Alessia:
I woke up happy.
Not the fragile kind of happiness that feels like it might shatter if I breathe too hard, but the warm, steady kind that settles in your chest and refuses to leave.
And no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t truly wipe the smile from my face.
Hope slept beside me in her bassinet, tiny chest rising and falling, her little face scrunched in the most serious expression I’d ever seen. I turned my head just to look at her, and my heart swelled so painfully I thought it might burst. I wanted to move. To do something. To walk, to stretch, to prove I was still me and not some delicate thing tucked away in bed.
I pressed my palms into the mattress, ready to sit up.
“No.”
Sienna’s voice cut cleanly through the room.
I froze and glanced toward the door. She stood the
