Jason stared at the suitcase.

His face went blank for half a second.

Then he laughed.

A short, confused laugh.

“Very funny,” he said.

I didn’t smile.

The nurse stopped shuffling paperwork and glanced between us.

“Emily?”

I adjusted Ava higher against my chest.

“No,” I said quietly. “It’s not a joke.”

The room suddenly felt smaller.

Jason’s smile disappeared.

“What are you talking about?”

“You told me to pack a bag.”

His jaw tightened.

“For her.”

“No.”

I looked down at my daughter.

“For you.”

Silence.

The nurse froze beside the bed.

Even Noah woke up and made a tiny sound from the bassinet.

Jason stared at me as if I had spoken another language.

“What?”

“You said one of our children had to leave.”

I pointed at the suitcase.

“So I chose the adult.”

The nurse’s mouth actually fell open.

Jason looked around the room, waiting for someone to tell him this wasn’t happening.

Nobody did.

“Emily, stop being dramatic.”

The old version of me would have cried.

The version of me who had spent four months begging him to love both of his children.

The version who still believed reason could change a person.

But that woman was gone.

Labor had taken her.

Months of arguments had taken her.

Watching him ignore his daughter twelve hours after she was born had buried whatever hope remained.

“Dramatic?” I repeated.

My voice stayed calm.

“You spent my entire pregnancy trying to get rid of one of our babies.”

His face reddened.

“That’s not what happened.”

The nurse quietly stepped backward toward the door.

Smart woman.

“It is exactly what happened.”

“You’re twisting everything.”

“No, Jason.”

I looked directly into his eyes.

“For nine months I listened to you call her ‘the girl.'”

His shoulders stiffened.

“For nine months I listened to you tell people you were having one child when you knew we were having two.”

His mother had just walked into the room carrying a balloon.

Unfortunately for Jason, she arrived in time to hear every word.

“Jason?” she said.

He spun around.

“Mom, not now.”

Her eyes moved from him to the suitcase.

Then to me.

Then to Ava.

“What is happening?”

I answered before he could.

“Your son wants to give away his daughter.”

The balloon slipped from her hand.

It floated toward the ceiling.

The room went completely silent.

Even Jason looked shocked that I had finally said it out loud.

His mother stared at him.

“Tell me she’s lying.”

Jason swallowed.

“It’s more complicated than that.”

Wrong answer.

The look on her face changed instantly.

A look I had never seen before.

Disgust.

“Complicated?” she whispered.

“You wanted to give away your child?”

“Mom—”

“Your child?”

The nurse suddenly found something very important to do outside the room and disappeared.

I couldn’t blame her.

Jason looked trapped.

Good.

I had felt trapped for months.

His mother turned toward me.

“Emily, is this true?”

I nodded.

Every color drained from her face.

Then she did something none of us expected.

She walked over to Ava.

She gently touched her tiny hand.

And she started crying.

“My granddaughter,” she whispered.

Jason looked horrified.

“Mom, we’re not keeping both of them.”

The words had barely left his mouth before she snapped around.

“We?”

Her voice cut through the room like glass.

“There is no we.”

Jason blinked.

“What?”

“There is no we.”

She pointed at the suitcase.

“You get in the car.”

“Mom—”

“Now.”

For the first time since I had met her, she wasn’t speaking like a mother.

She was speaking like a judge delivering a sentence.

Jason laughed nervously.

“This is insane.”

“No.”

She looked at her son with tears in her eyes.

“This is insane.”

Her finger pointed toward Ava.

“That little girl has been alive for less than twenty-four hours, and you’re already trying to abandon her.”

Jason opened his mouth.

Nothing came out.

His mother stepped aside and revealed the discharge papers on the counter.

Then she looked at me.

“Do you have somewhere to stay?”

I nodded.

“My sister.”

“Good.”

Jason’s head whipped around.

“What?”

I smiled for the first time.

A real smile.

Because there was one thing he didn’t know.

One thing I had prepared months ago.

“I signed the lease last week.”

The blood drained from his face.

“What lease?”

“The apartment.”

Silence.

His eyes widened.

“You rented an apartment?”

“Two bedrooms.”

His expression cracked.

“You were planning this?”

I looked at Ava.

Then at Noah.

Then back at him.

“No.”

I picked up Noah from the bassinet and held both babies against me.

“I was preparing for it.”

Jason sank into the visitor chair.

Suddenly he looked smaller.

Not physically.

Just less important.

Like a man discovering the world would continue without him.

“You’d really leave me?”

I couldn’t believe he asked that.

After everything.

After months of trying to separate siblings before they even took their first breath.

I looked at him for a long moment.

Then I answered.

“No.”

His face softened.

For one hopeful second, he thought he had won.

Then I finished.

“You left us first.”

The room went silent.

Jason didn’t speak.

His mother didn’t speak.

Nobody did.

Because everyone knew it was true.

The babies stirred in my arms.

Two tiny heartbeats.

Two tiny lives.

Two children who had entered the world together.

And who would leave that hospital together.

The nurse returned with discharge papers.

She looked around cautiously.

“Everything okay?”

I took the papers.

Signed my name.

And smiled.

“For the first time in months?”

I looked at my son.

I looked at my daughter.

Then at the suitcase waiting beside the door.

“Everything is perfect.”

And twenty minutes later, I wheeled my twins out of the hospital.

While my husband watched his family leave without him.