While Serena fought through active labor, Neal treated the hospital room like a gaming lounge. But when one nurse saw how alone Serena felt, she called in the two people who could make Neal face exactly what kind of husband and father he was becoming.
I thought the most painful part of giving birth would be the contractions.
The real pain was watching my husband sit on a hospital couch with a controller in his hands, gaming on his PlayStation while I was doubled over, sweating, trembling, and trying not to scream through the early stages of labor.
My name is Serena, and up until that day, I had spent nine months telling myself Neal would change once the baby came.
“He was not a bad man,” I used to say. He was just immature sometimes. Careless sometimes. Distracted most of the time. But whenever my friends raised their eyebrows at the way he forgot appointments or turned every serious conversation into a joke, I defended him.
“He’ll step up when it matters,” I told them.
When my water broke that morning, Neal was in the living room, wearing the same gray sweatpants he had slept in, his headset crooked over one ear.
“Neal,” I called, gripping the edge of the kitchen counter. “I think it’s time.”
He paused his game and stared at me like I had interrupted a meeting with the president.
“Now?” he asked.
I blinked at him. “No, next Thursday… Yes, now.”
For one bright, hopeful second, he jumped up. He moved fast. He grabbed the car keys, forgot his shoes, came back for them, kissed my temple, and said, “Okay, okay. I got you, babe.”
I pictured him holding my hand. I pictured his forehead pressed to mine while I breathed through each contraction. I pictured him crying when our baby arrived, maybe whispering something sweet about how proud he was of me.
Then we got checked in, and that picture started cracking.
At first, I honestly thought it was a joke.
When he rolled into the delivery room with a duffel bag, kissed my forehead, and pulled out his PlayStation like we were checking into a hotel for the weekend, I actually laughed. I thought, “There’s no way he’s serious.”
The nurse beside me, a calm woman with silver threaded through her dark hair, glanced from him to the console.
But then he looked at the nurse and casually asked, “Where’s the HDMI port?”
My laugh died so quickly it almost scared me.
What happened next changed everything… continues on the next page.
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