Chapter 18 - One Breath at a Time
The nurse answered before the second ring. Nicolás had experienced a breathing setback overnight. The team had adjusted his support, and a doctor wanted to explain the plan. He was stable at that moment, but he wasn't ready to leave the hospital.
I sat on the curb outside the courthouse while cars moved past. The hearing had cost all the strength I'd saved for the day. Now I had to stand up and become a mother in the NICU again.
"I'll drive," Daniel offered.
I let him. Accepting a ride wasn't accepting his excuses, and for once he seemed to understand the difference.
At the hospital, the doctor showed us a chart and answered every question I asked, even when I asked the same one twice. Premature babies could improve and struggle and improve again. The team would keep watching him closely.
When I reached the incubator, Nicolás turned his face toward a familiar sound. I sang the off-key lullaby my father used to sing when the electricity went out during summer storms. The nurse smiled and dimmed the light.
"He's heard your voice before," she said.
That night Daniel met with Alma's new counselor for the first time. He didn't tell our daughter that everything would be fine. He said he had failed to see how frightened both she and I had become.
"When Grandma said Mommy was bad, I thought maybe you agreed," Alma told him.
"I acted like I agreed by not stopping it," he answered. "That was wrong."
"Can people get better at being dads?"
"I hope so. I'm getting help to learn."
Alma considered that for a long moment. Then she handed him a drawing of five figures outside a little yellow house. She had left a wide space between the grown-ups.
"That's where everybody can breathe," she explained.
May you like
When Daniel showed me the drawing, he asked the question he'd avoided since I woke from surgery.
"Mariana, do you think you could ever trust me again?"
