She typed lazily, then pointed a pen down the hall. “Take the elevators to the fourth floor. Follow the blue line on the floor.”
I practically ran, my cheap shoes squeaking aggressively on the polished linoleum. When the elevator doors dinged open on the fourth floor, the atmosphere shifted. It was quieter here, hushed and reverent, punctuated only by the terrifying, rhythmic beeping of dozens of monitors. I followed the blue line until I rounded the corner into the NICU observation hallway.
When I saw him, my heart fractured into a million jagged pieces.
There, sitting in a rigid plastic waiting chair, illuminated by the harsh fluorescent overheads, was Ethan. He was still wearing his landscaping uniform. His jeans were heavily stained with dark grass and mud, and his heavy work boots were caked in dried dirt, leaving a trail on the pristine hospital floor. He looked so incredibly young—a boy playing dress-up in a man’s clothes. Yet, the way his broad shoulders slumped carried the unimaginable weight of an old, broken man.
Cradled awkwardly against his chest, supported by his large, dirt-stained hands, was a tiny, impossibly fragile bundle wrapped in a faded pink hospital blanket.
“Ethan,” I gasped, the word tearing out of my throat.
He flinched and looked up. The sheer, unadulterated terror swimming in his dark eyes instantly shattered any anger, any confusion I might have harbored.
“Mom,” he choked out. His voice cracked, sounding like the little boy who used to wake up from nightmares. “She… she was early. Her lungs… they said her lungs were struggling, but she’s breathing on her own now.”
I moved toward him, my knees feeling like water. I knelt beside his chair, my hands trembling violently as I pulled the soft pink blanket back just a fraction of an inch. I expected to see a baby, but what I saw was a miracle clinging to life. Her face was no bigger than a bruised apple. Her skin was translucent, crisscrossed with delicate blue veins. Her eyes were squeezed tightly shut beneath a plastic oxygen cannula taped to her tiny cheeks. She was hooked to a symphony of wires.
