“I love you,” I said to my wife. Then, quietly: “Goodbye.”

It was 6 a.m. and I was getting up for work. If I had said more, she would have had trouble falling back to sleep. She already had been woken numerous times in the night by our two boys, aged 4 and 13 months. Our loudly breathing 4-year-old was now curled on a pillow beside the bed.

“I love you,” she replied, starting to stir.

I felt an overwhelming desire to approach her, to feel the softness of her hair, the warmth of her touch, a simple kiss. With a hollow feeling, I turned and hurried away, not knowing when I would see her again.

Almost three weeks had passed since the Kirkland, Wash., hospital where I work diagnosed a pair of novel coronavirus cases and saw the earliest Covid-19 patients succumb to the ravages of the disease, becoming the epicenter of the national outbreak. That dark morning was the last time I saw my wife or children in person, as of this writing.

My wife and I had guessed — correctly, it turned out — that I had been exposed to patients infected with coronavirus before anybody knew the virus had landed here. While my colleagues and I scrambled to don and doff personal protective equipment that first day back on service, my wife scrambled to collect sippy cups, clothing for the family, activities and a travel crib, distracted by worries about whether I would become ill.