JAY JAY POV
"Doctor, does that mean I don't have to go to school?" Angel asked, his eyes lighting up like he'd just won the lottery.
I couldn't help but grin. Every kid's favorite words: No school.
"Well, since I'm the doctor and I say you really can't walk on that leg, I think I can officially grant you a 'Get Out of Class Free' card," I said, matching his excitement.
"But Doc, if he misses school, he might fall behind," Angelo interjected, sounding exactly like every worried father I'd ever dealt with.
I turned back to Angel and gave him a conspiratorial wink. "It's fine. I have a feeling this one is a bit of a genius. He can manage a week of playing video games and resting, right champ?"
Angel nodded vigorously, his grin reaching both ears. I reached out and ruffled his hair, feeling that strange, instinctive warmth again. This kid was dangerous—one more smile and I'd probably end up buying him the entire toy store.
"Okay, Dad, let me see that file real quick," I said, turning my attention to Angelo.
He handed me the folder, his expression still a mix of gratitude and lingering worry. I opened it, my eyes scanning the top line where the patient's full name was printed in bold letters.
JASPER ANGEL FERNANDEZ.
Fernandez.
The name hit me like a physical blow. Jasper... Fernandez...
Suddenly, the sterile white walls of the ER seemed to tilt. A high-pitched ringing started in my ears, drowning out the steady beeping of the monitors and the distant chatter of nurses.
"Jay-jay, don't be stubborn!""Come on, let's go, Mutya!""Are you okay, Jay?"
A swarm of voices—deep, rowdy, and filled with a familiar chaos—exploded inside my head. They weren't just memories; they were ghosts screaming from a room I had locked seven years ago. My vision blurred as I gripped the edge of the hospital bed, my knuckles turning white. My head throbbed with a rhythmic, stabbing pain, like someone was trying to hammer their way back into my brain.
"Are you okay?" Aries asked, his voice cutting through the static. I felt a hand on my shoulder—steady and protective.
I forced myself to take a deep, shaky breath, pushing the voices back into the dark corners of my mind. I stood up straight, trying to blink away the black spots dancing in my vision.
"Yes, sorry about that," I croaked, my voice sounding foreign to my own ears. "Just a sudden dizzy spell. Probably skipped breakfast one too many times."
Angelo, looking concerned, immediately reached for the bottle of water sitting on the side table. "Here, Doc. Drink this."
"Thanks," I murmured, taking the bottle.
The air behind my surgical mask felt suffocatingly hot, and the dizziness was still making the floor feel like it was made of jelly. Without thinking about the protocol or the fact that I was in a room with two
very handsome strangers, I hooked my fingers behind my ears and pulled the loops of the mask down.
I needed to breathe. I needed the cool air on my face.
I tilted my head back and took a long, slow drink of the water, letting the cold liquid soothe my parched throat. As I lowered the bottle and wiped a stray drop from my lip, I realized the room had gone completely silent.
I turned back toward the brothers, and my heart nearly stopped.
Angelo was frozen, his mouth slightly agape as if he'd forgotten how to breathe. And Aries... Aries—or Horoscope, as my brain kept insisted on calling him—looked like he'd been struck by lightning. His eyes were wide, fixed on my face with a terrifying, raw intensity that made the hair on my arms stand up.
I stood there, exposed, my face finally clear of the mask. For a second, I felt like a butterfly pinned to a board.
"Is... is there something on my face?" I asked, my inner surfacing to hide the sudden flare of self-consciousness. "I know I have a bit of a I-just-had-a-headache glow, but you two are staring like you've seen a ghost."
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ARIES POV
I didn't believe a single word that came out of Percy's mouth.
When that idiot called me, hysterical and babbling about how he'd heard from Keifer and Section E that Jay was back, I dismissed it as another one of his pathetic attempts to brighten the mood. Percy has always been a narcissist, but I thought he'd finally lost his mind, grasping at straws because he couldn't handle the silence of our house anymore.
We've been living in a graveyard for seven years. Seven years of looking at her empty room. Seven years of my silence and the crushing guilt that I, her brother, let her walk into that accident.
But seeing her here… right in front of me… it wasn't a prank. It was real.
The world didn't just tilt; it shattered into a million jagged pieces. For seven years, I've been mourning a ghost, and now that ghost is standing three feet away, holding my nephew's medical file.
When she hooked her fingers behind her ears and pulled that mask down, time didn't just slow down—it stopped.
It's her. It's really her.
It was the same face. The same stubborn curve of her face, the same bright, defiant eyes that used to drive me crazy when we were younger. She looked older, more professional in that white lab coat, but she was unmistakably my sister. My annoying, brave, reckless half-sister.
I wanted to lunge forward. I wanted to grab her by the shoulders, pull her into a hug so tight she'd realize she could never leave us again, and scream at her—demand to know where the hell she'd been for seven fucking years while we were rotting in our own grief.
Where were you, Jay? Why didn't you come home to your family?
But my legs were made of lead. My throat was so tight I couldn't even whisper her name. I was paralyzed, trapped in a moment that felt like a dream I was terrified to wake up from.
Beside me, Kuya Angelo was just as frozen. Usually, nothing rattles him—he's the calm, sophisticated head of the family, the one who keeps us all grounded.
But right now? He looked like he'd been struck by lightning. His face was ghostly pale, his eyes wide as he stared at her. For the first time in my life, I saw my older cousin look completely lost.
"Is... is there something on my face?" she asked, her voice snapping through the heavy silence like a whip.
She offered us that familiar, cheeky grin, completely oblivious to the fact that she had just stopped our hearts.
You ARE the ghost, Jay, I wanted to howl. You're the ghost that's been haunting our every waking moment.
The irony was a bitter pill. She was right there, taking care of Angel like we were total strangers
I looked at Kuya Angelo, and I could tell he was thinking the same thing. Life is a cruel joke. Here is the girl we thought we buried, treating my nephew, but she's looking at us with eyes that don't know who we are.
Tss. Gago.
Percy wasn't an idiot. For the first time in seven years, that narcissistic fool was right. She's alive. She's home.
And I'm not letting her disappear again. Not in this lifetime.
"Okay, here is a chocolate for my brave patient," Jay said, her voice bright and teasing.
She reached into the pocket of her pristine white lab coat and pulled out a Kit Kat, handing it over to Angel with a flourish.
Angel's eyes went wide, his pain momentarily forgotten at the sight of the red wrapper.
"Do you always have chocolates with you, Doctor?" he asked, looking at her like she was some kind of candy-bearing angel.
Jay-jay nodded, a mischievous glint in her eyes.
"You never know when a snack emergency might strike," she said, digging into her pocket again and pulling out one more for good measure. "It's a doctor's secret weapon."
I felt a lump form in my throat. Tss. Of course. Even after seven years and a blank brain, she was still the same foodie.
The girl who used to prioritize Samgyup over her own safety still had pockets full of snacks. It was so her that it hurt to watch.
She leaned in closer to Angel, lowering her voice to a playful whisper that carried clearly in the quiet room. "But listen, Captain. Don't tell your mom I gave you this. She might get mad at me for giving her son candy in a hospital, right?"
She giggled, a sound that used to echo through our house, and ruffled Angel's hair.
I looked at Kuya Angelo. He hadn't moved. He was staring at her with an intensity that would have been terrifying if it wasn't so full of heartbreak. Jay-jay was joking about Angel's mom—Kuya's wife—not realizing that she was the aunt this little boy never got to know.
Then, she turned toward us, her professional mask—the literal and metaphorical one—completely gone.
"Okay, Mr. Fernandez," she said, her voice steady and clinical.
That name. Mr. Fernandez. It felt like a slap to the face. She was using our family name to address her own cousin
"Like I said before, your son is in perfect condition, but his leg needs treatment," Jay continued, her pen moving in a blur as she scribbled something onto a notepad. "He might not feel the pain right now because of the adrenaline, but later today or sometime this week, it might start to throb. So, I'm going to prescribe some painkillers. If he takes them as directed, he should be perfectly fine."
She ripped the top page off the pad and handed it to Kuya Angelo. He took it with a shaking hand, his eyes never leaving her face. He wasn't even looking at the prescription; he was looking for her.
"And here is your doctor's note explaining why your son needs a full week off from school," Jay added, handing us a second page with a small, professional smile. "And please, make sure to come back after one week. We need to check the wound to make sure the cut didn't get infected. You'll need to re-bandage the area every day or every two days."
She explained the instructions clearly, the Doctor's persona perfectly intact. She was efficient, attentive, and kind—everything a top-tier surgeon should be.
"Any questions?" she asked, tilting her head with that polite, clinical smile that felt like a serrated blade across my heart.
I looked at her, my vision tunneling. I needed to hear it. I needed to hear her say that name out loud so I could justify the rage boiling in my gut. I needed to know exactly who she thought she was
"What is your name?" I asked, my voice coming out raspy and low, vibrating with a tension I couldn't hide.
She didn't even flinch. She just let out a small, melodic chuckle, like I was asking for something as simple as the time. She reached up, her slender fingers tapping against the silver-and-black name tag pinned to her pristine white lab coat.
Click. Click. Click.
"Luna Jay Val," she said, the syllables rolling off her tongue with a familiarity that made my blood run cold. "That's my full name. But like I said, most people around here just call me Dr. Jay or Luna."
Val.
The name echoed in my head like a curse word. She wasn't a Val. She was a Fernandez. She was the girl who used to steal my snacks and drive me up the wall. She was my blood. But here she was, claiming a stranger's name as her own, identifying as someone who didn't even exist seven years ago.
Beside me, I saw Kuya Angelo's jaw tighten so hard I thought bone might snap. He was staring at that name tag like it was a death sentence. To us, that little piece of plastic was a lie—a barrier between the girl we loved and the stranger standing in front of us.
"Val," I repeated, testing the weight of the lie on my tongue. "Is that… your father's name?"
Jay-jay's expression flickered for a split second, a shadow of something she couldn't quite remember crossing her eyes. But then she recovered, forcing that bright, professional smile back into place.
"It's my brother's name," she explained, her voice softening with a loyalty that made me want to roar. "Luan Val. He's the one who looked after me after the accident. He's my only family."
Your only family?
I nearly laughed, a bitter, jagged sound that died in my throat. I wanted to scream at her. I wanted to tell her that Luan Val was a thief. I wanted to tell her that I was her brother
But I looked at her eyes and saw nothing. No recognition. No spark of the sisterly connection we once had. Just the polite interest of a doctor talking to a stranger.
"Thanks, Doc. We'll see you soon," I said, my voice tight.
I made sure to emphasize that 'soon.' She probably thought I meant the one-week follow-up, but in my head, I was already planning to be back here every single day until those blank eyes of hers finally flickered with a memory of me.
We turned and started to leave, the sound of our footsteps echoing against the polished hospital tiles. I felt like I was walking on air and lead at the same time. My sister—my real, living, breathing sister—was right behind us, and we were walking away.
"Papa?" Angel's small voice broke the heavy silence.
"Yes?" Kuya Angelo answered. His voice was hoarse, stripped of its usual aristocratic coldness. He looked like he was still processing the fact that the universe had just handed him a miracle he didn't know how to hold.
"That doctor over there... she looks like someone I know," Angel whispered, looking back over his shoulder. "You showed me pictures of her, right? The pretty auntie?"
I felt my heart stop for a second. Even a five-year-old who had only seen her in old, faded photographs could recognize the Fernandez features. The blood doesn't lie. Angel had never met her, but the connection was there, humming in the air between them.
Kuya Angelo didn't say anything for a long moment. He just gave a slow, stiff nod, his hand tightening slightly on Angel's shoulder. "I will explain things for you later, Angel. Just... not here."
I stepped in, needing to break the suffocating tension before I started crying in the middle of the hallway like a total gago. I leaned down and picked Angel up, hoisting him
. He was heavy, a solid reminder that life had moved on even while we were stuck in the past.
"You're just lucky you got a reason to escape school next week, champ," I teased him, ruffling his hair to distract him from the somber mood. "While your classmates are stuck doing math, you'll be at home eating Kit Kats. Don't get too used to it, or you'll end up as lazy as your Uncle Percy."
Angel giggled, leaning his head against my shoulder. "I like her, Tiyo Aries. The doctor. She's nice."
I like her.
I looked back one last time before we reached the sliding glass doors. Jay-jay was gone, probably already moving on to her next patient, oblivious to the storm she'd just ignited in our lives.
Tss. I like her too, Angel, I thought, my grip on him tightening. She's your Tita Jay-jay. The bravest, most stubborn woman I've ever known.
I looked at Kuya Angelo as we reached the car. The look in his eyes was lethal. He wasn't just a grieving cousin anymore; he was a shark that had caught the scent of blood.
"Aries," Kuya said as he opened the car door. "Call Keifer. I want to know everything he knows about this Luan Val."
"On it, Kuya," I replied, a dark smirk tugging at my lips.
I looked up at the towering windows of St. Jude's.
See you soon, Jay-jay. Very, very soon.
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