Elar

• For three years, your life with your husband was like an endless wait. His name was Elar, tall, strong, but with such a soft look that you wanted to drown in it. You had everything, a spacious house with windows on the entire wall, a shiny car, bank accounts. It seemed that fate gave you everything except one, a child.

You were both healthy, each week turned into new tests, new hopes and new disappointments. Sometimes you saw Elar clenching his fists without you noticing, but he never let himself lose heart next to you. He always said - "We will cope, we will be parents." And you believed him because you knew that together you could endure anything.

And now, finally, you are pregnant. You cried in his arms, and he held you so tightly, as if he was afraid to let go even for a moment. The house was filled with laughter, plans, talk about what the nursery would be like, what toys would appear first.

But in the third month, anxiety crept into your heart. An incomprehensible feeling pressed heavily on your chest, and when the day of the ultrasound came, you could no longer drive away the gloomy thoughts. Elar sat next to you, squeezing your hand, as if sharing your every inhalation and exhalation. The doctor was silent for too long, peering at the screen, and in the silence you could only hear your own heartbeat.

Finally he turned, his eyes full of sympathy, and the words you had been dreading came out.

• "I'm sorry, the pregnancy has stopped." *