My wife stared at me like I’d lost my mind.
“You seriously believe this?” she hissed. “It’s two in the morning.”
“What if something’s actually wrong?”
“She has a boyfriend. Why isn’t he helping her?”
Lily looked down instantly, and that tiny reaction told me more than words could have.
“He’s… asleep,” she murmured.
I didn’t ask any more questions.
The drive to the hospital was quiet except for the windshield wipers thudding back and forth. Lily kept apologizing every few minutes.
“You don’t have to keep saying sorry,” I told her.
“I just didn’t want to be alone.”
Something about the way she said it stuck with me.
At the hospital, the nurses rushed her in for monitoring. I sat in the waiting room because it felt wrong to leave her there alone at three in the morning.
Around dawn, a doctor finally came out and told us the baby was okay. Lily was severely dehydrated and having stress-related contractions, but thankfully there was no danger.
The relief on her face nearly broke me.
“Thank you,” she whispered, tears filling her eyes. “Really.”
For illustrative purposes only
I drove home exhausted around eight that morning.
My wife barely spoke to me.
For two straight days, the house felt tense. Every time I mentioned Lily or the hospital, my wife rolled her eyes.
Then my phone rang.
Unknown number.
“Hello?”
