents answered immediately.
Your father eventually spoke, his voice carrying the weight of someone who had witnessed far more than he wanted to.
"The first night..." he began, "...they weren't sure you'd survive."
"The doctors told us to prepare ourselves."
He rubbed a hand across his face before continuing.
"Niki never accepted that."
Your mother smiled sadly.
"He kept talking to you."
"He said you hated quiet rooms."
She laughed softly, wiping away the tears beginning to gather in her eyes again.
"So he just... kept talking."
"He told you about the weather."
"About the movie he wanted the two of you to watch."
"About how your apartment was probably becoming a disaster because neither of you had watered your plants."
"They were already dead."
For the first time since waking up, you found yourself smiling naturally.
It faded just as quickly.
"He really thought I'd hear him?"
Your mother looked toward the empty chair beside your bed.
"I think he just needed to believe you could."
The room fell silent again.
Your gaze drifted toward the bouquet sitting beside you. The lilies looked fresh now, tiny droplets of water still clinging to their petals. They were beautiful.
You wondered how many bouquets had come before these.
How many had wilted while you slept.
How many mornings Niki had quietly replaced them without expecting you to ever know.
Your fingers absentmindedly traced the edge of the blanket.
"I wish I remembered him."
The confession escaped before you had time to stop it.
Neither of your parents looked surprised.
Your mother simply reached over and squeezed your hand.
"No..." you whispered, swallowing around the lump forming in your throat. "I don't just mean... because he's my boyfriend."
You searched for the words.
"...I hate looking at someone who's clearly hurting because of me."
"He keeps looking at me like..." You hesitated. "...Like I'm still the same person."
"I don't feel like I am."
Your father walked over to the window, folding his arms as he stared out at the gray afternoon sky.
"Memory doesn't make a person."
"You still laugh at terrible jokes."
"You still wrinkle your nose when you're thinking."
"You still overanalyze everything."
A faint smile tugged at his lips.
"You've been doing that since you were six."
Your mother nodded in agreement.
"The memories are missing."
She brushed a loose strand of hair away from your face.
"But you're still our child."
You wanted to believe her.
Yet every time you thought about the last three years, your mind ran into the same invisible wall.
No late-night conversations.
A gentle knock interrupted your thoughts.
A young nurse stepped inside carrying a small cardboard box.
"I almost forgot," she said. "These were recovered from the vehicle."
She carefully placed the box on the table beside your bed.
"The police already documented everything they needed."
She smiled politely before leaving the room again.
For several seconds, nobody moved.
Your eyes remained fixed on the box.
"They wanted to wait until you were awake."
You reached toward it hesitantly.
Inside were familiar objects.
A cracked phone sealed inside an evidence bag.
A small notebook with bent corners.
Nothing that explained why someone might have wanted to kill you.
Near the bottom of the box sat an old silver key attached to a tiny moon-shaped keychain.
Your parents exchanged confused looks.
"I've never seen that before," your mother admitted.
The key felt strangely cold in your palm.
It wasn't attached to your apartment keys.
It belonged somewhere else.
Somewhere you couldn't remember.
Your heartbeat quickened.
There was something oddly familiar about it.
Not enough to unlock a memory.
Just enough to leave behind an uncomfortable feeling that it mattered.
You turned it over between your fingers.
Engraved on one side were three tiny numbers.
"What does that open?" you asked.
Your father shook his head.
You slipped the key back into the box, unsettled by how insignificant it looked despite the strange feeling it left behind.
Your attention shifted to your phone.
The screen had shattered into a spiderweb of cracks, but the device still powered on after several attempts.
Your mother smiled hopefully.
"Maybe seeing pictures will help."
Even so, you unlocked it using muscle memory alone.
It was a picture of a sunset over the ocean.
You opened your photo gallery.
Thousands of pictures loaded slowly onto the screen.
Standing beside you with his arm slung around your shoulders.
Laughing across restaurant tables.
Making ridiculous faces while you rolled your eyes at the camera.
Sleeping on the couch with one of your hands tangled in his hoodie.
You stared silently as photograph after photograph painted the life your mind had erased.
Not just smiling for a picture.
Your fingers trembled as you continued scrolling.
Then one image made you stop.
It had been taken in front of a mirror.
Niki stood behind you, his chin resting lightly on your shoulder while you grinned at the camera.
Around your neck hung the same silver ring he'd shown you earlier.
The caption underneath read simply:
Your chest tightened so suddenly that it hurt to breathe.
Before you could process the feeling, the phone vibrated in your hands.
An incoming notification appeared across the cracked screen.
A second message arrived before you could react.
He isn't telling you everything.
Ask Niki what happened at 11:43 p.m. the night before the crash.
ou couldn't stop staring at the screen.
The cracks running across your phone distorted the words just enough to make them shimmer beneath the fluorescent hospital lights, but they were still perfectly readable.
He isn't telling you everything.
Ask Niki what happened at 11:43 p.m. the night before the crash.
Your pulse hammered against your ribs so violently you could hear it over the steady beeping of the heart monitor. The room around you seemed to disappear until those three messages were all that existed. Whoever had sent them knew your phone still worked. They knew you'd woken up. More importantly... they knew Niki had just left the room.
Your father noticed the color draining from your face almost immediately. "What's wrong?" he asked, crossing the room in only a few strides. When you couldn't answer, you simply handed him the phone with trembling hands. His expression shifted the second he read the messages. The warmth disappeared from his face, replaced by a seriousness that made your stomach twist. Your mother moved beside him, reading over his shoulder before quietly covering her mouth.
"No..." she whispered. "Who would send something like this?"
"I don't know," you admitted, your voice barely above a whisper. "It just... appeared."
For several long moments, neither of your parents spoke. Your father tapped the screen several times, attempting to reveal more information about the sender, but the contact remained completely blank. No name. No number. No picture. Just the words Unknown Number staring back at him.
Without another word, he slipped the phone into his pocket.
"I'm calling the detective."
The door clicked shut behind him, leaving only you and your mother in the room. She sat carefully beside your bed, though she seemed just as unsettled as you felt. Her fingers absentmindedly smoothed the blanket covering your legs while her eyes remained fixed on the closed door, lost in thoughts she didn't seem ready to share.
"You don't believe it," you finally said.
"I don't know what to believe."
Her answer surprised you. You had expected immediate reassurance—some insistence that Niki would never hurt you, that the messages were nothing more than a cruel joke. Instead, she remained painfully honest.
"I know the young man who's barely left this hospital in three days," she said quietly. "I've watched him sleep in uncomfortable waiting room chairs because he refused to go home. I've watched him argue with nurses because he thought they weren't checking on you often enough. I've watched him talk to you for hours even when everyone believed you couldn't hear him."
She paused before meeting your eyes.
"But I also know we still don't know everything that happened that night."
Her words lingered in the silence between you.
You thought back to everything you'd learned since waking up.
Someone had deliberately rammed your car.
The police believed you had been targeted.
Now anonymous messages were warning you about the one person who seemed to love you more than anyone else.
Nothing made sense anymore.
The detective returned less than twenty minutes later, his expression immediately sharpening when your father handed him the phone. He read each message twice before slipping on a pair of latex gloves and placing the device inside a clear evidence bag.
"The timing is interesting," he murmured.
Your brows knitted together.
He looked directly at you.
"These messages arrived four minutes after Niki left your hospital room."
The realization sent a chill racing down your spine.
"So... someone knew he wasn't here?"
He didn't finish the sentence.
Someone had been watching.
The image of the black SUV sitting outside the hospital immediately resurfaced in your mind. You remembered its headlights pointed toward the building, remembered the strange feeling that someone inside was observing the entrance instead of preparing to leave.
"There was a car," you said suddenly.
He immediately opened his notebook.
"Did you see the driver?"
You slowly shook your head.
"What about the license plate?"
He scribbled something onto the page before closing the notebook with a quiet snap.
"I'll have someone review the hospital's surveillance footage."
He hesitated for a moment before continuing.
"I'd appreciate it if you didn't mention these messages to Niki."
"If someone is deliberately trying to create distrust between them, I don't want that person knowing we've seen the messages."
His explanation made sense.
The thought of keeping something from Niki felt strangely uncomfortable.
Before anyone could continue the conversation, footsteps echoed down the hallway.
You looked up just as the door opened.
Niki stepped inside carrying a small paper bag from the hospital café, his hair slightly damp from the rain outside. The moment he saw you awake, the exhaustion on his face softened into the same gentle smile he'd worn all day.
"I brought dinner," he said, lifting the bag slightly. "I remembered you always complained that hospital food tasted like cardboard."
The detective quietly excused himself, offering Niki a polite nod before leaving without another word. Once the door closed, Niki walked over to your bedside and carefully unpacked the contents of the bag. Tomato soup. A bread roll. Apple juice.
"You used to ask for this whenever you got sick," he explained with a small smile. "Said it was the only thing that made you feel human again."
You couldn't help smiling back.
"You said a lot of dramatic things."
"You once cried because a pigeon stole your sandwich."
"It was probably a good sandwich."
A quiet laugh escaped both of you.
For just a moment, the heaviness surrounding the hospital room seemed to disappear.
"You still laugh the same."
"I don't remember doing it before."
Those three words settled heavily inside your chest.
He remembered your first date.
The first time you said you loved him.
He remembered birthdays, anniversaries, lazy Sunday mornings, arguments that ended with apologies, grocery shopping, midnight drives, inside jokes that only the two of you understood.
He remembered an entire life.
While you couldn't remember a single day of it.
Your eyes drifted toward the silver ring hanging from the chain around his neck.
The one he'd admitted he planned to use to propose.
A proposal that never happened.
A future that disappeared somewhere on a rain-soaked highway.
Without thinking, your gaze shifted toward the digital clock mounted above the hospital door.
The glowing numbers froze you where you sat.
Your mind immediately returned to the anonymous message.
Ask Niki what happened at 11:43 p.m. the night before the crash.
Before you could stop yourself, the question escaped your lips.
He looked up from opening the soup container.
"What happened at 11:43 the night before the accident?"
The smile disappeared from his face.
His movements stopped completely, the spoon still clutched loosely between his fingers. The color slowly drained from his face as he stared at you in complete silence.
It wasn't confusion you saw.
The kind that appears before someone has even spoken.
Several seconds passed before he finally managed to find his voice.
His smile slowly disappeared.
