I guess I'm about to find out.
"What if I'm not ready?" The question comes out before I can stop it. "To be a dad. What if I screw it up?"
Aunt Ellie laughs—a warm, genuine sound. "Honey, nobody's ever ready to be a parent. You just figure it out as you go. And from what I've seen, the people who worry about screwing it up are usually the ones who do just fine."
"That's not very reassuring."
"It's not meant to be reassuring. It's meant to be true." She settles back in her seat, closing her eyes. "Now let me rest. I'm too old for five AM road trips."
I smile despite myself and keep driving.
We pull into the facility's parking lot at 9:55.
Five minutes early.
The building looks different than it did five weeks ago, when I dropped Vanna off and watched her walk away.
Less intimidating.
More like a place where healing might actually happen.
"Ready?" Aunt Ellie asks.
"No," I admit. "But I'm going in anyway."
The visiting room is warm and bright, with big windows that let in the pale November light.
It's designed to feel comfortable, I realize.
To make families forget, even for a moment, that their loved ones are fighting for their lives.
I sign in at the front desk, my hands steadier than they were three days ago.
Aunt Ellie settles into a chair nearby, pretending to read a magazine, giving me space.
And then I see her.
She's standing in the doorway, a staff member beside her, and everything else fades away.
The room. The people.
The fear that's been eating at me for weeks.
All of it disappears, and there's only her.
She looks better.
That's the first thing I notice.
Her cheeks have filled out a little, and there's color in her face that wasn't there before.
The dark circles under her eyes are fading.
The haunted look—the look of someone who's always chasing something just out of reach—is gone, replaced by something clearer. Calmer.
She looks like my Vanna.
The real one.
