Janelle met his gaze. “My daughter died two months ago. She was four months old. Same age as him. Heart condition. They didn’t catch it until it was too late.”
She paused, breath shaking.
“For the last months of her life, she would only nurse if I sang this song. She needed to hear my heartbeat. If anything changed, she refused. The doctors told me it was superstition.”
Her voice cracked, but she didn’t let it break fully.
“When she died, it wasn’t because I stopped loving her. I got the flu. They took her away, said I’d infect her. She was gone in three days. And my milk never dried up. My body refused to accept she was gone.”
She looked down at the baby, now breathing steady, fingers fisted in her dress.
“And your son latched like he’d been waiting for something specific. Not just milk. Not just warmth. Something… familiar.”
Marcus stared, rage draining from him like color from a wound. His hand reached for the doorframe, gripping it hard enough the wood creaked.
“He’s eating,” Janelle said softly. “For the first time in weeks. He’s eating.”
Marcus swallowed, throat working. “What’s his name?”
Janelle blinked. “I… I don’t know.”
Marcus’s face twisted with
