The hospital armchair was an instrument of torture disguised as furniture.
I'd already spent hours in it, feeling every rusty spring pierce my back, every right angle scream against my spine. But there was no force in the world that could make me leave that room. Alice slept, her face turned to the side, blonde hair spread across the white pillow like threads of gold against snow. The monitor beside the bed blinked in steady rhythm, a visual reminder that she was stable, that the babies were fine, that the detachment hadn't worsened.
I should have been relieved.
I was.
But I was also exhausted, tense, and so deeply in love it physically hurt.
"You look like a dog guarding its owner."
Alice's raspy voice cut through the silence. Her eyes were open now, blue and slightly puffy with sle
