Nina's question deserved more than the list of things I had carefully refused to claim. She sat close enough for our knees to touch if either of us moved, giving my answer nowhere abstract to hide. I wanted several futures from her, though naming them all would turn interest into pressure.
"I want to know you," I said, keeping my hands still above the blanket, "outside lectures, accidents, plus hospital visiting hours."
"That is one thing," Nina replied, refusing to let a broad answer carry everything else.
"I am attracted to you," I continued, watching her face instead of the score display, "and I want the chance to see whether that becomes something mutual."
Nina breathed through her nose, holding my gaze as color reached her cheeks. She did not look trapped or surprised, but the answer had removed our last plausible excuse. Attraction now existed aloud between us even if its direction remained uneven.
"What would the chance involve?" she asked, turning her pen once above the closed notebook.
The question tempted me to describe dates, kisses, plus every fantasy my hospital medication had improved. None belonged inside a first answer while she sat beside an injured man who had saved her life. I chose what could happen without demanding a romantic decision around me.
"Messages, coffee, then another plan if we both want one," I said, accepting how ordinary it sounded, "I do not expect an answer about us inside this room."
"Because I feel guilty," Nina said, checking whether I understood the imbalance rather than supplying an excuse.
"Partly," I replied, allowing her guilt to remain true without defining every choice, "and because I have spent four days learning how to speak to you."
"Three days," she corrected, glancing toward the hospital clock with a small smile.
"The accident afternoon contained several years," I said, keeping the humor behind the answer instead of before it.
Nina laughed quietly, resting the pen across her notebook while tension left her shoulders. The conversation had not produced a confession from her, but it had survived mine without retreat. I felt relief before the System could record anything in that moment.
"I can give you a smaller answer," she said, leaning forward until her elbows rested near her knees, "I want the messages, the coffee, plus a chance too."
The phrase reached me in sections because excitement kept interrupting comprehension again. Nina had not called it attraction, dating, or a promise for now. She had still chosen the same next steps for reasons beyond accident guilt.
"That is enough," I replied, stopping before gratitude made her responsible for my happiness.
"Do not sound shocked," Nina said, moving her knee deliberately until it touched mine, "I have been flirting with you since the corridor."
"I believed the evidence," I told her, looking down once before returning to her face, "but disbelief has excellent legal representation."
"Fire that committee too," she replied, leaving her knee against mine while she reopened the notebook.
The contact remained through several minutes of silence, practical only if we agreed to lie badly. I could feel the warmth through my thin hospital trousers that evening. Nina wrote interview notes without moving away, allowing the touch to become comfortable before anything else changed.
[Communication milestone recorded.]
[Communication: 14 → 17]
[Relationship status: Acquaintance]
[Mutual Interest: UNCONFIRMED]
The final line prevented the System from deciding what Nina had not said. Wanting a chance might include attraction, but only a direct conversation could confirm the stage. I appreciated the restraint even while wishing the screen understood subtext today.
"Three points," I said after Nina looked toward my expression, "plus an official refusal to interpret you."
"Keep it that way," she replied, tapping her pen against my blanket as she watched me, "I can interpret myself."
"It says mutual interest remains unconfirmed," I told her, giving the wording without asking her to change it.
"Accurate," Nina said, holding my gaze long enough to make the accuracy frustrating.
Her answer carried amusement rather than rejection inside the quiet room around us. I let the unresolved line stay unresolved because she had given me coffee, messages, plus a chance. Trying to force a status update would damage the thing I wanted confirmed.
Nina closed the notebook, then asked what I believed a chance required from her. The question exposed another expectation I had left hidden beneath reasonable language. I took several seconds because an immediate answer would probably repeat whatever sounded safest.
"Nothing you have not chosen," I said, watching her fingers remain around the notebook, "but honesty when something feels wrong would help me."
"Honesty can include me changing my mind," she replied, keeping her voice calm enough that the condition felt ordinary.
"It has to," I said, accepting the discomfort before it could become an argument, "otherwise the first yes becomes a trap."
The answer relaxed something small across her shoulders because Nina had probably expected gratitude to become leverage once my recovery improved. Naming the right to leave made our smaller agreement more real, not less valuable.
"What do you need from me?" I asked, returning the question without assuming our needs matched.
"No disappearing when you feel embarrassed," she said, tapping the closed notebook against one knee, "and no System summaries instead of conversations."
Both requests found harmful habits I had already demonstrated repeatedly inside the hospital. I used screens when feelings became difficult, then withdrew before another person could evaluate me. Nina wanted honest access to my answer, not permanent access to everything inside me.
"I can promise to tell you when I need space," I said, choosing something more honest than never withdrawing, "then I will say when I plan to return."
"That works," Nina replied, moving her knee away only when Ava's cart sounded beyond the door.
The agreement contained no romance label, yet it established rules a careless relationship might skip. I felt more painfully exposed discussing withdrawal than I had while admitting attraction. Nina had received the part of me most likely to sabotage whatever chance she offered.
Her phone vibrated with a message from Olica asking about discharge time. Nina answered without hiding the screen, then placed the phone beside her notebook. I did not mistake that casual openness for permission to read anything else.
"Olica wants to know whether she should bring the small car," Nina said, glancing toward the oversized clothing bag.
"Bring the largest vehicle available," I replied, looking toward my mother's folded shirts, "my future growth requires cargo space."
Her laughter returned before the nurse entered, leaving our difficult conversation attached to something warm. The smaller answer had survived boundaries, possible withdrawal, plus the threat of maternal tailoring. I trusted it more because neither of us had made it large.
Ava entered to remove the drain before discharge, sending Nina toward the corridor with both notebooks. The procedure was brief, uncomfortable, plus impossible to narrate with dignity quietly. When Nina returned, she carried my folded clothing from the cabinet today.
"Your mother packed these before leaving the country?" she asked, holding up a grey shirt designed to fit two larger men.
"She buys clothing around future growth," I replied, accepting the shirt after she lowered it, "I disappointed the fabric."
"You are twenty," Nina said, examining the collar while disbelief entered her face, "your future growth should not require a sail."
The System opened a locked Style tab above the shirt, displaying a silhouette wearing my usual lecture clothes. Every poor fit received a precise marker: shoulder seam too low, trousers pooling, colors selected through surrender. Nina could not see the assessment, but my expression apparently translated enough.
[STYLE ASSESSMENT UNLOCKED]
[Current Style: 09/100]
[Primary issue: clothing selected to avoid notice rather than fit the wearer.]
[Secondary issue: grooming maintained for invisibility, not intention.]
"It says I dress to avoid notice," I reported, looking from the screen toward the oversized shirt in my hands.
"That machine occasionally earns its electricity," Nina replied, sitting after Ava confirmed the procedure was done.
"It also objects to my grooming," I said, reading the secondary line before lowering the screen.
"Your hair has three separate escape plans," she told me, gesturing toward my head while her smile widened.
I touched the flattened side, finding another section rising behind my ear. Surgery had excused several days, though my normal routine differed only through access to a shower. Nina studied my face without turning the assessment into ridicule nearby today.
"You do not need expensive clothes," she said, folding the shirt across her lap while she looked at the shoulder seam, "you need things shaped for the body wearing them."
"The body is currently shaped around swelling," I replied, resting a hand near the bandage.
"Then we use what you own for discharge," Nina said, placing the shirt beside two other options, "after that, you decide whether Style nine bothers you."
Her wording mattered because help had not become a makeover I owed her for receiving. She could teach fit without replacing my choices before anything else changed. I asked whether she would help select tomorrow's clothes from the bag.
"Yes," she replied, opening it only after I placed it within her reach, "but I reserve the right to insult one shirt."
"Only one?" I asked, looking toward the four candidates my mother had folded.
"I am practicing restraint," Nina said, pulling out a brown polo before her face changed, "though the program is under pressure."
Her laugh arrived before mine, forcing me to hold a pillow against my ribs while the sound escaped. She apologized without becoming solemn, placing the brown shirt at the bottom of the stack. The System added one final line above it inside the room nearby.
[Recommended first action: stop hiding inside fabric chosen by somebody else.]
Nina read my expression, then held up the grey shirt against my shoulders without touching the injured side. The hem reached halfway down my thighs before the moment moved forward again. She tried maintaining professional seriousness for two seconds before laughter defeated her again.