Two days later, I signed discharge papers alone, listened to therapy instructions alone, and watched women leave the maternity ward with flowers, balloons, and husbands carrying bags.
I left with a sleeping baby, a folder thick enough to choke a printer, and a nurse named Carla walking beside me.
“You got somebody meeting you?” she asked.
I smiled so tightly it hurt. “Eventually.”
That was the lie I told strangers for about a year.
I signed discharge papers alone.
***
My apartment smelled like formula, baby powder, and lemon cleaner. I cleaned when I was scared, which meant I was always cleaning.
The hard years weren’t noble. They were expensive and exhausting.
I learned how to stretch Henry’s legs while he cried and my own hands shook from lack of sleep. I learned which insurance reps responded to charm and which ones needed pressure.
At church, people spoke to me in the soft voice reserved for funerals.
One Sunday, when Henry was six months old, I was in the nursery hallway fixing his braces when a woman from the choir came over.
The hard years weren’t noble.
“He is just precious,” she said. Then her voice dropped. “And Warren? Is he… coping?”
I smoothed Henry’s sock and said, “No. He left long before my stitches melted.”
Her mouth opened and closed.
Henry sneezed.
I kissed his forehead. “If you see the sign-in sheet, can you hand it over? My hands are full.”
***
