💐 Qiara — Coming Home
My name is Qiara. I work as a nurse at this psychiatric hospital. And after working here for years, there are plenty of things I've grown used to seeing. Patients talking to themselves. Patients spending hours in front of windows. Patients waiting for someone who never comes. But there's one sight I still can't quite bring myself to consider ordinary. That man. Every Sunday, exactly at nine in the morning, he arrives carrying a bouquet of white lilies. He sits on the same bench. Silent. Lost in thought. Sometimes he hugs the flowers tightly with both hands before finally walking toward the pavilion at the end of the hallway. That pavilion has a single resident. Her name is Lili Madona. Maybe that's why the man always brings white lilies whenever he comes. For years, I've watched him do the same thing. Arrive. Bring flowers. Sit. Then leave. He never says much. Never asks for anything. And strangest of all... Not once has a single family member ever come with him.
I've actually been curious for a long time. Who was that man? And what was his connection to Lili Madona? But no one else at this hospital seemed to care. There was only one patient who always paid attention to him. Nara. Nara was one of the patients who had been living at this hospital for quite some time. Her condition often caused her to experience hallucinations. But while caring for her, there was one thing that always confused me. She always said she could see Lili Madona. Even though... Lili Madona had died years ago. One morning, I was adjusting Nara's IV drip when she suddenly asked me. “Qiara.” I turned around. “Yes, Nara?” Nara looked at me seriously. “Who is Lili Madona?” My hands paused for a moment. “Why are you asking about her?” “I see her a lot.” I drew a slow breath. “Nara...” “I’m serious.” “Yes, I know.”
I gave a faint smile, trying to keep my voice calm.
“Lili Madona was a patient who used to live in the pavilion at the end of the hallway.” Nara nodded.
“I know that.”
“She died.”
Nara fell silent. A few seconds later, she furrowed her brow instead.
“Then...”
Her eyes turned toward the room's window.
“...who’s the woman who stands beside the man carrying white lilies every Sunday?”
I was choked up. I stared at Nara. Then, without realizing it, I looked toward the window too.
At the end of the hallway, the man in the Navy uniform had indeed arrived.
As usual. With a bouquet of white lilies in his hand.
His name was Mario.
I knew him. Everyone on staff knew him. But not many people knew the story behind his visits.
I approached Nara and tried to change the subject.
“That’s enough. Don’t think too much. Get some rest.”
“But I want to know.”
“Later.”
“Qiara.”
“Yes?”
“She looks sad.” I fell silent. Nara smiled faintly.
“That man.”
She pointed toward the hallway.
“He always looks sad.”
I didn’t answer. Because for the first time... I was starting to pay attention to him too.
And it turned out Nara was right.
Mario really did always look like someone waiting for something.
Something that never came.
Raka read to the last sentence, then lifted his face from the laptop screen.
“Whoa...”
He leaned back in his chair.
“So what Nara saw... was it a ghost or just one of her hallucinations?”
Raka rubbed his chin, then looked back at the screen.
“Okay, let’s keep going.”