Harrison cries out in the night like he always does, but now the silence of one less warm pulsing body in the house, makes the sound more acute, more needy, more desperate. I am his father, I am his care giver, no one else.
The police tape has been ripped down, the tacky floor cleaned to a gleaming shine again. No more pools of bright beautiful blood stain this house. But no matter how much the floor gleams in the daylight, or the electric light that shines out over the tiles and the porcelain, I will always see the bright spots, specks and rivulets of her life affirming beautiful blood.
He cries, and I am his care giver. So I hold him, fast, to my chest, and walk him about the dim house as he lets out his fragility on me. As always we end up standing in the door to the gleaming room, the room of all my sins, Rita's death room. He hiccups into my shoulder, and I rock, rock, rock, shift, and rock.
"No one's ever going to hurt you." I whisper into the top of his downy soft head.
"Ever."
