St. Mary’s Hospital became my purgatory for the next three days.

Lily lay in the Pediatric ICU, a tiny figure swallowed by technology. A ventilator breathed for her. Four lines snaked into veins that were impossibly small. Machines beeped and hummed, a mechanical symphony keeping my daughter tethered to this world.

I sat in a hard plastic chair, unable to eat, unable to sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw her turning purple. I felt her go limp.

My parents arrived on the second day. My mother’s face was pinched with performative worry, but it was the look in my father’s eyes that unsettled me—he looked annoyed, as if this were an inconvenience to his schedule. Trailing behind them was my sister, Natalie.

My blood ran cold.

“How is she?” Natalie asked. Her voice didn’t tremble. It dripped with a casual curiosity, as if asking about the weather.

I couldn’t look at her. I stared at the floor tiles. “She’s in a coma.”