Not for a long while.
Just sit there together listening to her fight.
Then, real soft, he says, “She’s gonna be fine.”
I glance over. He’s looking straight ahead, jaw set like a man twice his age.
He adds, “She always is.”
I scrub my hands down my face and nod. “Yeah,” I say. “Yeah, she is.”
The night stretches long, cruel and slow.
The storm rolls off just before dawn, leaving everything slick and silver outside. I’ve been sitting on these damn steps so long my back aches and my legs have gone numb, but I don’t move. Can’t.
Gideon’s head slumped against my shoulder sometime after three. He’s breathing slow, passed out cold. I didn’t have the heart to wake him.
Upstairs, Alice’s cries deepen with grit and fury and pain.
Mrs. Clay’s voice cuts through, gentle and reassuring: “That’s it, Alice. You bear down. Don’t you hold back now, girl. You’ve got her almost here.”
I press my fist hard to my mouth.
Lord, you don’t take her from me.
Then—I hear it.
A cry, high and wet. Tiny lungs testing the world for the first time.
I realize I ain’t breathed in what feels like a full minute.
Gideon stirs beside me. Lifts his head, blinking. “That the baby?” he asks.
I nod once, but my throat’s too tight for words.
There’s scuffing upstairs, hushed voices. Then soft footsteps on the stairs.
Mrs. Clay appears, framed in the pale light of dawn. She’s smiling. Just barely. “She’s here,” she says. “Your wife’s all right. Baby too.”
I make a sound—could be relief, could be a sob, maybe a mix of both.
“Come meet your daughter, Mr. Collier.” She steps aside.
So I stand.
And I go.
Up the stairs I ran down what feels like a lifetime ago.
The door creaks as I push it open. Light of dawn filters through the lace curtain, pale and gold. And there she is.
Alice.
Propped against the pillows, hair damp and clinging to her temple, eyes heavy. She’s got a bundle in her arms, wrapped up tight in a yellow blanket Mrs. Baxter knit as a gift. The little thing is tucked in so careful, just the tiniest pink face peeking out, lips pursed, nose scrunched like she’s already pissed off with the world.
Alice lifts her eyes to me. “She’s perfect,” she whispers.
Something breaks clean open in my chest. I cross the room. I can’t speak. Just look.
