Preparing

Sonya and I are taking classes. Childbirth preparation. Baby care. How to change diapers. How to swaddle. All the things that seem impossibly complicated right now but apparently become muscle memory.

The instructor is a kind woman who has clearly done this thousands of times. She said something I'll remember: "You don't have to be perfect. You just have to be present."

Present. That's the thing I'm least capable of being.

I nodded and wrote the words down in my notebook and pretended to take it seriously. Sonya held my hand and I held hers back and we looked like a couple preparing for parenthood.

In reality, I was thinking about Simona. About the fact that I will never have that. That this is my life now—performance parenting with a woman I don't love while fantasizing about someone who rejected me.