The quiet tone. The pity in the nurse’s eyes. I remembered how I shut down, how I cried for days, then shoved the grief somewhere far away where it couldn’t touch me.
And then thrown myself into work. I wanted that promotion. I wanted all my hard work and stress to go into something that could provide me with enough financial support for anything I wanted.
“You said you didn’t want to talk about IVF or adoption,” Greg went on. “You said that you needed to forget it. That you needed a moment…”
“I did,” I whispered.
“I know. And I wanted to respect that. But one night, when we were laying on the couch and watching that cooking show you like, I asked… What if we found someone else?
A surrogate? You looked at me and told me to do whatever I wanted. That you were tired.”
A flash of memory hit me.
Me in my robe, cradling a mug of wine because I couldn’t be bothered to pour it into a wineglass. I remember blinking slowly while Greg rubbed my feet. I had said that.
I just hadn’t… processed it. Greg had given me paperwork to sign, and I did. But I just didn’t ask about it.
I thought it was insurance forms or financial documents. I barely skimmed them. I’d checked out, and Greg… well, Greg had always handled the boring stuff.
I wanted to be mad. But I couldn’t. A sliver of hope had begun to rise inside me.
“I thought you were just talking,” I said. “I thought…”
“I didn’t want to bring it up again. But I reached out to my mother.
She knew Maria. She told me that she’d done this before. And… she would be willing to do this for us.
I wanted it to be real before I told you.”
“But… the procedure? Did we really freeze embryos that long ago?”
“Yes. From before we even started IVF.
Remember the two that were viable? One didn’t survive. This one did.
Please tell me that you still want this… Because if you don’t, everything will fall apart now.”
I paused. I let the weight of everything sink in. We were going to be parents.
Finally. I nodded. “And Lizzie, we’ve been working on the… nursery.
I’ve been turning the guest room into the nursery. I took a few flexible shifts this month to help Maria settle into our space. I told her to feel at home, to get used to the space.
But nothing ever happened, Lizzie. Nothing like that.”
“I enjoyed cleaning up and helping out,” Maria said. “I liked prepping meals, folding laundry… light stuff.
I wasn’t really a maid, just… helping out where I could. I wanted to feel useful, part of something. And Greg made sure I took it easy.”
My hands were still shaking.
“Why not just tell me?” I asked, finally. “I told Maria to say she was a maid, just in case you came home early and saw her. I didn’t want to ruin the surprise until I could tell you the whole story.
But also… we’re covering her as a household helper on paper, just until we were ready to reveal the truth.”
Greg pulled a small box from his pocket and opened it. Inside, was a delicate silver bracelet. A tiny charm in the shape of a heart and a baby’s footprint.
“I was going to give this to you at dinner, tonight,” he said. “I thought… maybe it would bring back your smile.”
“You should’ve told me,” I said, but my voice was already cracking. “I know,” he whispered.
“I wanted to. A hundred times. But every time I saw you dragging yourself through another 12-hour day, I kept thinking… what if it just made things worse?
What if it broke your heart all over again?”
I swallowed hard. I remembered the silence that followed our diagnosis. I’d put up walls.
Maybe he’d just tried to build something behind them. “Five months, Elizabeth,” Maria said. “It’s a boy.”
And suddenly, I was crying.
Because none of this made sense. And yet… in the strangest way, all of it did. Greg had forced my hand a little bit, but I wasn’t upset about that.
In fact, I was glad that he did what he did… I wanted this. I wanted this baby more than I cared to admit. That night, we lit the candles again.
We ate the dinner that Maria had prepped. She left early, promising to be back the next week. “I’ll keep working for as long as I can,” she said.
“For as long as my belly will allow it.”
“You’ve got to take it easy,” I said. “You’ve got precious cargo in there.”
Later, Greg and I sat on the couch with bowls of ice cream and chocolate sauce. “I’m scared,” I admitted.
“Me too,” he said. “But I’m happy,” I continued. “And thank you for believing that everything would go smoothly.
That everything will be okay. I thought our dream of being parents was over… but it’s only beginning.”
“You’re going to be the most incredible mom, Lizzie. I’m sorry… I should have kept you in the loop.
But I wanted to be sure. I wanted to wait until we reached the second trimester. And then… I wanted to wait a little longer to make sure that we were safe.
But he’s a happy and healthy baby.”
I rested my head on his shoulder. I glanced down at the bracelet on my wrist, the tiny silver footprint glinting in the glow of the television, and for the first time in months, I reached out and placed my hand over my belly. I wasn’t carrying him yet… But this home would be his, and my lap would be his safe space.
My arms would hold him through every storm. I knew that I needed to be more present. I needed to be back on track with Greg.
I needed to listen more and be there, in the moment. I couldn’t let things slip through my fingers anymore…
For the first time in a long time, I believed that everything was going to be okay. And I haven’t sleepwalked since.
Maybe the truth, as messy as it was, calmed something deeper in me than any sleep journal ever could. What would you have done?
