Mark
I woke before she did, the way I usually do, old habits from years of early surgical rounds refusing to let go even on a morning I had no actual reason to rise early for. Gray light was just starting to edge around the curtains of my bedroom, and for a long moment I simply lay there, watching Sophia sleep beside me, feeling something settle in my chest that I hadn't let myself feel in longer than I wanted to admit.
I have never, in my adult life, woken up in my own bed with someone else in it and felt anything close to this. Not with Claire, obviously, whose six months with me had never once involved anything close to this kind of morning. Not with any of the handful of women Peter liked to remind me I'd dated over the years, all of whom I'd said goodbye to without much feeling one
