Tom saw the disappointment on DJ’s face when he told him he was too busy to stop and talk. He felt guilt weigh him down. Just like it had after Mikey died. Guilt that he could not save his son. Guilt that he could not reach his wife and bring her back from the horror she now lived in. He felt like he would drown under the weight of the guilt he felt. Now that he had opened a door in his mind to the memory of Mikey’s death, he could not stop memories pounding at him continuously. He tried to keep moving, to keep busy, to stem the flow, but they came, no matter what.
Tom and Cathy sat opposite each other at the kitchen table. A new notebook and pen, the kind with the spiral top, sitting in front of them.
Beside the notebook sat a small white box.
A whole life was contained in that box. Mikey’s birth cert. His first curl, snipped carefully by Tom, because Cathy was too afraid to cut him, her hands shook so much. The small identity bracelet from his birth: ‘Baby O’Grady. Parents: Cathy and Thomas O’Grady.’
His first babygro. Simple plain white. Pure and innocent like their boy.
One more item was now added to the box. A death certificate: ‘Cause: Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. SIDS.’
The silent killer with no explanation. Children should outlive their parents by decades. What is the actual point if not?
The point was a life too short, cruelly snatched away.
The remains of that life lay in one small white box.
If Mikey had been sick they would have been prepared for the loss. But instead they had no answers. And just the one question.
Why?
They had not been the only ones asking questions. When Tom and Cathy returned home from hospital, parents without a child, their home had become a crime scene. Cathy’s mum and dad awaited them, her mother stammering, ‘They’ve … sealed off Mikey’s nursery … I’m so sorry, I couldn’t stop them …’
And even though Tom knew the authorities were following procedure, standard practice following the sudden death of a child, he was angry. Crime-scene yellow tape barred them from their own child’s nursery and mocked them, accusing them of something truly terrible.
There was no foul play. The room was not too cold, in fact they were having a mild winter. Mikey wasn’t co-sleeping with them, so there was no issue of either parent smothering him by mistake. No air pollution. No cushion or pillow in the cot that blocked his airways. No answers to that same fucking question. Why?
Their baby boy’s heart had just stopped beating.
‘There was no way you could have known.’ That’s what the coroner said.
But Tom should have. He was a doctor and he had somehow missed something. He should have saved his son’s life. He saw the way that Cathy looked at him. She knew it, too.
They sat on opposite sides of their kitchen table, staring at a blank notebook page. Trying to find the words to go on Mikey’s headstone. Words that conveyed to the world how much his life was worth.
Tom reached over to touch Cathy. His need to feel the warmth of her hand in his was overwhelming.
I need you. Please Cathy. Please …
His silent plea went unanswered. She pulled her hands back and placed them under the table. Cathy hadn’t spoken a single word since their baby died. And he wasn’t sure she ever would.