Their relationship had been built on lies, a fact which often made Alvin laugh. It seemed that every relationship in his life was made out of lies and secrets. 
Isla had seemed to have gathered her courage, for she lifted her head slightly to match Alvin's gaze and let out a sigh. "I'm sorry Mr. Svent, it seems this medicine hasn't made much difference either. She reacted at first, but as you can see," her hand waved towards the woman with white sheets up to her chin, face wet with sweat and fever. "She hasn't shown any positive response." 
If anything, Alvin could see his mother's condition had deteriorated. His heart sank against all reason as he looked at his mother. Then suddenly he felt disgust. How many people planned on waving his mother off like a lost cause? 
His father was too busy to worry about her well-being. His uncle was over seas working. The one person Alvin thought he could rely on, his cousin, was tied down with 'research' and likely hadn't thought about his aunt's condition for months. 
Alvin was the soul person caring for his mother. He was the only one that visited. The one that paid for the medical bills. The person that authorised medicines and operations. It had been that was for five years, once his father had lost interest. It would be that way for five more -- should, Alvin realised, she last that long. 
"Mr. Svent?" 
The man turn to the doctor and fiddled with the scarf around his neck, always careful to ensure that it looked prim and proper. The woman was waiting for a response, and Alvin was practiced in responding to Isla's medical reports. "I understand. Thank you for your continued hardwork, doctor. If you don't mind, could I have a minute?" 
The woman gave the usual "we'll do everything we can to make sure she gets better" response before she turned and walked out of the door, shutting it behind her with a small 'click'. Alvin suppressed a laugh.  
Of course they were doing all they could. Why would they not be, when they knew that keeping his mother alive would fill their pockets with her overly expensive hospital bills? When they knew that Alvin would continue to hope for a cure even as he watched his mother forget him, day by day, loosing herself to her illness. 
Alvin's hand reached for the clipboard at the end of his mother's bed, there to present information on the patient to any who entered the room. Alzheimers. The world left a bitter taste in Alvin's mouth whenever her read it, and since he was a child he had tried to skip over the word, but he always failed. Alzheimers. That was what was claiming his mother's life. It was the only medical term Alvin had memorised, the only illness Alvin knew all the facts about.  
Below the condition's name was a word that Alvin didn't even dare try to pronounce. He wondered, if Balan was there, would he have known what medicine they were feeding the sick woman.  
But Balan was never there.  
Alvin sighed. He sat on a chair that he had occupied more times than the ones that he owned at home, and wondered how many other people there were in the hospital, sitting on chairs just like this one, waiting for a loved one to wake up. How many people had waited for hours, days, months, for hospital rooms that would always be occupied by someone else? How much longer would this room be the home of a woman who's son was prolonging the inevitable? How many more medicines would his mother take before her body couldn't take it any more and she gave up? 
Was he doing the right thing? Should he have just let go? Should he have given up when his cousin did? When his uncle did? When his father did? 
"Alfred, is that you?" 
The man looked up, into eyes searching his for anything that might help her remember who he was. And she smiled. His mother smiled, a bright, welcoming smile. She remembered. She was having a good day. 
Just like that, Alvin hated himself for what he had thought. How could he give up on his mother, when she smiled at him despite the pain she was in. When she remembered, despite the condition upon her? How could he have been such an awful son, even for just a minute? 
"Yeah mom, its me." 
"Oh you look so big now. I forget that you're an adult, sometimes I still look for the lost little boy that I knew when we moved here." She smiled, as though her condition were something of a joke. As though forgetting the past ten years was a joke. As though she wasn't slowly forgetting how to live. 
"I'm so glad you're here, Alfred. Its ever so lonely in the hospital. I wish you would visit more often." 
But Alvin knew that was a lie, for he visited every day. It wasn't him that his mother longed to see. It was her husband. Alvin knew, because on bad days she would mistake him for the man she had fallen in love with. The man that had given up. 
"I know. I'm sorry," he grasped his mother's frail hands. "I'll visit more often from now on." 
"I'd like that." 
Leticia didn't look anything like her son. Where Alvin had dark hair, his mother had always had light hair -- though now her hair was streaked with grey. It had once been something she prided herself on. Alvin remembered watching his mother through mirrors as a child, while she sat smiling to herself, styling her hair in fashions the boy had never seen before. But now her hair was a constant limp, tangled mess, clumped together from her constant thrashing whenever she had nightmares. 
But her eyes were still bright when she looked at her son. When she was having bad days, she would look at the world through dull, clouded eyes. But then she would catch Alvin's gaze, and for a moment the light would return to her eyes. It was for these small moments that Alvin fought on. The reason Alvin continued to hope for his mother's swift recovery. 
As he looked at Leticia's hopeful eyes, he wondered if she still felt homesick. 
"Alfred, my child, have you made friends yet?" Alvin's gaze fell away for but a second. Leticia squeezed his hand, her eyes never leaving his for a moment. "I don't want you to be lonely." 
He wanted to argue that he would be lonely so long as she continued to live inside of the hospital. That he would be lonely until they returned home, until he left this dreadfully foreign and cruel city. That making friends wouldn't quench the feeling in his heart that longed for his old life. "I'm not lonely. I have you, and dad," and every other woman his father brought home with him, Alvin thought. 
"That isn't what I mean, Alfred." She argued, but her voice had grown quiet, her eyes heavy. "I don't want you to be alone." 
And Alvin told her that he understood, that he would try, even though he knew he wouldn't. 
He stayed until his mother had fallen asleep -- which only took a moment -- before placing a kiss on her forehead and slipping out of the room. Isla turned as the door opened, and the two passed each other in silence; Isla into the room and Alvin away from it, as had become routine. 

The corridors of the hospital were always so busy, with people rushing to and fro down every hallway. Alvin had always felt out of place in the blur of colour, voices and machinery. All these people with very little time left, and there he was, taking a leisurely stroll through the hospital wing, all the time in the world. 
What he wouldn't give to trade his time with his mother's. If he could forget the things he had been through, the changes he faced, and pass knowing only his childhood, Alvin would be content. He wanted his mother to live a full life. He wanted her to spring out of bed in the morning and surprise him with picnics in parks or trips to arcades. To return home to his mother's cooking. To go to bed knowing that she was in the room down the corridor. For her to wish him luck every day, and praise him for good work. 
He wanted his mother to be his mother again. 
Alvin didn't know when he had decided not to go back home, but he realised as he reached the back entrance and text his driver to return home that he himself had never planned on returning at all that day. Perhaps it was the strange women who would walk around his house as though they owned it -- a new one everyday. Maybe it was the deep sense of not belonging that welcomed him whenever he walked through the door. 
Whatever it was, it drove him forward and into the empty streets, where he would wonder for hours and be perfectly okay. Where he would think about what a bad son he had been. Where he would wonder how long it would take for his mother's good day to turn into a bad day. Where he would wonder how the same conversation would play out the next time he saw her. 
But not where he had planned on meeting a friend. 

-- 

This is a draft chapter. It's being uploaded in celebration of my first successful job interview. Which means, you should expect the finished version of the chapter to include more accurate medical data, better structure and other minor changes that will lead to plot later on! This change will be uploaded as a full chapter once completed, along with the remainder of the story, so look out for that. 
But for now, we shall celebrate. 

I do not plan on adding author notes to the end of any future chapters throughout the story, unless they are important and need to be there. 
Actual chapters will be named after flowers.