Chapter 2

After six and a half hours, I gave birth to a daughter.

When I opened my eyes again, the only person in the room was a nurse changing my IV bag.

When she saw I was awake, she gave me a sip of warm water.

"Where's your husband? Should we call him? What could possibly be more important than his wife having a baby?"

I paused.

"He didn't come?"

The nurse's face said it all.

A whole night, our baby already born, and Ethan hadn't even shown his face.

Holding back my anger, I dialed his number. This time it went through.

He kept his voice low. "I'll be right there."

Then a woman's voice drifted in from the background, lazy, a little husky, as if she'd just woken up. "Ethan, have some breakfast before you go. You were up all night. I made French toast and coffee. Eat something first."

My nails dug into my palms. It felt like someone had taken a hammer to my heart. It hurt so much I couldn't breathe.

"You were at her place all night?"

His fairly calm tone changed instantly.

"What are you accusing me of now? She's got a kid here. What do you think I could possibly do? Fine. I'll come back after I eat."

He hung up on me.

The tears came and wouldn't stop.

A few hours later, Ethan rushed into my room with a bouquet of roses and an overnight bag.

"Honey, I'm sorry. I thought you were just saying that... When I got home you weren't there, and the neighbor downstairs said an ambulance took you..."

He sat by the bed and explained, over and over.

He said Mia had a meltdown last night and wrapped herself around his leg so he couldn't leave. By the time he finally got her to sleep, it was past midnight.

He was afraid he'd wake me if he came home, so he crashed on Vanessa's couch.

"Mm," I said.

"Are you done? I'm tired. I want to sleep."

Ethan opened his mouth, but in the end he didn't say anything else.

I drifted off in a daze. When I woke up again, Ethan was gone.

There was a sticky note on the nightstand in his messy handwriting: Vanessa says she was in a car accident. Going to check on her.

For the next few days, I didn't see him at all.

The iMessages kept coming, though, one after another, and every single one was about Vanessa. Vanessa's leg hurt, so he had to go help. Vanessa hurt her hand and couldn't cook, so he had to go make Mia something to eat. Mia had nightmares, so he had to go sit with her for a while.

Our daughter had been born, and he hadn't even given her a name.

I stopped counting on him.

I named our daughter myself. Joy.

At mealtime, the nurse brought me my hospital tray: dry, mushy ground turkey, a cup of ice-cold green Jell-O, and a little carton of apple juice.

I forced down two bites and couldn't manage any more.

The new mom in the next bed over had a husband who'd just picked up takeout from a restaurant nearby, hot chicken noodle soup and fresh-baked lasagna. The whole room filled with the rich smell.

Her husband was gently coaxing her to eat a little more, the whole family gathered around her bed, talking and laughing.

I turned my head and looked out the window, and my tears fell silently into that awful cup of Jell-O.

On my phone, Vanessa's Instagram had updated again.

A photo of a plate of lasagna and a glass of red wine on the table. The caption: Someone's cooking is still the best. Never get tired of it.

On Joy's fifth day, the doctor said her jaundice levels were high and she had a mild lung infection.

I cried quietly all night.

The next morning, I left my room to go to the restroom and spotted Ethan in the distance.

He was with Vanessa and Mia. Mia was slumped against Ethan's chest, her little face flushed red with fever. Ethan held her and patted her back, slow and steady, his voice so gentle it practically melted.

"Take your medicine like a good girl and you'll get better. Daddy's right here. Daddy's not going anywhere."

I gripped my phone so hard my knuckles went white. The message I'd sent him last night, Joy's really congested, the doctor says she has a lung infection, was still unread.