Chapter Twenty-Eight: Victoria Hospital
Five years was a lifetime measured in textbooks, case studies, and the quiet hum of a life lived at a careful, manageable volume. Oakhaven was a memory. The cottage, the neutral-toned existence—they had served as a cocoon. Now, Dr. Amaya Snow (the title still felt like a costume she hadn't quite grown into) lived in a small, sunlit apartment on the other side of the country, a forty-minute train ride from her parents' new, stylish condo in the city. The distance was a relief, a necessary buffer maintained with weekly dutiful calls and monthly dinners.
She was a junior intern in clinical psychology at Victoria Hospital, a sprawling, grey-stone institution that buzzed with a relentless, sober energy. Her life was a rotation of supervised therapy sessions, endless paperwork, and the low-grade anxiety of knowing she was responsible for fragile, human minds. She was good at it. Careful, empathetic, precise. She had learned to channel the once-overwhelming flood of her own feelings into a professional tool for navigating others' pain.
The engagement to Richard was a fact of her life, like a distant satellite in a stable orbit. It was a long-distance arrangement of mutual convenience and familial expectation. He was climbing the corporate ladder with the same ruthless efficiency she applied to her case files. He visited every six to eight weeks—polite dinners, discussions of future real estate investments, a chaste kiss goodbye. It was a partnership on paper, and she had long ago stopped trying to feel the words.
Her one spark of genuine warmth in the sterile hospital corridors was Chloe. Her old college friend, reunited by the sheer, random luck of matching to the same internship program. Chloe, who still had a glint of mischief in her eye and who remembered the girl Amaya used to be.
"I still can't believe you're engaged to a human spreadsheet," Chloe whispered as they sorted patient files in the cramped intern's lounge. "Does he have a favorite cell in Excel? I bet he does."
"He's very… orderly," Amaya said, a faint, wry smile touching her lips. It was their old routine, and it was comforting.
"Orderly is for filing cabinets, not fiancés," Chloe snorted. "You need a man who causes a little healthy chaos. Like… I don't know, a brooding, brilliant doctor who works in the psychopharmacology unit and looks like he stepped out of a medical drama." She wiggled her eyebrows.
Amaya's smile didn't falter, but a familiar, ancient wall slid shut inside her. "I'll stick with my spreadsheet, thanks. Less plot twists."
The announcement came during the weekly senior staff and intern briefing. Dr. Vance, the head of the Psychology Department, a woman with a voice like rolling gravel and a gaze that could pin you to your seat, stood at the front of the lecture hall.
"Right, people. Assignments for the next rotation," she barked, looking over her reading glasses. "You'll be paired with a senior consultant for direct supervision on your complex cases. This is not a suggestion. It is mandatory."
A list flashed up on the screen. Amaya scanned it idly, sipping her terrible hospital coffee. Chloe Bennett – Dr. Elna. Michael Torres – Dr. Singh. Her own name was near the bottom. Her eyes tracked across.
Amaya Snow – Dr. Rowon.
The world did not stop. The coffee did not spill. Her heart did not shatter. Instead, a profound, surreal stillness settled over her. The letters of the name seemed to vibrate on the screen, separate from all the others. Rowon. It wasn't an uncommon name. It was a coincidence. A statistical anomaly in a large hospital system. It had to be.
But a cold certainty, deeper than logic, seeped into her bones.
"Any issues, see me after. Dismissed," Dr. Vance said.
The room erupted into chatter. Chloe grabbed her arm. "Rowon? Isn't that the new hotshot consultant in Adult Psychiatry? The one who just transferred from that big research hospital? The one they say is a genius but has the bedside manner of a scalpel?"
Amaya couldn't speak. She could only stare at the screen, the name burning itself into her retinas.
"Hey, you okay?" Chloe's voice softened. "You're white as a sheet. Do you know him?"
"I…" Amaya's voice was a dry rustle. "A long time ago. A neighbor." The words were absurdly inadequate.
"A neighbor?" Chloe's eyes went wide with delicious scandal. "The neighbor? The one from the motorcycle and the locket and the great wedding escape? That Rowon?"
Amaya managed a tight nod.
"Oh my god." Chloe's whisper was gleeful and horrified. "That's not a twist, that's the whole plot! You have to request a change. Immediately. Vance has to understand, this is… this is a conflict of interest of epic, Shakespearean proportions!"
Clutching at the lifeline, Amaya hurried after the retreating form of Dr. Vance. "Dr. Vance? A moment, please?"
Vance turned, her expression impatient. "Snow. What is it?"
"My assignment. Under Dr. Rowon. I… I have a prior acquaintance. From years ago. I believe it could constitute a personal conflict that might interfere with the supervisory relationship." She kept her voice professional, steady.
Vance looked at her over her glasses, her gaze assessing. "A personal conflict."
"Yes. We were… neighbors. As teenagers. It was… somewhat contentious." The understatement of the century.
"Are you currently in a personal or romantic relationship with Dr. Rowon?"
"No. Absolutely not."
"Are you related by blood or marriage?"
"No."
"Do you have any active financial or legal entanglements with him?"
"No."
"Then I don't see a conflict," Vance said flatly. "The hospital's definition is clear. Prior acquaintance is not grounds for reassignment. Dr. Rowon is one of our most sought-after supervisors. His research on treatment-resistant mood disorders is groundbreaking. You should consider yourself fortunate. Learn from him. Personal history is irrelevant to professional conduct. I expect you both to behave accordingly."
"But Dr. Vance—"
"The assignment stands, Snow. Consider it an opportunity to demonstrate professional maturity. Dismissed."
She walked away, leaving Amaya standing alone in the bustling corridor. The sterile hospital air felt suddenly too thin. The walls, with their cheerful posters about mental wellness, seemed to mock her.
Dr. Rowon. Not Aris. Not the boy next door. A senior consultant. Her direct superior. The architect of her most profound humiliation was now the gatekeeper to her professional future.
She had spent five years building a new, calm, controlled life. She had boxed away the tempestuous girl with the loud heart. She had agreed to terms of surrender. And now, with a few letters on a screen, the past had not just returned.
It had been assigned to her.