That was all he was given.
And for the first time, he didn’t ask for more.
A week later, I visited Chloe’s apartment and found the original gender reveal photograph sitting on her mantel.
The white cake was in the center of the picture, its pink filling exposed. Everyone was smiling except Chloe, whose face had been turned away from the camera.
She had placed another photograph beside it.
Grace, sleeping peacefully in her mother’s arms.
I studied the two pictures.
“Why keep the first one?” I asked.
Chloe smiled gently.
“Because I don’t want to forget the day everything fell apart.”
She lifted Grace from her crib and kissed her tiny forehead.
“And I don’t want to forget that it was also the day I finally learned what I would never allow to happen again.”
Outside, sunlight streamed through the nursery window.
The little girl who had once been treated as a disappointment by people who had never even met her had become the reason her mother found the courage to walk away.
