His eyes reddened.
“Who is?”
The question surprised me.
I looked toward the doorway where my children’s laughter drifted faintly down the hall.
“No one,” I said. “And everyone. My unit showed up. My friends showed up. Their teachers, neighbors, Lena from my office, the nurses from the NICU who still send birthday cards. They were loved by a village you were too proud to join.”
Daniel looked at the floor.
“I thought about you,” he said.
The old me would have wanted that.
The new me pitied it.
“Thinking is not showing up.”
“I know.”
“No, Daniel. You don’t. Showing up is holding one baby while another is screaming and two more need feeding. Showing up is driving to the emergency room at two in the morning with a feverish child and three terrified siblings. Showing up is sitting through kindergarten graduation while they look into the crowd, trying not to ask why one chair is empty.”
