Mira tries to stop.
She avoids the bridge. Takes different routes. Forces herself to forget his name.
It doesn't work.
She finds him anyway—in a hospital hallway, sitting beside a vending machine that hums too loudly.
"You said you'd stop coming," he says.
"I tried," she replies. "I can't."
He stands. He looks real. Entirely, frighteningly real.
"If I stay," he says, voice tight, "you won't just lose memories anymore."
"What will I lose?"
"Continuity," he says. "People will remember you… differently."
Mira thinks of her carefully constructed life. Her distance. Her safety.
She thinks of the way he looks at her, like she is the only proof he has ever had.
She steps closer.
"Then stay," she says. "I'll adjust."
Something breaks open in his expression.