“At 3:30 in the morning?”
He shrugged. “You know you’re going to.”
“No, buddy, she’s not.”
He was right. When Sarah picked up, thick with sleep, I told her everything. She sat up so fast I could hear the sheets shift through the phone.
“I think you need to come see her,” I added, and I already knew what that sentence was going to cost us both if things didn’t go the way we were hoping.
By the time Sarah arrived, dawn was just starting to stretch pale light across the bay doors. We had spent seven years trying for a child.
“I think you need to come see her.”
Seven years of appointments and bad news. Seven years of sitting in parking lots afterward because Sarah couldn’t bring herself to cry until the car doors were closed.
She came into the medical room and stopped when she saw the baby in my arms.
“Oh my God,” she whispered. “Can I?”
I nodded and placed the baby into her arms.
Sarah looked down, and tears filled her eyes. Her fingers adjusted the blanket with a tenderness that came from some place grief had been sitting on for years.
Seven years of appointments and bad news.
When her hands began to tremble, I knew exactly what was happening.
“She’s so small,” Sarah murmured. Then she looked up at me. “Arthur, can we keep her?”
I crouched beside her chair and looked at the little one again. The baby had one hand tucked near her cheek. She looked warm and safe.
“She looks like she belongs with you,” I replied, my eyes blurry.
Seeing Sarah with that baby… it felt like my chest might give out, but in the best possible way. “I know we might not get her. But if there’s even the smallest chance, I need you to tell me we’re taking it.”
