Richard took a step in, his breath catching.
Sister Catherine’s voice lowered. “They were left together,” she said. “All at once.”
Richard stared, as if his eyes didn’t believe what they were seeing.
“Nine?” he whispered.
Sister Catherine nodded. “Nine baby girls.”
Richard moved closer without realizing. The girls were so small—newborn small. Their skin was deep brown, their hair soft and tight against their heads. One had a tiny fist pressed to her cheek. Another made a sound in her sleep, like a sigh.
“They’re… sisters?” he asked.
“We don’t know,” Sister Catherine admitted. “No papers. No note. Just a basket on our steps and nine babies inside. A miracle and a tragedy all at once.”
One baby opened her eyes briefly, dark and wide, then shut them again like the world was already exhausting.
Richard felt something shift inside him—something he hadn’t felt since Anne’s last breath: direction.
“What happens to them?” he asked, voice unsteady.
Sister Catherine didn’t answer right away. Her silence was the answer.
Then she said softly, “People will adopt one. Sometimes two. But nine…” She shook her head. “No one wants to take them all.”
Richard looked at the cribs again.
Nine babies. Nine lives that had started together.
He pictured someone coming in, pointing, choosing—like selecting fruit at a grocery store. He pictured the girls being separated, raised apart, never knowing the sound of each other’s cries, never sharing the same roof again.
His throat tightened.
“So you’ll split them,” he said, though it wasn’t really a question.
Sister Catherine’s eyes looked tired. “We’ll do what we must,” she said. “But yes. Separation is… likely.”
Richard’s heart pounded. The storm outside cracked with thunder like a warning.
He thought of Anne. Thought of the nursery in his house that still sat untouched. Thought of all that love trapped in his chest with nowhere to go.
And then he heard himself say it—before logic could stop him.
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