L skimmed through the nutritional plan he had carefully prepared for you, flipping page after page with a furrowed brow and a visible mix of confusion and frustration clouding his usually unreadable expression.

"Hn, maybe it's just another hormonal shift..." he muttered under his breath, almost as if trying to convince himself, before turning on his heel and heading into the kitchen to prepare a different dinner for you.

He had been fairly confident that tonight you would need something rich in protein and vitamin B6—something to help with the fatigue, the nausea, maybe even the irritability. That’s why he had gone with steamed fish, gently seasoned and cooked to perfection. But the moment you stepped into the dining room and caught a whiff of the dish laid neatly on the table, your face twisted in discomfort. You turned away almost instantly, the wave of nausea hitting you hard.

And in that moment, something in L’s mind cracked, just a little. Was he failing?

For someone like him, who had always thrived on precision and logic, who had spent countless hours studying maternal care, prenatal nutrition, and the delicate intricacies of supporting a pregnant partner—this felt like a betrayal of everything he’d worked so hard to learn. Cooking classes, medical journals, parenting books... He had absorbed them all, and up until now, he hadn’t made a single mistake.

But now?

Now he wasn’t sure if he was truly doing enough—as your partner, and more painfully, as the father of the child you were carrying.