Nala was curled in a ball on the floor. She pressed her hands tightly between her legs. The blood was coming faster and thicker and there was nothing either of them could do.

It was over quickly; there was no time to do anything. No time to drag her to her bed, no time for Rajan or the doctors to arrive, no time for the child’s lungs to breathe, for its heart to beat.

Nala lay on the floor, folded up like a baby—like the baby she could not see because she would not open her eyes. Dhara held her as she wept, stroking her hair and rocking back and forth to soothe her, like Nala did when she was little. When Rajan arrived, they were still like that—the mother wrapped in the child’s arms, lying in a pool of dark blood. Dhara tapped Nala’s back, lost in the rhythm of her own memories.

Bending down, Rajan moved Nala and extricated the baby from between her thighs. Her face was streaked with tears and pain as she held her arms out. He hesitated before passing the child to her. He was small and perfectly formed, and yet not formed. His skin was translucent and thin, revealing the web of tiny veins underneath. His eyes were sealed shut, framed by only the whisper of eyelashes. He held his hands together as if in prayer. Nala ran a finger over her son’s naked body, tracing his head, down the small ridges of his spine, the curve of his soft bottom, to his tiny toes and back up again. She stopped at the place where she should have felt a heartbeat and then traced the perfect line of his lips. She kissed them and whispered something in the shell of his ear.

Rajan touched her shoulder and slowly took the baby from her, Nala’s hands clinging hard, first to the child, then to him. He swaddled the child carefully in the blanket Ayah had brought, reluctantly covering his face. After a few moments he spoke, ‘Nala, I’m going to carry you to the ambulance, hold on to me.’

She wrapped her arms around his neck as he said to Dhara, ‘Stay with her in the ambulance. Kamini will meet us there. I’ll follow with some clothes for both of you.’

At his words, Dhara looked down at her school uniform and saw that it was dark and sticky with blood. She closed her eyes against the image of the baby that should have lived; and the other images that were freefalling around her. She started to cry too. He shook his head.

‘There’s no time now, she needs you,’ he said, carrying Nala to the door. Dhara watched as Nala rested her head on his chest. She heard his voice catch as he swallowed hard, fighting back his own tears.

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