Despite everything, I laughed.
Ethan laughed too, softly, with tears still standing in his eyes.
The sound broke the heaviness just enough to let air in.
Linda returned and checked my vitals, then helped me try feeding Maya. It was awkward and tender and nothing like the calm instructional videos I had watched at two in the morning. Maya fussed. I panicked. Linda reassured me. Ethan looked away respectfully until I told him to stop acting like a Victorian gentleman and hand me the pillow.
For fifteen minutes, we became practical.
Pillows.
Blankets.
Water.
A burp cloth.
Maya’s tiny mouth.
My exhausted body learning its next purpose.
When Maya finally settled, Linda smiled.
“She’s a determined little thing.”
“She comes by it honestly,” Ethan said.
I looked at him.
He wisely said nothing else.
After Linda left again, my phone buzzed on the side table.
Aunt Marianne.
I had called her when labor started, but she lived two hours away and had been waiting for updates. My heart squeezed as I answered.
“She’s here,” I whispered.
Marianne cried immediately.
“Oh, honey.”
“She’s okay. They’re monitoring her, but she’s okay.”
“And you?”
“I’m tired.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
Then her voice shifted.
“Is someone with you?”
I looked at Ethan.
He sat beside the bed, Maya asleep in the bassinet now, his gaze still fixed on her as if looking away might make her disappear.
“Yes,” I said.
A pause.
“Who?”
“Ethan.”
Silence.
Then Marianne said, very carefully, “I see.”
“He delivered her.”
“Oh, Chloe.”
Those two words held everything.
Shock.
Concern.
The memory of all the nights I had cried on her couch.
“I’ll explain later,” I said.
“I’m coming now.”
“You don’t have to drive at this hour.”
