Maybe I was just lucky, but I had the best pregnancy, and I loved

Host: The sun was just beginning to rise over the hospital rooftops, its light bleeding through the pale curtains like a soft, golden mist. The corridor smelled faintly of antiseptic and hope, that strange mixture that belongs only to places where life and death share the same walls. Jack sat on a bench outside the maternity ward, his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped so tightly they looked carved from stone. Jeeny stood beside a window, her silhouette caught in the morning light, her long hair swaying slightly as she turned to speak.

Host: Outside, a city was waking up—sirens, footsteps, and the first rumble of buses moving through wet streets. Inside, a new heartbeat echoed faintly through a room beyond the glass. The air trembled with something sacred, something both surreal and real, as Ashlee Simpson once said—the impossible paradox of birth.

Jeeny: “You ever think about it, Jack? How some people call giving birth the most terrifying thing in the world, and others—the most amazing? Ashlee Simpson once said she loved every second of it. That it was surreal, but so real at the same time.”

Jack: (snorts softly) “Yeah, sounds poetic enough. But let’s be honest—pain, screaming, blood—it’s not exactly a magical experience. People romanticize it because they have to. Otherwise, no one would go through it again.”

Host: Jeeny turned, her eyes steady but tender, her hands folded over her chest as if she were holding something unseen.

Jeeny: “You’re missing the point. The beauty isn’t in the comfort—it’s in the transformation. It’s the moment something bigger than you decides to arrive through you. Pain doesn’t erase wonder, Jack. Sometimes it’s what makes it real.”

Jack: (leaning back, arms crossed) “Transformation, huh? You make it sound like a spiritual awakening. But let’s face it—biology doesn’t care about beauty. It’s just a survival mechanism. A system repeating itself.”

Jeeny: “And yet that ‘system’ creates life. You call it function; I call it miracle. What’s more surreal than something invisible growing inside you, then breathing its first breath outside? You can’t measure that with science.”

Jack: “You can measure everything with science. You can predict due dates, track heartbeats, even design genetic codes now. The only surreal part is how people still think it’s mystical.”

Host: The light shifted slightly, glinting off the sterile floor tiles, painting faint golden lines toward them. A nurse’s laughter echoed down the hall—a soft, fleeting sound that seemed to bridge the two worlds they were arguing about.

Jeeny: “You think you’re safe hiding behind logic, Jack. But tell me—when your sister gave birth last year, didn’t you cry? You stood there, watching that tiny life move for the first time. Was that logic?”

Jack: (pauses) “That was adrenaline. Relief. Maybe... awe, if I’m honest. But awe isn’t proof of magic. It’s just the brain’s reaction to something it doesn’t fully understand yet.”

Jeeny: “Or maybe it’s your soul’s way of remembering something ancient. Maybe birth is the one moment we see creation up close—raw, terrifying, and divine.”

Host: The room around them felt smaller now, the air heavier. Jack’s jaw tightened, his eyes wandering toward the window where the sunrise was dissolving the last traces of night.

Jack: “You know, you talk about it like it’s holy. But you’ve never gone through it.”

Jeeny: “No. But my sister has. I watched her in that delivery room—screaming, crying, laughing all at once. It wasn’t holy because it was easy. It was holy because it was human.”

Host: The heartbeat monitor in the next room beeped softly, a reminder that somewhere close, a new world was just beginning. Jack rubbed the back of his neck, his voice quieter now.

Jack: “When you put it like that… I get it. Maybe what people call ‘surreal’ isn’t about being dreamlike—it’s about being too real. So real that our minds can’t handle it.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. It’s not about escaping reality—it’s about crashing into it with everything you are. The pain, the joy, the fear—they all collapse into one impossible truth: that life continues.”

Host: The light now flooded the corridor, warm and complete. Dust particles drifted in the glow like tiny golden stars. Jack watched them, his face softening, the hard logic in his eyes melting into something gentler.

Jack: “Maybe I’ve always thought of birth as an obligation—another cycle of cause and effect. But listening to you… maybe it’s more like… an act of courage. Choosing to bring someone new into this mess of a world.”

Jeeny: “It is courage. And faith. Not the religious kind—just the belief that love can make the world worth being born into.”

Jack: “You really believe that?”

Jeeny: “With everything I have.”

Host: Silence returned—thick, but not empty. The kind of silence that feels like prayer. Jack leaned back, his shoulders relaxing for the first time that morning. The cry of a newborn echoed faintly through the walls—thin, trembling, and infinitely alive.

Jack: “You know, maybe Ashlee was right. Maybe she was lucky. Or maybe she just understood something we forget—that even the most ordinary miracles are still miracles.”

Jeeny: (smiling) “Yes. That’s what she meant, I think. That the line between the surreal and the real isn’t a line at all—it’s a heartbeat.”

Host: The sunlight spilled across their faces, soft and golden, erasing the shadows of the long night. Jack looked at Jeeny—really looked—and for the first time, his usual armor cracked. His eyes glistened, reflecting something unspoken: reverence.

Host: Outside, a bird fluttered past the window, cutting through the morning air. Inside, life had begun again, unseen but everywhere. And as Jack and Jeeny sat in quiet understanding, the world itself seemed to whisper—the surreal had never been separate from the real. It was always just another name for wonder.