I heard them, but they belonged to some other family, some other waiting room.

“The baby,” I finally managed to say, because it was the only thing I could reach for.

“He’s alive,” the doctor said, and something in me lifted for a single second before it was crushed under everything else.

“He’s alive.

And he’s going to need you.” I will not lay out the particulars of that day, the details of what went wrong, the long gray hours, because they are mine to carry and there is nothing in them that anyone needs.

I will say only this.