The name on the file glared back at me: Elias Ward.
I didn't know who he was. The picture showed a man maybe a few years older than me, sharp-jawed and stoic, with storm-grey eyes that seemed to pierce through the page itself. He looked cold. Controlled. Unreachable.
And yet... familiar.
There was something about his face. A shadow of memory, a fleeting moment I couldn't place. Like I'd seen him once in a blur and forgotten. A coincidence, maybe.
But more than that—he looked willing. His photo wasn't taken under protest. His expression wasn't one of a man forced into donation. It was like he wanted to be found. Like he was... waiting.
My fingers trembled slightly as I put the file back on the desk. Lila was still arguing with the nurse outside. I stood alone in that room, and for the first time, I felt a shift inside me — like something invisible had taken root and was pulling strings I didn't understand.
I memorized the address on the file.
I didn't even tell Lila.
Not yet.
---
Back home that night, sleep wouldn't come.
I stared at the ceiling for hours, the name Elias Ward repeating in my head like a haunting. He was the key. The only way to save myself.
And maybe it was desperation… maybe it was fear of dying… or maybe it was curiosity that whispered to me in the dark:
"Find him."
--