His Heart

Prologue

I would die for my kids.

All parents say that and it's true. We have some primal instinct to protect our young from the moment they're brought into this world.

Children come with a whole list of potential things that could go wrong. The list doesn't include how you can prevent these things from happening. You have to figure it out yourself.

Maybe that's why it takes two to have a kid. So you only have to deal with half of the problems life throws at them?

And mothers do this kind of thing so naturally. From the beginning they know how to keep them warm and how long to chill formula for.

Children are one of life's great mysteries. You spend hours, days, your whole life trying to figure out their patterns and how to make them happy. And once you finally crack the code with one kid, you have another, and undoubtedly, the second child doesn't respond to any of the methods you used with the first.

It was like walking blindly through a dark forest, holding onto this little egg. And you just have to hope the egg doesn't fall or break by the time you make it out.

I have a theory on why we need two parents to have a kid.

You need one to show you how far you can go.

And you need the other to show you the route back home.

But what happens when you have a parent who must play both roles? How do you show them the route back home when you can no longer find it yourself?

Should I have done more to convince them that everything was going to be ok?

They were so little when it all fell apart. What if it was too late to fix us now?

I wish you were here, Jasmine. You always made it look so easy.