The Yes That Should’ve Been a No
It began with an email and a favor.
Dr. Amara Basu had not intended to cover anyone’s patients that week. She had just returned from a retreat in Dartmoor meant to recalibrate her inner compass, or at the very least, recharge her caffeine addiction. But when Simon from Adult Services emailed saying, “Quick favor—could you sit in for one of Maya’s Thursday afternoon sessions? Patient’s named Noor. Should be straightforward,” Amara sighed and replied:
“Sure. Just one session.”
It was always just one session.
The clinic smelled like old fabric and forgotten biscuits, as it always did. Amara wore her navy blouse, her lucky one, and carried the leather notebook that no longer left ink stains. Her desk was neat, her mind sharp. Order was her currency. Disruption, a debt she avoided.
Noor arrived at 2:03 p.m.
Seventeen, according to the chart. Slim, silent. A light blue scarf around her wrist like it was holding something shut.
Amara smiled with habitual professionalism. “Hi, Noor. I’m Dr. Basu. I’ll be seeing you today, just for this session.”
Noor nodded. “You live near a yellow gate.”
Amara’s smile paused. “Sorry?”
Noor blinked. “You had a dog named Rusty. He used to chew the fence.”
Amara stared.
Rusty had died when she was eleven. Their house had a yellow gate, flaking paint and all. It wasn’t a secret. It was just… impossible.
She checked the file. Noor. Anxiety. Mild depression. Quiet but stable. Nothing unusual.
Noor said nothing else that session. Just watched Amara with eyes that felt like déjà vu.
***
The Static Between Sessions
By Monday, Amara had convinced herself that Noor’s comment was a coincidence. Maybe she’d read something online. Social media footprints were leaky.
But when she tried to pull up Noor’s file again, it didn’t load.
“Noor who?” asked admin. “You sure that was your client?”
Amara nodded, mildly irritated. Systems glitched. Paper trails tangled.
She requested Maya’s notes—nothing yet.
Thursday came. Noor returned.
***
The Child of Shifting Names
This time, Noor spoke in rhyme.
“Fire eats trees but fears the wind.
Dreams forget the rules we pinned.”
Amara raised an eyebrow. “Are those your words?”
Noor shrugged. “Yours, once.”
Amara laughed, uneasy. “I don’t write poetry.”
“You did. Before the fire.”
Amara flinched.
Noor’s gaze remained steady.
Amara’s journal, buried in her attic back home, had a poem—unfinished, burnt at the edges. About a fire in a pine forest. About silence so loud it cracked glass.
She hadn’t looked at it in fifteen years.
***
Session Three: The Girl Who Wasn't
Amara did her due diligence. She messaged Maya directly. No reply. Left a voicemail.
She checked with admin again.
Still no Noor on the Thursday schedule. No appointment record. No NHS number.
“It must’ve been a manual booking,” Amara muttered.
Then why did Noor return exactly at 2:03 p.m., every time?
She never asked for follow-up. Never smiled. But she kept coming.
And each time, she said things that made Amara’s bones remember things her brain refused to.
A red ribbon. A broken violin string. The inside of a cupboard door covered in tally marks.
***
Session Five: Reverse Transference
Amara started dreaming in static.
Not sounds. Visual static. Like broken televisions from the ’90s. But inside the static were flashes: her childhood room, the fire escape at St. Martha’s School, and a girl—always the same girl—with her back turned.
She began checking her mirrors more than necessary. Sometimes her reflection didn’t quite mimic her movements.
One night, she saw Noor there.
Just standing. On the other side. Smiling softly.
She dropped the glass. It didn’t break. It just rippled.
She didn’t tell anyone.
Because who does a psychiatrist call when reality leaks?
***
Session Six: The Notebook
Noor brought a notebook this time. It looked oddly familiar. Leather-bound, dark maroon, fraying at the corners.
She slid it across the table. “Do you remember this?”
Amara opened it—and her hands trembled.
Every page was written in her own handwriting.
But in the margins, newer writing. Not hers.
“You left me in the cupboard the night you cried.”
“I waited for you every Thursday.”
“You promised we’d never forget.”
Amara’s heart clanged inside her ribcage. This was her journal from age eleven. She’d thrown it away. Burnt it. Or had she?
“Where did you get this?”
“I never left. You just stopped visiting.”
***
The Breakdown Begins
Amara took leave.
Officially, it was for rest. Unofficially, she needed to escape the clinic before she started unraveling in public.
She returned to her mother’s home—the yellow-gated house. It was quieter now. The garden overgrown. Her childhood room a storage closet.
In the attic, she found the burnt violin case. Inside it, a red ribbon tied around a pinecone. She sat on the floor for hours.
And when she opened the cupboard door in that old room, there they were: tally marks. Over 300 of them. Carved with a compass needle.
Her compass.
She wept like she hadn’t wept in decades.
***
Session Seven: Noor Speaks
Amara called the clinic. “I need one more session with her.”
“She’s not on the system,” admin said again.
“Just… book me a room. I’ll handle it.”
2:03 p.m. on Thursday. Room 6C.
Noor arrived.
This time, she looked older. Or Amara looked younger. Time was a fog.
“You kept me here,” Noor whispered. “So you could be smart. Successful. Safe.”
Amara shook her head. “I didn’t know I locked you away.”
“You did it to survive. But now I’m tired of waiting.”
Amara reached across the space between them. Her hand touched Noor’s—and for a second, she felt... heat. Like a heartbeat passed between skin.
“I’m sorry,” Amara whispered.
“I know.”
***
Session Eight: The Mirror Cracks
That night, Amara stood before her bedroom mirror.
“Show me.”
The mirror didn’t ripple. It shattered.
Not with sound—but with light.
Dozens of versions of herself stared back. Eleven-year-old Amara, violin Amara, medical school Amara, weeping-at-3-a.m. Amara, rage-in-the-car Amara, holding-it-together Amara.
And in the center: Noor. Not a patient. A part.
Amara fell to her knees.
She whispered, “I see you now.”
One by one, the reflections bowed their heads.
The mirror went dark.
And whole.
***
The Ninth and Final Session
The next Thursday, Amara waited.
But Noor didn’t come.
Instead, there was a folded note on her desk.
“Dear Dr. Basu,
We met when you were too tired to remember your own voice.
I was never a patient. I was the part of you you thought unlovable.
But you listened. You returned.
Now I can rest.
With love,
Noor
(which means light)”
***
Epilogue: Notes From the Mirror
Amara returned to work three weeks later.
She restructured her schedule. Took fewer clients. Wrote in longhand again.
She started a support group for clinicians dealing with burnout. She called it “The Mirror Room.”
Every time someone said, “I feel like I’ve lost myself,” she smiled gently and said, “Maybe you just haven’t looked in the right mirror yet.”
She never saw Noor again.
But every now and then, at 2:03 p.m., her reflection would smile just a beat before she did.
And that was enough.
React
