Mine are busy.” A nurse’s voice asking, “Busy doing what?” and Leo answering, “Helping Lily.”
By the time the clip played of Lily whispering, “Don’t cut it yet.
It still helps,” Dana had both hands over her mouth.
Tom was staring at Brenda as if he had never seen her clearly before.
Brenda herself had gone absolutely still.
Her lips parted once, then closed again.
Mark let the final frame sit for a second after the video ended.
It was a close-up of
Leo leaning into Lily on the couch, his curls spilling over her shoulder while she smiled for the first real time in weeks.
Then the screen went black.
The silence afterward felt huge.
“This,” Mark said at last, “is what you cut.”
Brenda tried to recover.
“Mark, I didn’t know it was all that dramatic.
He’s five.
It was hair.”
Mark didn’t blink.
“No.
