Disclaimer: If I owned them, I would be doing better things than writing about them...

Chapter 9: November 1987

The first day of hell—the end of my life…

I woke up early—Thanksgiving was in a few days, and my mother was flying out again. I was surprised she would make the trip—it was expensive and flying made her joints hurt—but then again, she hadn't had grandchildren to fly out to see before, so I guess it made sense. Anticipating her stay, however, I was going to use my day off to clean the apartment. I knew that if I didn't do it, Laura would force herself to do it and she'd been exhausted since she gave birth. It had been months, but she was suffering more than she let on. She'd gotten an infection from the stitches after she had torn… and that was just the beginning of her complications.

I dragged myself up, telling myself that if I could finish scrubbing the bathroom before everyone else got up for breakfast then I'd be half done—breakfast clean up could just be done a little more thoroughly, and after that it was small things—vacuuming and dusting and washing windows. Easy.

I start a pot of coffee, reveling in the silence of the morning, and stop in the bathroom. While I'm washing my hands, I think about Amber and Joshua, and I can't help but sneak a peek at them sleeping before I get to work. So I move to the closest door—Amber's—and peer in, watching as her little chest rises and falls softly in sleep. Her breathing is thicker than normal… I wonder if she's catching a cold. When she wakes up we'll have to see if she needs some cold medicine to clear out her sinuses. I move next to the den, on the other side of Laura's room, and peer in. He's so still in sleep, he must be dreaming peacefully. I move forward, just wanting a closer look, to see if I can guess what he's dreaming…

Oh God. My heart falls through my chest and away from my body, and I am left with nothing…nothing. I pull him from the crib anxiously, noticing that he's already a little blue. "Laura! Oh God! Laura!" I scream, laying him on the floor and trying desperately in my panic to remember infant CPR—two fingers, heart compressions, but wait… check his pulse, check his breath… there's neither, and tears are streaming down my face as I blow air into his lifeless body, watching as his chest rises and falls and yet he doesn't move and doesn't react.

Distantly I am aware that Laura's on the phone, shouting, speaking urgently, but I don't have a thought to spare for that now. I count as my fingers pump blood through his veins, and I listen to his breathing even though I know there's none to hear, and then my mouth is to his again, desperately inflating his tiny figure like a balloon… a lifeless balloon, but I keep moving, keep pumping, until I feel myself being pulled away from him.

Paramedics take one look at him and pronounce. He's been dead an hour, by their estimation. But that isn't good enough… I've seen paramedics do amazing things with CPR, they can't just give up. Without a liver temp they have no idea how long… they don't know… I struggle away from whoever holds me back so that I can get to my son, my only son, and try to pump the life back into him, but I'm restrained again, a voice in my ear forcing me to terms with what cannot possibly be true—"He's gone. He's gone. There's nothing you can do for him now. He's gone."

I sit and stare at the wall, unaware that tears have not stopped falling since I found him—I'm not really aware of who else is in the room until, with a start, I see the faces of the graveyard shift. They're processing the scene—why would they do that? Suspicious circs? I try to read their faces, but they don't react to me, and I feel a deep, overwhelming anger building up inside of me. I want to scream, kick these people from my home and my mourning and my despair. I want to lash out, beat every one of them, until I can't see their expressionless faces and blank eyes for the blood I've spilled across them…

"Gil?"

I jump, looking up to see Philip. "Gil, we're going to process your apartment, just because you're one of ours, and you can never be too careful. We don't suspect foul play, but we put away a lot of horrible people every day, okay? We're just covering our bases, making sure… protecting you. Why don't you and Laura take Amber to a hotel? Or maybe Amber can stay with a friend of the family, if you two need some time…"

"You're… making sure?"

"Yes, Gil, Is there somewhere for you three to go?"

"You… you have to question me, take my statement, Phil. If… if you're making sure… checking your bases… I, uh, I was getting up early to clean. My mother is coming for Thanksgiving and Laura's stitches…I didn't want… and I made coffee!—why the hell did I need coffee?! Why didn't I check on him right away? Why—"

"Gil, we'll take your statement tomorrow, after you've had a little time, okay? You're… you're not really coherent right now. Come on, let's get you outside, find a place for you and Laura to stay. Amber, sweetheart, come take Daddy's hand and help him outside."

I felt a tiny, warm hand in mine. I did not look down, but I knew that I would follow wherever the hand led me. I had strength for nothing else.

Thanksgiving… Gobble Gobble.

No school, Ty's visiting his Grandma in L.A. I'm bored out of my mind.

I pull out the book from Jim, wondering whether I'll be able to lose myself in poetry as easily as I do in prose—it requires so much more thought, analytical thinking… I crack open the book, regardless, to a random page, and begin reading softly to myself, my whispered syllables filling up the empty bedroom and the loneliness around me.

I did not read them slowly enough for the words to grasp me deeply, but instead let the sound of them overcome me as I whispered, whispered to myself, over and over.

And then I was crying, tears streaming down my face inexplicably, but the words would not stop pouring from my mouth as I sobbed—I was overcome with a pain larger than myself, bigger and more infinite than all that I was, and I didn't know where it came from, but I let it carry me through the sonnets, until it had worn itself out.

My tears dried, my lips stilled, the memory of the pain real and fresh in my mind. I marked the page where the pain had stopped—where my tears had stopped, and set the book aside. I didn't understand what had happened, but I knew it would be a while before I read the book again.