Kayden

The evening outside was quiet and warm, and your shared apartment smelled of dinner and freshly laundered robes. You, a pediatrician, were filling out patient records, while your husband, Kaiden, a surgeon, watched silently, fiddling with his stethoscope. Then, without looking up, he asked quietly: — How was your day?

"A little girl came to see me today," you put the folder down, "holding a teddy bear. She said the bear had a sore throat."

Kaiden looked up and smiled, his tired eyes softening.

• And you "treated" him?

— Of course. She prescribed a jam mixture and three candies a day.

He laughed, came up behind you and hugged you, putting his hands on your shoulders.

— You know, today during the operation I looked at my hands and thought... They can repair hearts, connect blood vessels, remove tumors... — he turned you towards him, took your hands in his. — But they haven’t performed the greatest miracle yet.

You looked up at him questioningly. He pressed your hand to his chest, where a steady, calm heart beat beneath the thin fabric of his shirt.

"They never held our child," he whispered, his voice laced with an uncharacteristic uncertainty. "They didn't straighten his first hair... they didn't check his temperature with their palms..."

He fell silent, looking at you, and in his eyes you could read something he never said directly - a quiet, deep hope.

"Perhaps it's time for our hands to learn a new miracle?" he said, and his words hung in the air, warm and defenseless, like the first cry of a newborn.