I flip the page, my breath catching in my throat.
She’s lying in a hospital bed, dark circles under her eyes, her hair a slight mess in the bun she’s pulled it into, and in her arms is the smallest bundle. A dark head of hair pokes out from a pile of blue blankets and she is smiling so wide it physically hurts to look at.
Ethan Avery-Hale
Six pounds, four ounces
Born at 2.35.P.M. on the twenty-fourth of September.
My heart aches inside my chest.
Unable to stop, I flip the next page and the next, seeing all the photos she took of him and the two of them. Each one has a date so I can see how old he was when he first went to the park or ate solid food for the first time. He’s so little, this fragile little thing that seems much too pure and perfect to have been created by me. Her, she was made for this, made to be a mother. She cares for him in a way I never got when I was young, and I can only hold so much gratitude towards her for doing it.
I don’t know how to be a dad.
I saw some from the father that chose me instead of the one that made me, but I’m so rotted from the years before, that I feel dirtied by it. Like I am not fit to be a father.
The album is filled with images, so many images taken from the past couple years, and I can see the weeks and months go by in each one, Ethan growing up, getting bigger and stronger. And even when I come to the end of the album, I start again, worried I missed something but just wanting to see it all and memorize everything.
There’s more in the box, another album and a small bag that rattles when I pick it up. I empty the contents, finding three USB drives.
I place them next to me to look at in a moment and reopen the album to the first page, unsticking a photo of Vanessa when she was six months pregnant. She’s in a flowing blue dress that reminds me of the dress she wore that night in the cave, and she’s at an angle that shows off the growing baby bump. She’s looking down at her stomach, cradling it gently as a smile pulls up her mouth and sinks dimples into her cheeks.
I place that photo down and then go to the one taken just after Ethan was born, removing that one and then flick a couple more pages to a photo taken when Ethan is eighteen months old. They’re in the park, she’s holding him with her back to the camera as she points to a flock of ducks that float on the lake in front of them.
I have to fold them a little to make them fit, but I stash each of them in my wallet so I can carry them with me everywhere I go.
Chapter Twenty-seven
“Say hi to daddy,” Vanessa’s sweet, whisper of a voice speaks into the camera, she’s barefaced with her golden hair tied back but her smile is wide and her eyes neon. And in her arms is a small bundle, sleeping as she rocks him.
“He’s four days old today,” She tells me as if speaking to me directly instead of to an empty room and a camera. “We are being released from the hospital today. I wanted to start these videos straight away, but we had a bit of a scare with his health, and I didn’t get a chance, but he’s perfect now.” She shows him to the camera, his squishy face surrounded by all that dark hair, “He feeds all the time, and sleeps so much but apparently that’s normal. I feel like I’m going crazy sometimes. Like he makes this squeaking noise and I think something terrible.” She rolls her eyes at herself, as if jesting but I see the tears glistening.
“The nurses say that’s normal too.”
She rocks him for a few seconds, looking down on him, “We can go home soon. Just me and him.”
She gives me one more show of the tiny baby before she shuts off the camera and the video ends.
I don’t wait long to move to the next video, the pain in my chest radiating to the rest of my body.
She sits on the couch, Ethan cradled to her chest as she feeds. She looks so tired, “It’s hard.” She says to the camera. “It’s so hard. Immy comes often but I feel so damn lonely.” With a pause, she looks down at our son, gently stroking his head, “He’s so perfect, Kolt. I’m beside myself, like I have all these big feelings inside me and so much love for him. We’ve been home for a week now and I haven’t slept much. Immy will be back tomorrow,” she blows out a breath, “I’ve expressed some milk, so I’m really hoping he’ll take some bottles from her while I get some sleep.”
If I were there, if I had known…
What would I have done?
I was tied to Malakai, for her safety, for my family’s safety… would he have made an exception knowing I had a son?
I finish that video and move to the next one and then the next and the next, watching each one from start to finish, not once taking my eyes off the screen or focusing on anything else.
I give Vanessa and our son my undivided attention like I should have done back then.
The videos range from happy and cheerful videos to somber and sleepy. There’s a couple filmed in the hospital when Ethan had to go in because of bad colds and flus and a nasty bout of whooping cough.
I click on a new video and this one starts unlike the rest.
Vanessa is in tears, the house is dark save for a single lamp on which throws shadows across her face, and highlights the deep purple-like bruises under her eyes from lack of sleep.
