Chapter 3 - The Question
That truth sat heavy in the quiet hallway as a small whimper drifted out from the bassinet. All three of us turned toward the glass at once.
"She's doing remarkably well, considering how early she came," the nurse said gently, before stepping back inside to check on the baby.
I turned back to Ethan and finally saw the full shape of his fear — not fear of the hospital, or of what had happened to Isabel. Fear of what I was about to say to him.
"She has no one left," Ethan whispered, his voice cracking. "The father was reached by social services about an hour ago. He signed off on all his parental rights on the spot."
"He signed away his rights that fast?"
"He walked out on Isabel months ago and already told the state he wants nothing to do with the baby," Ethan said. "The social worker told me she'll go into emergency temporary foster care while they search for any distant relatives."
I could see exactly where this was headed before he ever said the words.
"I want us to step forward. Ask to be considered for her." He held my eyes steadily.
"Considered for what, Ethan?"
"To take her home. Raise her as ours." He took one hesitant step closer. "I already told the caseworker I'm happily married, and that I would never make a decision like this without you."
"Ethan, this is enormous." I wiped a tear off my cheek.
"I know exactly how insane it sounds," he admitted, wringing his hands together. "If this is too much — if you need me to drop it, just say the word. I will, right now."
A short, breathless laugh escaped me despite everything.
"Why are you laughing?" He looked completely thrown.
"You actually thought I'd be jealous of a dying woman," I said, shaking my head as the tears kept coming. "You thought I'd hear Isabel's name and jump straight to betrayal."
"I genuinely didn't know what you'd think when I called you."
"I spent the whole drive over here terrified you'd had an affair."
"Okay," he said, a faint, relieved smile finally breaking through. "That's infinitely worse."
I stepped in and let him pull me into a tight hug. My mind kept circling back to Isabel — a woman I'd never met, who spent her last conscious minutes on earth frightened and alone in a delivery room. And instead of using whatever breath she had left to ask for comfort for herself, she used it to make absolutely sure her newborn daughter wouldn't be forgotten. She remembered the name of a good man she'd once trusted completely, and she gambled everything on him showing up when her baby needed it most.
"Can I hold her?" I asked the nurse, who'd just stepped back into the hallway.
"Of course you can," she said warmly, waving us both inside.
A few minutes later I was sitting in a worn armchair with a six-pound baby girl cradled against my chest. Barely twelve hours old, a mop of dark hair, tiny fingers curling against my shirt. Ethan knelt on the floor beside the chair, tears running freely down his face.
"Are you completely sure about this?" he asked softly, one hand resting on my knee. "Because if you have any doubt at all, we can step back. No questions asked."
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"We spent years praying our three boys would get a little sister," I said, looking down at the baby in my arms. "Maybe we were just praying for the wrong kind of miracle."
Ethan buried his face in his hands and wept quietly beside us — only the second time in my entire life I'd seen him cry.
