Picture of Innocence. TJ Stimson
years it’d taken her to rush to his cot and pull the blanket away from his cheek. His face had been waxy and deathly pale, his lips a deep mottled blue. When she’d touched his cheek, he’d been cold.
She had no memory of rushing to the window and screaming down at Lucas, though she supposed she must have done. Her throat was still raw. She didn’t remember scooping her baby out of his cot, either, but she would remember forever the cold, dead weight of him in her arms. She could feel it still. The back of his head, where she had always put a steadying hand, like a ball of stone. Her precious, warm, milky son, now a stiff, cool statue, a porcelain doll. Already she couldn’t remember what he looked like alive. When she tried to picture him, all she could see was his face, deadly white but for his indigo lips and the purple blotches on his skin where the blood had settled.
She supposed Lucas had called the ambulance and her mother. She didn’t know how long it’d taken for the paramedics to get there. She hadn’t wanted to let Noah go, refusing to let anyone take him from her arms. It was Sarah who’d finally persuaded her. Maddie had handed Noah’s cold little body to her mother, watching as the paramedics briefly examined him and then wrapped him tenderly back in his blanket. She’d felt the emptiness of her arms and had known instinctively the feeling wasn’t ever going to go away.
‘Maddie, stop that. You don’t take sugar. Maddie! Stop!’
She jumped and glanced up. She was standing at a counter at the side of the room, spooning sugar into an empty coffee mug. It was already a quarter full; she must have added at least six spoonfuls without even knowing what she was doing.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, dropping the spoon so that it clattered onto the counter. ‘I don’t know what I was thinking.’
She sat on the tan leather sofa, pinning her hands under her thighs to stop herself from plucking at her clothes. It didn’t matter what anyone said. It was her fault Noah was dead. She’d wished him gone. She hadn’t meant it, of course, but she’d got exactly what she’d asked for. Maybe, deep down, in a corner of her mind too dark for her to see clearly, this was what she wanted.
Maybe she’d even made it happen.
‘He kept crying,’ she burst out suddenly. ‘No matter what I did, I couldn’t make it stop.’
‘He had colic, Maddie,’ Lucas said hoarsely. ‘He couldn’t help it.’
She stared down at her lap. Her legs were jiggling, but she seemed powerless to stop them. ‘I could hear it in my head, all the time. The non-stop screaming, on and on. Sometimes I didn’t know if it was him crying, or me. I tried to be patient, I did my best for him, but nothing made him happy. No matter what I tried, it didn’t make any difference. He never stopped screaming.’
‘It wasn’t your fault, Maddie.’
‘I couldn’t make him better. I’d feed him and change him and cuddle him and nothing helped. I couldn’t stand it anymore.’ She covered her face with her hands. ‘I just wanted it to stop.’
When Lucas spoke again, he sounded wary. ‘Maddie, what are you trying to say?’
‘I wished he hadn’t been born,’ she said bleakly. ‘I wished he wasn’t here. Sometimes … sometimes I even prayed he’d just disappear. That someone would just … take him.’
‘Maddie—’
‘Didn’t you hear me?’ she cried wildly. ‘I wanted someone to take my baby! What kind of mother would fantasise about something like that?’
‘It’s not your fault,’ Lucas said again, but his voice sounded less certain.
He sat next to her and put his arm around her, and she leaned into the familiar bulwark of his shoulder, but it no longer seemed comforting or safe. He was like an oak that had been hollowed out, as vulnerable as she to the coming storm.
The door opened. One of the doctors who’d met them from the ambulance came into the room, followed by a middle-aged woman wearing round gold spectacles and a painfully sympathetic expression.
‘Mr and Mrs Drummond, first let me offer you my deepest condolences,’ the doctor began, pulling up a hard plastic chair opposite the sofa and placing a file on the coffee table. ‘I am so very sorry for your loss. I can’t begin to imagine how you must be feeling.’
Maddie stared at him blankly.
‘My name is Leonard Harris, and I’m the duty doctor at A&E today. This is Jessica Towner,’ he added, as the older woman took another chair beside him. ‘She’s our family liaison and bereavement counsellor. She’s here to help you through the process and explain everything that will happen next.’
‘I’m also very sorry for your loss,’ the woman murmured, her voice a respectful whisper. Maddie had to strain to hear her. ‘I’m here to help you in any way I can. I know what a distressing time this is, so if there’s anything I can do to make things a little easier, please ask.’
The doctor leaned forward, his clasped hands dangling between his knees. ‘I know you must be in a state of shock right now,’ he said, ‘but there are a few questions I have to ask. There are certain procedures we have to go through, and a few decisions you need to make, which Jessica will discuss with you in a moment. If we can sort some of these things out now, you’ll be able to go back to your family and grieve without any more interference.’ He waited a moment for this to sink in, and then reached for his file. ‘We just need to check a few facts first. Your son’s name is Noah Michael Drummond, correct?’
‘Michael was after my father,’ Maddie said automatically. It was suddenly important they understood her son wasn’t just another statistic, a name on their forms. He would never have a chance now to show the world who he was. She had to speak for him. ‘We both liked the name Noah. We wanted something old-fashioned.’
‘And he was born on the third of February this year?’
Lucas nodded.
‘There were no problems with the pregnancy or birth? No complications during labour or delivery?’
‘No, none.’
The doctor ran through a series of routine questions about Noah’s birth and the first few weeks of his short life. Maddie tuned him out, letting Lucas answer all of them. She found herself unable to concentrate on what the doctor was saying. The questions were pointless anyway. Apart from colic, Noah had never had a single thing wrong with him, not even a cold. Her pregnancy had been ridiculously easy, and Noah had had a normal birth, her labour taking less than four hours from her waters breaking to his delivery. She hadn’t even needed an epidural. She was good at having babies. Shelled them like peas, her mother said.
‘Maddie,’ Lucas murmured, squeezing her hand.
They were all looking at her. Clearly, someone had asked her a question.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said thickly. ‘Could you say that again?’
‘I know it’s difficult, Mrs Drummond. I’d just like you to walk me through the last time you saw Noah alive.’
Oh, God, Maddie thought, spots dancing in front of her eyes. Oh, God. She was never going to see him open his eyes again. Never see him smile …
‘Maddie,’ the bereavement counsellor interjected suddenly. ‘Would you like to step into the bathroom for a moment to tidy up?’
‘You’re leaking,’ Lucas murmured.
She glanced down. The entire front of her T-shirt and fleece were soaked with breast milk.
The