Noelle Confides in Bea

The staff locker room was small, windowless, and smelled faintly of lemon cleaner and worry. Metal lockers lined the walls, some dented, and some covered in peeling motivational stickers from nurses long gone. A dying fluorescent bulb buzzed softly overhead, flickering every few seconds like it couldn't decide whether to give up or keep going.

Noelle sat on the bench in the middle of the room, head bowed, hands clasped between her knees. Her hair was loose today, falling around her face like a curtain she could hide behind. Her cleaning gloves sat discarded beside her, wrinkled and empty.

Bea stood near the sink, sipping coffee from a reusable cup that had faded butterflies printed on the sides. Her uniform was spotless, but her expression wasn't. It was lined with fatigue, concern, and something harder to name, protective irritation.

"You saw him again," Bea said, not asking.

Noelle didn't respond.

"You spoke to him this time."

Still no reply.

Bea sighed and set the cup down. "Noelle."

"He looked right at me."

Her voice was soft. Unsteady.

Bea turned, arms crossing. "And?"

"And… I saw it," Noelle whispered. "For a second. In his eyes. It wasn't memory, not fully, but it was something. He felt something."

Bea was silent.

Noelle looked up. Her eyes were rimmed red, but dry. She looked like a storm that had already passed, but might come again at any moment.

"I wanted to tell him," she said. "I almost did. Just say it. I'm your wife. You loved me. But I couldn't."

Bea sat down across from her. "Because you knew what it would cost."

Noelle nodded, her voice barely audible. "If he looked at me and still didn't remember… I don't think I could survive that."

Bea reached over, took one of her hands. "You've already survived worse."

Noelle managed a bitter laugh. "That's what everyone keeps saying."

Bea squeezed her fingers. "Tell me everything."

So she did.

From the moment she walked into the room, to the sketchpad with her name written like prayer, to the moment Kairo stared at her and said, "Do I know you?"

Bea listened without interrupting, but her eyes never stopped moving, reading, measuring, bracing.

When Noelle finally went quiet, Bea leaned back, exhaling.

"He's getting closer."

Noelle nodded. "But what if I'm making it worse? What if seeing me this way… as a stranger… just confuses him more?"

"And what if it's what's keeping him grounded?" Bea said gently. "What if seeing you is the only reason he's still fighting?"

Noelle looked at her. "But what if it breaks him when he finds out I lied?"

"You didn't lie. You protected him. And yourself."

"I didn't tell the truth."

"You didn't destroy it either."

Noelle looked down at their clasped hands. Her thumb moved absentmindedly across Bea's skin like she was comforting both of them.

"Do you think I should leave?" she asked. "Just… disappear before he remembers the wrong version of me?"

Bea's eyes narrowed. "Absolutely not."

"Why?"

"Because I've never seen a man fight for a shadow the way he's fighting for you. And if you walk away now, he might stop fighting altogether."

Noelle blinked quickly. Her throat felt tight again.

Bea stood and moved to the door, glancing down the hallway.

When she spoke again, her voice was lower.

"I'm breaking rules to keep you here, Elle. Real ones. The kind that could cost me my job, maybe more. But I'd do it again tomorrow, and the day after, because I believe in you two. But that means you have to decide if you're staying long enough to be found or leaving before he has a chance."

Noelle stood, slowly.

"He's drawing me."

Bea blinked. "What?"

"In his sketchpad. My face. It's not finished, but it's me. And he keeps writing my name."

Bea's shoulders softened. Her mouth parted like she wanted to smile but didn't quite have permission.

"That man," she said, "is already halfway back to you."

Noelle crossed the room, pulled her coat off the hook.

"He deserves the truth," she said quietly. "But I need him to choose it. I need him to see me and choose me again."

"Then you better keep showing up."

Noelle nodded.

And for the first time in weeks, there was something alive behind her eyes.

Not relief.

Not certainty.

But resolve.

The kind you carry when you're still hurting but you're not done yet.