The OPD went quiet earlier than usual that night.
By 8:40 pm, the last patient had left. The receptionist was reconciling the register. A nurse was stacking files that would be opened again the next morning. The half-shutter was already down – the familiar signal that the day was ending.
Nothing about the day stood out.
No arguments.
No complications.
No raised voices.
Just another clinic day.
The doctor washed his hands, dried them carefully, and sat down to finish the final note. Outside, traffic thinned. Somewhere nearby, a pressure cooker whistled. The city was preparing for sleep.
Then the phone rang.
Not his personal phone.
The clinic phone.
He looked at it for a second longer than usual before picking it up.
“Doctor Saab?”
The voice was calm. Formal. Polite in a way that felt rehearsed.
There was a pause – the kind that arrives before sentences that don’t end where you expect them to.
“I’m calling regarding today’s procedure.”
He didn’t sit immediately. He leaned against the table, fingers resting on its edge, listening. The words that followed weren’t dramatic. There was no accusation. No anger.
Just information.
A complication.
A concern.
A family asking questions.
By the time the call ended, the clinic felt different.
Not louder.
Quieter.
The kind of quiet that makes you aware of the walls.
He locked the clinic himself that night.
At home, dinner was already served. The television was on. A panel discussion was playing – people arguing loudly about things that felt distant and abstract.
He ate without much thought.
At 2:17 am, he woke up convinced the phone was ringing again.
It wasn’t.
But his mind had already begun replaying the day – slowly, meticulously.
The consent.
The dosage.
The moment he paused before making a decision that felt routine at the time.
Nothing looked wrong.
Everything looked familiar.
By morning, the case had started growing – not medically, but mentally. Like a shadow that lengthens without warning.
At the clinic, patients came in as usual.
“Good morning, doctor.”
“Doctor, just a quick question.”
He nodded. Smiled. Listened.
Only one thing had changed.
Every time the phone rang – even for appointments – his body reacted before his mind did.
This is how most cases begin.
Not in courtrooms.
Not with notices.
But with an ordinary day ending quietly – and one call that refuses to stay in the past.
End.
