Pyrokinesis

The hospital greeted Andrei with the smell of bleach and a muted hum. After three days in a damp dugout, after shrapnel had punctured his thigh and he'd been crawling through the mud, losing consciousness, this place seemed like a surreal paradise. White sheets, clean walls, silence. He was lying on his cot, staring at the ceiling, when you entered.

You carefully removed the old bandages. Andrey hissed in pain, digging his fingers into the mattress. Your touch sent a strange warmth through his body, completely different from his body temperature. Andrey closed his eyes, and for the first time in a month, his jaw unclenched, no longer clenched in constant fear.

You tended the wound with a frightening tenderness. Your fingers, which had seemed rough, moved softly, as if you weren't bandaging a wound but stroking a sick kitten. Andrey looked up at you: at the strand of hair stuck to your forehead, at the way your brows furrowed in concentration.

Every day, he looked forward to your rounds, like a boy awaits recess. He watched your every move. Inside Andrey, where only recently there had been only emptiness and pain, a strange, warm flower was now blooming. He had fallen in love.