Chapter 7: Hold Her

Elora's POV

Beth wheeled me to the NICU at three in the morning, because I would not stop writing PIP on the whiteboard.

I had been awake four hours, and the cut across my belly burned every time I breathed.

I did not care.

The unit was dim and warm and full of small beeping lights.

A nurse looked up from her station and her face went careful.

"Mrs. Erickson," she said. "She's right through there. Janelle is with her."

Beth stopped pushing.

"Janelle is with her," she repeated.

Through the glass I saw a rocking chair in the corner of the room.

Janelle sat in it in a yellow gown, holding something small wrapped in a pink striped blanket.

She was humming.

It took me a second to know the tune.

It was four bars, and the second one was right.

She had memorized my lullaby off a kidnapper's phone.

Beth said a word I will not write down, and pushed me through the door.

Janelle looked up and smiled.

"Look who's awake," she said softly. "Ansel asked me to sit with her. He's worn out. He's been up since yesterday morning."

The nurse hovered in the doorway, looking from one of us to the other.

"He didn't ask," she said.

"He did, in the hall." Janelle did not even glance at her. "Sweetie, go find us a bottle."

The nurse stayed where she was.

I looked at the blanket.

My daughter's whole face was the size of my palm.

She had a knit cap and a tiny plastic tube taped at her nose and her eyes were squeezed shut.

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