When I scratched beneath his jaw, he leaned into my hand.
The crying had stopped.
That should have made me happy.
Instead, I found myself thinking about the first time I carried him.Browse Reference
Maybe he cried because he hurt.
Maybe he cried because he was terrified.
Or maybe his body had simply reached the point where being held felt stranger than suffering.
I would never know.
On the fifth morning, Dr. Morris asked me to come into her office.
There were new images on her computer.
“We repeated part of the imaging now that he is more stable.”
My stomach tightened.
“What did you find?”
“The healing around the injury confirms what we suspected. This happened weeks ago.”
She zoomed in.
“His body has already been trying to repair itself.”
“Wrongly?”
“In a less-than-ideal alignment, yes.”
“What does that mean for walking?”
“It complicates things.”
I looked through the glass panel in the office door.
