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The bus left the busy city centre quite quickly and continued to the north-west. Finally, he stopped again and Alice prepared herself to exit. Eric followed her a few seconds later and they arrived in front of a large brick building together, which was several stories high. The city hospital. To Eric's surprise, Alice didn't walk farther along the street but directly to the large oak wood entrance of the hospital.
"What are we doing here?" asked Eric and wondered what the girl wanted to show him here.
"Hey, have a little patience. You can see that soon!" only a mysterious smirk revealed their destination again.
The entrance was still a few meters away, and behind the oak doors appeared the entrance hall in chilly white.
"Hey, you can't just go in!" Eric tried to hold Alice back. "Not when it's so late!"
"Trust me."
With the swing of her hip, she pushed the glass door open and went inside. Eric followed her slowly. The entrance hall was crowded with just a female employee sitting behind a glass box on the right side. When the door fell into the lock, she looked surprised by the late visit. Eric almost expected her to complement the two of them outside again. But when the receptionist's gaze fell on Alice, she smiled and, only with a criticising expression, lifted her right arm to point with the finger of her other hand on the watch there. In response, Alice raised both hands in walking, put them together and begged for permission. The lady gave a deep sigh, and the two newcomers were allowed to pass the entrance.
The whole scenario suggested that Alice and the lady at the entrance knew each other personally, which confused Eric even more. Who the hell was he travelling with?
"We'll be there soon, just a ride on the elevator!" Alice interrupted his thoughts and opened the elevator doors with a push of the button.
Still completely confused and without a plan, Eric went up to the 14th floor together with Alice. With a quiet ping, the doors opened and the two got out.
"Now, we just gotta go upstairs!" instructed Alice and ran down the few meters of the hallway, until they came to a grey steel door, which apparently was the entrance to the staircase. Meanwhile, Eric was certain that Alice wasn't going this way for the first time. With rapid steps she ran up the remaining steps, and then, his companion stopped before opening the last door.
"We're here," she said emotionally.
"That's just the roof, Eric explained to her.
She didn't even listen to him but opened the door, and was the one to step out first. The boy followed her without great expectation or any idea why she wanted to show him the night-time roof of the hospital. This, however, changed when he went to the balustrade and looked around. Everywhere the colourful lights of the city were stretching along, throwing a gleam of light into the dark night sky which was spiked with stars. The river which passed through the southern part of the city formed a dark scar in the sea of lights. Never before had Eric seen the city out of this breathtaking perspective.
"We're currently standing at the highest point in the city," Alice explained to him. "That's the reason I like this place so much."
The boy didn't respond to his companion because he was still sucked in by the magical panorama that surrounded him. For a moment, he forgot everything.
"How do you know this place?" finally, the boy found his voice again.
Alice was silent and looked out into the sea at bright lights.
"I've already told you that you didn't see me in the neighbourhood because I have been away for a long time," her eyes were lost on the horizon. "The truth is tha- that I've spent the last years here.
"You're saying that-§
She didn't allow Eric to finish his sentence and nodded quickly, "As the patient."
"Oh!" Eric couldn't say more and felt stupid.
"Therefore, I had never had a true best friend. All the friends I had before disappeared. Who wants to be friends with someone whose whole life takes place on 16 m2.
So I wanted to show you this. Back then, I promised myself that if- when I survive all this, I would find a best friend to whom I can show all this here. And now it's the time."
She grinned, and for the first time, her overwhelming happiness infected Eric. Then, she turned away from the nightly scene and faced Eric. Nervously she grabbed the bottom of her shirt and slowly pulled it upwards.
"W-what are you doing?"
"I've never shown anyone."
With shaky fingers, she continued to reveal her upper body. When the shirt was over her stomach, Eric stared straight at her body. A big scar, about a centimetre thick, started about five centimetres above her navel and was lengthened with every centimetre the girl revealed while lifting her shirt further up. The line ended shortly before her collarbone.
"Ma-may I?" he asked cautiously, and only after Alice had allowed it with a small nod, he touched the scar gently. Tears filled his eyes with the thought of how unfair and painful the life had been for Alice. He quickly pulled his fingers back, afraid that he might hurt her.
"It doesn't hurt," assured Alice. "Not any more. It is a reminder of my new heart and how grateful I can be for the gift of a second life. So that I never forget to cherish this life, to enjoy it."
She let the shirt slide down again, hiding her scar, at least visibly.
"The time must have been incredibly hard on you," Eric couldn't even guess to some extent how he would have reacted in such a situation.
"To be honest, I had already given up hope of ever leaving the hospital alive. But then - it may sound strange – just a few hours before the doctors said that I get a new heart, something weird happened. I lay in my bed and looked out the window. From there, I could always look at an old cherry tree that grew in the park. It was full of pink cherry blossoms. The smell of them travelled through the open window into my nose. The smell of freedom and life. Suddenly a gust arouse and dragged on the delicate, small blossoms. Although they were trying to withstand the raging storm, some were torn down and thrown into the air. The tree was a few metres from my room, but I suddenly saw this one leaf, as if it was only a few centimetres in front of me. As in a slow motion, the leaf rocked from left to right while it was spinning its pirouettes like a ballerina."
