The chap­ter opens with a poignant account of a baby born with severe facial defor­mi­ties, described as “the most beau­ti­ful baby” despite his con­di­tion. The moth­er, unaware of the defor­mi­ty due to incon­clu­sive pre­na­tal ultra­sounds, deliv­ers at a small­er hos­pi­tal. The deliv­ery room falls into stunned silence when the baby is born, and a stu­dent nurse’s hor­ri­fied reac­tion high­lights soci­ety’s dis­com­fort with phys­i­cal dif­fer­ences. The obste­tri­cian deliv­ers the dev­as­tat­ing news that the baby’s con­di­tion is incom­pat­i­ble with life, set­ting the stage for an emo­tion­al explo­ration of parental love and grief.

Ruth, the nurse nar­ra­tor, focus­es on pro­vid­ing dig­ni­ty and care for the new­born, empha­siz­ing that even in death, the baby deserves the same bond­ing rit­u­als as any oth­er child. She swad­dles the infant while the par­ents grap­ple with shock and despair, their frag­ment­ed ques­tions reflect­ing uni­ver­sal fears. The moth­er’s ten­der nam­ing of the baby—“Ian Michael Barnes”—and her raw, lov­ing gaze con­trast sharply with the father’s ini­tial rejec­tion. Ruth inter­venes, urg­ing the father to con­front his emo­tions, argu­ing that avoid­ing this pain would leave him emo­tion­al­ly hol­low.

The father’s even­tu­al break­down and rec­on­cil­i­a­tion with his wife and dying son form the chap­ter’s emo­tion­al cli­max. The par­ents take turns hold­ing Ian for ten hours, with the moth­er even attempt­ing to nurse him, demon­strat­ing uncon­di­tion­al love. Ruth uses this moment to teach the judg­men­tal stu­dent nurse a les­son about love tran­scend­ing phys­i­cal appear­ance. The baby’s peace­ful death is fol­lowed by small memo­ri­als, like hand and foot casts, and the cou­ple lat­er returns to have a healthy daugh­ter, under­scor­ing resilience.

The chap­ter con­cludes with Ruth reflect­ing on her own child­birth expe­ri­ence, con­trast­ing her super­fi­cial con­cern about her hair with the pro­found les­son she learned from Ian’s sto­ry: beau­ty is sub­jec­tive, shaped by our per­cep­tions. Her final lines—“every baby is born beau­ti­ful. It’s what we project on them that makes them ugly”—serve as a pow­er­ful the­sis on prej­u­dice, com­pas­sion, and the trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of love in the face of suf­fer­ing.

The chap­ter opens with Ruth, a nurse, recount­ing the birth of a severe­ly deformed baby boy whose facial abnor­mal­i­ties were unde­tect­ed dur­ing pre­na­tal care. Despite his shock­ing appear­ance, the new­born was oth­er­wise healthy, leav­ing the med­ical team and par­ents unpre­pared. The moth­er, though dev­as­tat­ed, imme­di­ate­ly bond­ed with her son, nam­ing him Ian Michael Barnes, while the father ini­tial­ly recoiled in hor­ror and denial. Ruth empha­sizes the impor­tance of acknowl­edg­ing the child’s human­i­ty, even in his brief life, and gen­tly guides the father toward accep­tance.

Ruth describes her pro­fes­sion­al approach to this trag­ic sit­u­a­tion, focus­ing on help­ing the par­ents grieve and con­nect with their child. She con­trasts the moth­er’s uncon­di­tion­al love with the father’s ini­tial rejec­tion, as well as a stu­dent nurse’s cru­el descrip­tion of the baby as a “mon­ster.” Ruth inter­venes, cor­rect­ing the stu­dent and insist­ing the infant be treat­ed with dig­ni­ty. She lat­er brings the stu­dent back to wit­ness the par­ents’ pro­found love, chal­leng­ing her prej­u­diced per­spec­tive and demon­strat­ing that true love tran­scends phys­i­cal appear­ance.

The nar­ra­tive high­lights the fam­i­ly’s ten pre­cious hours with their son, includ­ing the moth­er’s attempt to nurse him and the father’s even­tu­al emo­tion­al break­down as he holds the baby. Ruth reflects on her role in facil­i­tat­ing this painful but nec­es­sary bond­ing process, believ­ing it would pre­vent life­long emo­tion­al dam­age. The baby’s peace­ful death is fol­lowed by the cre­ation of keep­sakes for the par­ents, and Ruth lat­er learns they went on to have a healthy daugh­ter, under­scor­ing the resilience of the human spir­it.

The chap­ter con­cludes with Ruth’s per­son­al reflec­tion on beau­ty and per­cep­tion, assert­ing that all babies are born beau­ti­ful until soci­etal prej­u­dices dis­tort that view. This segues into her own post­par­tum expe­ri­ence after deliv­er­ing her son Edi­son, where her imme­di­ate con­cern about her hair’s appear­ance con­trasts with the pro­found themes of the pre­ced­ing sto­ry, sub­tly illus­trat­ing how soci­etal pres­sures can over­shad­ow life’s most mean­ing­ful moments.