Page 21 of Absolution

Her body’s angled toward the window; arms wrapped tightly across her stomach like she’s trying to hold herself together. I keep glancing over, half-hoping she’ll talk, half-afraid of what she’ll say.

The car feels too quiet. Too clean. Like it doesn’t match the chaos happening inside both of us.

Then I hear it. Just a sound at first. A sharp inhale. The quiet hitch of breath.

And then she breaks.

Not loud. Not dramatic. Just these awful, aching sobs that shake her small frame like aftershocks. Like her body is still trying to catch up to what happened.

I pull over without thinking, putting the car in park on the shoulder of the road. My hand reaches for hers. She doesn’t look at me. Just keeps staring out the window, tears streaking silently down her cheeks.

“We’re gonna lose him, aren’t we,” she whispers.

Her voice is so small. Like she’s afraid the words themselves will make it real.

I tighten my grip on her hand. “No,” I say. Not because I know it’s true, but because I have to believe it for both of us. “No. He’s a fighter. Just like you.”

She shakes her head once, sharp and bitter. “I couldn’t even carry them to term.”

“You carried them as long as you could,” I say gently. “You did everything right. This isn’t your fault.”

“I didn’t even get to hold him.”

Her voice cracks and I lean over, brushing a tear off her cheek with my thumb. “He knows you’re his mom, Jackie. He knows your voice. You talked to him every night. Remember?”

She bites her lip, trying to stop the tears, but they keep coming. “They won’t even let me feed him.”

“They will,” I say, brushing her hair back. “You’ll hold him. You’ll rock him to sleep. This... this is just the beginning. We’re going to get through it.”

She finally turns her face toward me, eyes red and raw. “How can you be so calm?”

I exhale slowly. “I’m not. I’m terrified.”

That’s the truth. Every second I was in that NICU, I was holding back panic like a dam about to burst. But I couldn’t show it. Not in front of her.

“I’m scared,” I say. “But I have to have hope.”

For a second, I think she’s going to crumble all over again. But instead, she squeezes my hand. Tight. Desperate.

“Thank you,” she says softly.

We spend the next two weeks doing everything they ask. We train, we take notes, we ask every question twice. Jackie masters the monitors. I drill the CPR steps into my brain until I can recite them in my sleep.

Eight weeks after the girls came home, Levi does too.

We don’t bring him through the front door. We bring him in through the back, carefully, quietly, straight into his room.

The crib looks like something out of a sci-fi movie. Tubes, wires, backup power. But Jackie sets him down gently, adjusts the cannula with practiced fingers.

He’s home.

Our daughters sleep in the next room.

And Levi, our fighter, is finally where he belongs.

We made it this far.

We’ll face what comes next, together.

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