Chapter 2 - THE SCAN
I arrived at the hospital before sunrise.
Emily was already awake.
She looked at the paper cup in my hand.
“Coffee?”
“For me.”
“Good.”
“I remembered.”
Her mouth almost moved into a smile.
Almost.
I sat.
Not too close.
I was learning distance could be respectful when it was chosen for the other person instead of used to protect myself.
At eight, they took Emily for imaging.
I stayed behind because she had not asked me to come.
Forty-three minutes later, she returned.
I knew immediately.
Bad news has a physical presence.
You can see it before anyone speaks.
Dr. Brooks entered with another physician.
Dr. Priya Shah, maternal-fetal medicine.
Two specialists.
That was never good.
Dr. Brooks opened the scan.
“The disease is present in several lymph-node regions.”
Emily swallowed.
“So it spread.”
“Yes.”
“Organs?”
“No major organ involvement at this time.”
At this time.
I hated those words.
Dr. Shah spoke next.
“The pregnancy currently looks appropriate for gestational age.”
Emily’s hand moved toward her stomach.
“Heartbeat?”
“Strong.”
She closed her eyes.
One tear slipped down her cheek.
The first good thing we had heard.
Dr. Brooks did not let us live inside it long.
“I do not recommend delaying treatment for several months.”
Emily opened her eyes.
“How long can we wait?”
“We are discussing days and perhaps a short number of weeks, not months.”
“What happens if we wait until the second trimester?”
“There are treatment approaches that may become more feasible then.”
“And if we don’t make it?”
The doctor held her gaze.
“That is the risk.”
Emily stared at the screen containing our child.
I wanted to tell her what to do.
Every instinct I had screamed at me.
Save Emily.
End uncertainty.
Pick the path with the clearest survival probability.
But it was not my body.
And this was not a battlefield where I outranked everyone else.
I gripped the chair instead.
Emily looked at me.
“What do you think?”
That frightened me more than not being asked.
“I think…”
I stopped.
What did she need?
My answer?
Or my certainty?
I had given her false certainty for years.
So I gave her the truth.
“I think I’m terrified.”
Emily’s expression changed.
“I think I want you alive more than I know how to say.”
Her eyes filled.
“And I think if I tell you what decision to make, I become one more person trying to control the worst thing that’s ever happened to you.”
I swallowed.
“So I’m going to sit here.”
My voice broke.
“And whatever you choose, I’m going to help carry what comes next.”
Emily looked away quickly.
But not before I saw her cry.
That afternoon, Dr. Shah ordered additional bloodwork because of our two previous pregnancy losses.
Emily frowned.
“We did tests before.”
“Some.”
“Why more?”
“Because recurrent loss sometimes reveals patterns only after broader evaluation.”
I watched Emily stiffen.
“What patterns?”
Dr. Shah was cautious.
“Clotting, immune, anatomical, genetic. Many possibilities. Sometimes we find nothing.”
Emily’s voice became small.
“And if you find something now?”
“We deal with what we know now.”
That answer sounded kind.
But I knew what Emily heard.
What if something could have been done before?
I saw the question enter her face.
I reached toward her.
Stopped.
She noticed.
Then, surprisingly, she turned her hand palm-up on the bed.
Permission.
I placed mine over it.
Her fingers closed around mine.
Not as husband and wife.
Not yet.
Maybe never.
But as two people who had already buried too much hope separately.
That evening I called my commanding officer.
Brigadier General Mark Hollis had known me for nine years.
“What happened?”
he asked.
“My ex-wife has cancer.”
Silence.
“And she’s pregnant.”
Longer silence.
“Yours?”
“Yes.”
“What do you need?”
The question almost broke me.
“I don’t know.”
“Then take forty-eight hours and figure out what you need.”
“Sir—”
“That was not a suggestion.”
The military had never sounded so human.
Emily’s blood results came back the following morning.
Dr. Shah entered with the folder.
Her expression made Emily grip my hand before she even spoke.
“One of the tests was positive.”
Emily’s face drained.
“What test?”
“A clotting-related autoimmune marker.”
I watched Emily stop breathing.
“Could it have…”
She could not finish.
Dr. Shah understood.
“Could it have contributed to your miscarriages?”
Emily nodded.
“It may have.”
The room went completely silent.
Emily pulled her hand away from mine.
She looked toward the wall.
“So there was a reason.”
“A possible explanation.”
“There was something wrong with me.”
“No.”
Emily laughed sharply.
“You just said—”
“I said there may have been a medical condition.”
The doctor’s voice was firm.
“That is not the same thing as saying you caused those losses.”
Emily shook her head.
“But if we had known—”
“We did not know.”
“If we had tested sooner—”
“Emily.”
She started crying.
I stood.
She looked at me.
And I finally did the thing I had failed to do after both miscarriages.
I cried too.
Not quietly.
Not privately.
I sat beside her and let the grief I had locked away for years finally break open.
“I thought about them every day.”
Emily stared at me.
“What?”
“The babies.”
My voice collapsed.
“Every day.”
She covered her mouth.
“I lied by acting like I didn’t.”
“You hesitated.”
“I was scared if I started talking about them, I’d never stop.”
Tears ran down my face.
“I wanted the bike lessons.”
“The stupid school plays.”
“The little shoes in the hallway.”
“I wanted all of it.”
Emily began sobbing.
For the first time since our first loss, neither of us tried to be the strong one.
We simply broke.
Together.
May you like
And somewhere beneath my hand—
our third child’s heart kept beating.
