Chapter Eleven

When Anai told him he was going to meet “the boss,” Doavin hadn’t known what to expect. When they entered the tunnel, however, he began to think they’d be going somewhere secret and isolated. As it turned out, they’d entered the Center for the Terminally Ill and Eternally Lost instead.

Beyond two sets of automatic doors was a gleaming shrine to the color white; the floor, walls, and front desk were all covered in white tiles of varying shape and size. The corridors were interrupted by white double doors, and around a soft bend was a waiting room filled with plush chairs, all also white. When a nurse passed by, red hair tucked in a bun under her bleached cap, Doavin wondered how these people could spend so much time there without going insane.

Aeneat had stopped at the front desk, leaning against it as one of the other nurses stopped typing at her computer to help him. He smiled with a charm Doavin had seen no sign of most recently and watched as the nurse’s cheeks flushed as she lowered her gaze to fumble with a small stack of paperwork. “Good Morning, sir,” she murmured. “Here to visit Ihsan today?”

Aeneat nodded, seeming to ignore the elf’s flustered reaction. “Yes, thank you. My friend and I would like to go up to see him. I could sign us in, if that’s alright?”

“Oh!” the nurse raised her eyes to look at him, not so much as glancing back at Doavin. “No, it’s okay. Nairi put that clipboard somewhere and I haven’t been able to find it for the life of me. We all know you here anyway. You can go ahead upstairs, and if I find it I’ll bring it up to you.”

Doavin got the feeling she was breaking some sort of unspoken rule from the way Aeneat’s smile widened slightly and the nurse’s face glowed with a vibrancy that rivaled the instance’s color. “Well thank you, Nurse…” he bent a bit to eye the nametag pinned over her breast, “Nurse Delwyn. I do appreciate it. Could you tell me if Ihsan has any other visitors right now?”

The nurse hesitated, eyes going skyward for a moment. “Well, without that clipboard I can’t say for sure. But I’m pretty sure I saw his sister come in earlier, so she’s probably up there now.”

“Perfect,” Aeneat pulled back from the desk, shooting the nurse one last smile. “Thank you. Very much.”

“Oh anytime, sir!” she chirped, still glowing. Doavin shot her one last look before turning to follow Aeneat, feeling as though he’d gone unnoticed by everyone he’d seen since Anai left them.

Aeneat bypassed the elevator, instead leading Doavin to a back staircase. He climbed to the top floor without so much as turning to make sure Doavin was still behind him but paused by the door leading into the hallway. “Answer her when she speaks to you,” he warned. “You’ll regret it if you’re rude to her.” The tone of his voice made it unclear just who would make Doavin regret his continued silence. Possibly it would be the boss, but Doavin found it more likely that it would be Aeneat himself. Still, rather than speak he nodded, and Aeneat shot him a sharp look before pushing the door open and walking back into the bright whiteness of another waiting room.

While the room downstairs had been far from bustling, this one was almost completely vacant. The television recited last night’s news for the sole occupant, and Doavin hesitated before following Aeneat closer. She was an elf, judging from the shape of her heavily adorned ears, and she looked more like Aeneat than she did the figures on the screen she had been watching so intently. After a moment, Doavin decided that was more because of her dark hair than anything else—when he studied their faces, he realized they were actually rather different. Their noses were similarly straight and they shared a certain fullness of the lower lip, but that was where the similarities ended. Her jaw was softer, her skin paler, and her hair lacked any of the Aeneat's curl. Doavin was most struck by her eyes, however; they were nothing like Aeneat's, nor were they anything like Lars', far larger, rounder, and a dark hybrid of blue and green. Aeneat’s eyes could be expressive, but hers were powerful. Pinned under her gaze, he felt ransacked, as though she had gone over every nook of his personality and discovered things about him that he himself still did not know or remember.

“Ah,” her lips twitched, forming a faint smile, and Doavin was shocked to find her mouth remained closed when she spoke. “So you’re the one who’s gotten my little Aeneat in such a state. My name is Esme. Come sit with me.”

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