The silence stretched on for what felt like an eternity but was probably only seconds, the doctor's hands moving with quick, practiced efficiency, suctioning, rubbing, the whole room holding its breath around a stillness too heavy to survive much longer.
Then, thin and furious and impossibly small, a cry broke through the quiet.
The room exhaled all at once, tension breaking into motion with nurses calling out numbers, the doctor's voice steadying into something relieved, and Ava, still flat on the bed, let out a sound that was half sob and half laugh, her hand crushing mine with a strength I hadn't known she still had left in her.
"Is she okay?" Ava's voice cracked, desperate, craning toward the small, wrapped bundle being carried quickly toward an incubator on the far side of the room
