The silence after the stent

I was just standing in the cath lab corridor, hands still gloved, when it hit me—the kind of quiet that doesn’t mean peace. It means something’s been held too long and now it’s breathing again. I heard a nurse humming under her breath, off-key, and suddenly remembered my sister’s voice at five a.m., same pitch. No one said anything. We don’t always have words for the space between life and repair. Sometimes it’s just a hum.