Chapter 13 - Three Pounds of Fight
The operating room lights were too bright. Emily heard wheels, instruments, nurses counting supplies. Someone told her to take a slow breath. She tried, but every breath caught on one thought: Please let me hear her.
Daniel sat by her shoulder in hospital scrubs, holding a hand that had once felt too small to fit inside his. "Tell her we're ready," Emily whispered.
"She can hear you. Tell her yourself."
"Hey, baby girl." Emily's voice trembled. "We're going to meet a little early. Be stubborn, okay? Like your mom."
A thin cry rose above the machines. Daniel made a sound Emily had never heard from him before, halfway between a laugh and a sob.
"She's here," he said. "Em, she's here."
Their daughter weighed three pounds, eight ounces. A neonatal team checked her breathing and carried her to the NICU for specialized care. Emily saw a tiny foot, a flash of dark hair, then the doors swinging shut.
"Is she okay?" Emily asked.
"She's receiving help breathing," a nurse said gently. "The team will tell you more as soon as they can."
Later, when Emily was recovering, Daniel showed her a photograph of a small girl under a soft blanket with a clear breathing mask. Emily touched the screen with one finger.
"Nora," she said. "After my mom."
Daniel smiled through tears. "Nora Whitmore."
"Nora Bennett Whitmore," Emily corrected, adding her own family's name. "She gets all of us. Not just your last name."
He kissed her forehead. "Nora Bennett Whitmore."
May you like
They sat together until a NICU nurse hurried into the room, asking Daniel to come to the unit. He arrived just as an alarm sounded near Nora's bedside.
"She's having an apnea episode," the nurse said. "Please give us room."
