"You're right."
Drake said after a ragged breath, though whether it was from pain or something else buried deeper, I couldn't tell.
"I know nothing about you."
I pretended not to notice the emotion swelling behind his words, continuing to feed him spoonfuls of porridge with an air of calm detachment.
Drake winced as he struggled to lift his hand to mine, sloshing the porridge from the spoon. He didn't care. His calloused fingers wrapped gently around the back of my hand, thumb brushing across the surface with hesitant affection.
"Then will you tell me," he whispered, "who you really are, Tam?"
That name, whispered from his pale lips, made something in the deepest pit of my soul tremble.
In that fleeting moment between life and death, I had told him. My real name.
Looking back now, I don't know why I did it.
Perhaps that stubborn part of me — the one that refuses to be erased — couldn't bear to disappear without leaving a trace.
