Chapter 6 - Awakening
Forty-eight hours later, the sterile scent of the hospital room had been replaced by the soft, domestic smell of fresh jasmine flowers brought by Dona Marta.
Marcos sat in a leather armchair beside Hospital bed 412, gently cradling a tiny bundle wrapped in a soft blue knitted blanket. Little Miguel was fast asleep, his chest rising and falling in perfect, rhythmic harmony against Marcos’s chest.
A soft rustle of sheets drew Marcos’s attention.
He looked up.
Ana’s eyelids fluttered. She squeezed them shut against the harsh morning sunlight filtering through the window, letting out a soft, groaning sigh.
“Ana?” Marcos whispered, his voice trembling as he carefully laid Miguel in the rolling bassinet and rushed to her bedside. “Ana, can you hear me?”
Her dark eyes slowly blinked open, looking confused, heavy with the lingering fog of the neurotoxin, but undeniably, brilliantly alive.
“Marcos...?” she whispered, her voice dry as sandpaper. She tried to lift her hand, and Marcos instantly caught it, pressing her knuckles against his wet cheek, covering her skin in desperate, grateful kisses. “What... what happened? Why am I in the hospital? The crash... I remember the car spinning...”
“You’re safe,” Marcos choked out, brushing a stray lock of hair from her forehead. “You’re safe, my love. The nightmare is over.”
Ana frowned, her maternal instincts kicking in with terrifying speed, her hands flying to her abdomen. “Miguel! Where is my baby? The crash—did I lose him? Is my baby okay?!”
Marcos smiled through his tears, stepping back slightly and wheeling the bassinet directly to the edge of her bed.
“Look for yourself,” he whispered.
Ana stared down into the bassinet. There lay Miguel, stretching his tiny arms out in his sleep, letting out a soft, contented yawn. Tears spilled over Ana’s eyelashes, cutting tracks down her cheeks as she pulled her newborn son into her arms, burying her face against his tiny neck, sobbing with a joy so fierce it shook the entire room.
May you like
“He’s here,” she wept, looking up at Marcos with bottomless adoration. “He’s alive. How... how is this possible?”
“Because,” Marcos said softly, leaning down to kiss them both, “I saw something impossible in the dark. And I refused to let you go.”
