One of the paramedics turning toward me with a face that already told me the bad news.
“She hemorrhaged,” I say. “Fast. Too fast.”
They said even if I had been there, even if I had been standing beside her when it happened…
That is the part I have never believed.
Doctors say things like that to the living.
They give us words to survive on because they need to leave the room and move on to the next body, the next family, the next tragedy.
Even if you had been there.
Nothing you could have done.
She would not have suffered long.
Lies, maybe.
Mercies, definitely.
“I should have been there,” I say.
Tomasso’s voice is quiet now. “You could not have saved her.”
“You do not know that.”
“Yes,” Matteo says, and his voice cuts through mine. “We do.”
I look at him.
His eyes are bright, but determined.
“We asked.”
The words stun me.
“When?”
“A long time ago.”
“Who?”
“Doctors. Lorenzo. Ricardo.” His mouth twists faintly. “Anyone who would answer us.”
My sons.
My boys.
Going behind my back for facts because I had given them silence.
I close my eyes for one second.
That is all I allow.
“What did they tell you?”
“That it happened fast,” Tomasso says. “That she lost too much blood. That the pregnancy was risky from the beginning. That being home or not being home would not have mattered.”
