“I heard him crying,” Sofia said quietly, adjusting the baby against her shoulder. “He needs to be changed and fed. When was the last time he ate.”
The man looked away, rubbing his face with both hands. He did not answer.
Sofia felt anger flare, hot and sudden, but she forced it down. This was not about her. She took a steady breath.
“Where is the bathroom,” she asked.
He gestured toward a side door without looking up.
Sofia moved quickly. She cleaned the baby with careful hands, speaking softly as if afraid that silence itself might hurt him. She changed him into clean clothes and washed his face, kissing his damp curls when he whimpered. Then she carried him downstairs and prepared a fresh bottle. The baby drank eagerly, his small fingers gripping her sleeve as if anchoring himself to the only solid thing he knew.
Tears blurred Sofia’s vision. The scene pulled her backward in time, to another night, another child, another moment she had failed to undo.
She did not notice the man watching from the doorway until she looked up and found him there, shoulders sagging, eyes hollow.
“I cannot,” he said quietly. “I cannot look at him without seeing her.”
