The Space Between Us

The world had gone quiet.

After the storm of labor, the pain, the rush, the blur of voices and hands and pressure, I was now wrapped in a silence I didn't know I needed. My mother sat beside me, quiet and still, her hand resting on my leg. My father stood near the window, pretending to check his phone but clearly keeping an eye on both of us.

And in my arms… her.

My daughter.

She was asleep against my chest, the tiniest breath escaping her lips in soft little sighs. Her skin was pink and warm, her hair—dark, thick, and wild like mine. She had my nose. Maybe Dominic's mouth. I didn't know yet.

I wasn't ready to know.

I just knew she was here. And she was mine.

The nurse had asked earlier what I wanted to name her. And I hadn't hesitated.

"Aurora," I said. "Her name is Aurora."

Because something about the name felt right.

Like light after darkness.

Like something new and powerful and untouched by the weight of the past.

Aurora Harper.

I had whispered it to her before anyone else did. Just the two of us, skin to skin, like a secret between a mother and her miracle.

But now, the weight of reality was pressing against the hospital room door.

I knew he was here.

Dominic.

I hadn't seen him. But I had felt it. I had seen the shift in the nurses' glances, the way my father stepped into the hall for a little too long. I had seen the worry in my mother's eyes — not fear, but concern. Like she knew this moment would come and wanted to protect me from it, even if it was already here.

He knew.

Somehow, he'd found out.

And now he was out there, waiting.

The part of me that used to ache for him stirred again — but it wasn't longing now. It was something heavier. Warier. Tired.

I had spent months grieving the version of him I thought I knew. The man I married. The man I fought. The man who, despite everything, still haunted me in dreams and memories and the tiny curve of my daughter's chin.

I looked down at Aurora again, brushing her little cheek with my knuckle.

How could I explain to him that she had been my strength and my breaking point all at once?

That I had left not because I hated him — but because I couldn't survive being near someone who made me feel so small… and still held so much of my heart?

"She's beautiful," my mother said softly.

"She is," I whispered. "She's everything."

There was a knock at the door. Gentle. Uncertain.

I froze.

It wasn't a nurse.

I didn't need anyone to say it.

It was him.

I looked at my mother. She gave me a small, encouraging nod.

"You don't have to let him in," she said quietly. "But if you do… you don't have to decide anything tonight."

I stared at the door for a long time.

Part of me wanted to protect this peace. This quiet. This moment that belonged only to me and my daughter.

But another part… the smaller, broken part that still remembered how his hand felt against mine, how his voice softened when he wasn't angry, how he looked at me like I was the only person in a world full of people…

The part wanted him to see her.

To see her.

To see what he missed. And maybe what he could still earn.

I pressed a kiss to Aurora's forehead.

"Come in," I said, voice barely above a breath.

The door creaked open.

And just like that… everything changed again.