The children’s ward of the hospital was filled with a silence more fitting for a library than a medical facility. Twilight tinted the sky in soft shades of violet, and the hallways echoed with the gentle steps of nurses and the faint cry of a baby from a distant room. Every moment felt calm — almost deceptively so. But that calm shattered the instant hurried footsteps and shouts echoed through the emergency entrance.
A little patient, just a year and a half old, was rushed in by paramedics, burning with a fever that defied every usual remedy. The thermometer stubbornly showed at least thirty-nine degrees, and no matter what the mother tried at home, the temperature would briefly fall — only to flare up again moments later, threatening to cross the critical forty-degree line.
His mother, a young woman with deep blue eyes full of immeasurable pain, stood paralyzed in silent agony. Her hands shook and twisted together, her lips whispering unheard prayers. She couldn’t take her eyes off her son’s limp body wrapped in a blanket, his small chest struggling to rise for another breath.
“Please… please do something! I’m begging you!”
Her cry wasn’t a plea — it was a scream of despair. The child was immediately taken to the intensive care unit, the heavy door sealing shut behind him, drawing a harsh boundary between mother and child. Two attendants gently held her back as she sobbed uncontrollably.
Modern medicine unleashed its entire arsenal: IV lines, injections, oxygen masks. The crisis worsened when the baby began to seize on the way to the ICU, making every heart in the medical team pound faster.
Forty minutes passed, though it felt like forever. A tense, exhausted Dr. Veronika stepped into the corridor, peeling off her damp mask and cap, releasing strands of hair. She could barely stand. The mother ran to her, as if Veronika were the final barrier between hope and the abyss.
“Doctor… my son… is he alive?”
There was a fragile spark of hope in her eyes. Veronika could not ignore the force of that emotion.
“It’s over. He’s stable now. The fever has dropped and is holding steady. We’re monitoring him. Try to calm down — your little boy will be with you soon.”
The child’s condition had stabilized, but the mother still wouldn’t leave, clinging to her questions and fears, desperate to understand what had happened.
When Veronika returned to the doctors’ room, her thoughts were tangled with worry. Suddenly, the door slammed open, and her husband, Denis, burst inside. His white coat fluttered behind him, and the moment he saw her, he stopped short — as if hitting an invisible wall.
“You’re here? What happened? With Gleb?!”
His panic only deepened her confusion as she tried to understand why he was there. Denis seemed to struggle internally as he approached her slowly and muttered, almost fearfully:
“You… had this shift? I didn’t know…”
Their conversation escalated quickly — and then the irreversible truth came to light.
The little boy, baby Skvortsov… was his son.
Veronika froze, stunned.
The truth stood before her — undeniable, merciless.
A storm of emotions flooded her: shock, rage, an overwhelming sorrow.
Her thoughts trembled, unsteady, as she realized one thing: she couldn’t simply ignore this. She couldn’t pretend nothing had happened.
Veronika left the hospital soon after. She packed her things and drove to her family home. The road felt long, winding through the turmoil in her heart, but she knew she needed space — to breathe, to heal, to understand what she wanted from her life now.
The journey brought her back to her roots, to her mother and her son.
Time spent at home helped Veronika confront her feelings — to accept them, instead of running from them. Slowly, she began to see a path forward.
Everything had already happened. Everything had already been lost — and in that, she discovered something new.
Looking toward the future with quiet hope, she understood:
sometimes loss becomes the beginning of something far greater.
Conclusion:
Life often takes unexpected turns. After enduring betrayal and heartbreak, Veronika found the strength to start anew — reclaiming her freedom, her dignity, and her hope for the future.