Contest #215 winner 🏆

92 comments

Fiction

This story contains sensitive content

Trigger Warning: infant/child loss, drowning

The day my daughter died, I became the villain of my own life story.

When your child dies of cancer, there are fundraisers and flower delivery vans and friends taking shifts sitting up with you through the long black nights and washing your hair.

When your child dies and it’s your fault, there are no homemade casseroles filling your freezer, no one to hold your hair back as acrid vomit wracks your body through the early morning hours, bilious and yellow from the lack of meal trains organized on your behalf.

There are half-hearted assurances and crepe-thin oaths that you did nothing wrong, but no one holds your hand as you trudge, desperate and empty, behind a too-small casket, upturned palms wretchedly empty.

Because what kind of mother lets her daughter die? What kind of mother? What kind of mother?

--

Annie was born with a full head of chili-red hair.

“It’s a girl!” Chip cried, a tear coursing down his cheek, tinged green from his chronic, but now long forgotten, aversion to blood.

“I’m so proud of you,” he whispered, and brushed an errant strand of hair, soaked with sweat, from my forehead, before planting a tender kiss on the top of my head.

“I can’t believe she’s here.”

--

In my worst moments, I imagine the last seconds of her life. Was she old enough, conscious enough of her own mortality, to know what was happening? I remember the bulging, terrified eyes of a newborn as a snug onesie is pulled down over their bulbous, disproportionate heads, and for one fleeting second they are in darkness, without air or sense or comfort. If an infant can feel horror, primordial, instinctual, then surely she must have felt the same?

Did she flounder, thrashing, splashing, grasping for someone? Or was she assured, in the way that babies are, that her mama would swoop in, be there any moment, save her? Was there a moment she realized help wasn’t coming? Was she afraid? What images of her so-terribly-short life bathed the backs of her eyeballs as her brain slowly suffocated? Did she see my face? Did she feel something akin to betrayal? With her final fragment of consciousness, the last fire of a synapse, did my daughter’s brain shriek, Where is my mama?

In the best moments, I have hope that perhaps she simply floated, weightless and peaceful, from the shores of this life, bobbing in the wake of her own tumble, until the over-chlorinated cocoon that carried her away from me faded into stardust and eternity.

On bad days, I know, in my deepest, most terrible self, that she didn’t.

--

Her gummy smile used to crack her face open, her mouth stretched wide, as if she couldn’t contain all that joy within one terribly small person, as if it needed an outlet to pour out of.

--

In the long, horrible days that came after, reporters from KJTV and WP10 and who knows where else congregated in threadbare clusters at the end of our road, loping tentatively toward our home from time to time, craning their necks and their cumbersome cameras over our cinderblock fence, trying to catch a shot of the pool, or of me, or, in a best case scenario, of me lying prone, beating my fists against the chipped terracotta tiles by the pool, I suppose? I thought about it, more than once.

Eventually Chip brusquely cleared the block, physically shooing the sensible pump-clad and contoured reporters away from our home. “Leave us alone, please,” I heard him, his voice catching on a suppressed sob. 

“Mr. Sutton,” a bright voice, dripping with flimsy concern, peeled. “Do you blame your wife for what happened to your daughter?”

Chip’s voice was gruff. “My wife loved Annie. Please, we lost our girl. Leave us be.”

When the front door slammed behind him, his eyes traveled up to meet mine. He nodded stiffly, and padded to his office, the door clicking closed behind him.

--

She only took contact naps. She’d open her bleary, inky blue eyes and I’d watch as the fog of sleep lifted, her momentary panic, her pupils contracting until they focused on my hovering face. And then the smile, that earth-shattering smile- relief and unbridled delight. Ah, you’re still here, it seemed to say. “You don’t have to be afraid, Annie. I’ll always be here,” I whispered, lips fitting into the shallow valley of the bridge of her nose.

--

In the Sheriff’s Office, they asked the same question in about a million ways: could she walk? How did we suspect she got out there so quickly? Was she still crawling? Eleven months is awfully young to be walking independently, wasn’t it?

Eventually Chip asked, “Are you implying that someone moved her out there? Are you trying to ask if someone put her out there on purpose?”

The Sheriff waved the question away, a troublesome gnat zigzagging around the room, but its buzzing filled my ears until a migraine bloomed in my cerebellum and two deputies had to help me out to the Subaru, Chip three paces ahead. He opened the door and I spilled into the backseat. The ride home was silent, but for the buzzing question still flitting between us.

--

Her hot dog fingers would bury themselves into the depths of my thick hair and spool ribbons of it into her soft palms, pulling my face toward hers for a wet, open-mouthed kiss.

--

As it tends to do, the news cycle moved on, and our front yard fell silent.  It felt like a force field was cloaking our existence, because the world moved on without us- without her- and without the reporters furtively shifting through our trash, now no one acknowledged our existence, our loss, at all. Her name disappeared from the local papers. The medical examiner, and social services, and the crematory, satisfied now, all stopped calling, stopped dropping in unannounced. I felt invisible, but for the realtor’s terse jerk of the head in our direction, mumbling something to a prospective buyer as she ushered them inside our neighbors’ home, which had been abruptly listed for sale.

It was just Chip and me and a stack of pink and yellow-striped birthday presents piled up in the corner of the living room that I couldn’t bear to move, even though my entire being vibrated with agony with every glance in their direction.

But then, suddenly, it was just me.

The divorce papers called our marriage “irretrievably broken”. 

“While Mr. Sutton believes that Mrs. Sutton was not maliciously responsible for the death of their child, it is indisputable that Mrs. Sutton’s actions directly led to her death, the strain of which has contributed to the total and irreconcilable breakdown of the marriage.”

--

“Oh, Annieeee,” I trilled as I walked back into the living room, fingers sliding my second-day blowout through the second loop of a hair tie on autopilot. Paw Patrol filled the room with a campy beat.

I didn’t notice that she wasn’t in her spot on the couch so much as the back door was open.

I froze.

Through the open blinds, I saw it.

A mass of matted red hair bobbing just above the nearly-still surface of the pool. The blob of pink fleece footie pajamas blurred through the lens of the water.

And then I was thrashing through waist-deep water, cutting my way toward her, fumbling to lift her head out of the water as it flopped haphazardly about, all the tension released from her tendons and sinews, heavy with water.

This was not reality. Couldn’t be. This was an unwanted image flitting through my brain, another intrusive thought, like how each time I descended the staircase the picture sprang to my mind, unbidden, of fumbling, dropping her down the stairs, her doughy body thumping down each tiled step, punctuated by sharp cries, until there was only silence and one final thud. And then I’d close my eyes, shake my head, and the horror would fall away like ash, and she’d be there, gurgling and happy, tongue tentatively poking at her newest tooth, and okay. She was always okay.

No, no, no.

My brain buzzed with only this word, beating out a frantic rhythm that kept pace with my racing heart. There was no sound; no splashing or the sodden squelch of laying her on the cold deck tiles, but I would read later than the neighbors called the ambulance when they heard my screams.

No, no, no. It was only three minutes.

Her eyes were half-open, almost sleepy, like when she fell asleep, milk-drunk and content at my breast. Peaceful, like she’d never known fear.

Oh god, had she been afraid?

But she was horrifically still. I knew, even as I slammed my palms against her sternum to the beat of Stayin’ Alive, like they’d taught us in our parenting classes. She was still and gray in the way the stillborn son I’d delivered as a teenager had been. “You’re going to hell,” my grandmother had spat as I sobbed over his fragile body, with its hazy skin already beginning to sag, completely devoid of a subterranean current of moving blood flushing his face. “God is punishing you.” She called over her shoulder as she slammed the wardroom door shut behind her.

The paramedics peeled me off her like a second skin.

My fingers raked the air, reaching for her even as the frenetic scene unfolded around me, like one of those doubletime shots of traffic moving through an intersection, cars blurred into nothing but for their taillights streaking out behind them like the tail of a comet.

No, no, no.

My therapist’s office is dimly lit and layered with essential oil diffusers sending up gentle puffs of lavender-scented clouds, down-filled throw pillows, and a tinkling Buddha water fountain. It’s intended to be soothing, but it feels more patronizing. I wince at a fluffy stuffed animal tucked into a shelf, tears pricking my eyelids. It seems exceptionally cruel for CPS to mandate my presence here now that I have no child.

Dr. Linda nods and smiles serenely from time to time, but mostly I sit and cry more than I say anything of note. I certainly don’t feel rehabilitated or supported or like I have been aided in any sort of revelation about how I got here, to this nubby Ashley loveseat in this dark office.

Today I’m angry.

(That’s normal, Dr. Linda says.)

Today I rant. And I cry. And she nods and smiles and says, “Go on.”

Why is it that in true crime shows, as a victim lays clinging to life, they use their last breaths to name their killer?

Is it that vengeance burns in our bloodstreams even after the rest of our humanity has been flayed from our bones? Is laying blame more powerful than everything else?

These questions keep me up at night now, buffeting me with their sharp edges.

“Interesting,” Dr. Linda says. “Let’s explore that idea. What do you think Annie’s last words would have been?”

I’m momentarily paralyzed by the exercise.

“Annie had only learned one word when she died.” My voice is rough, and the words taste so bitter I spit them out. 

“Mama.”

September 16, 2023 00:40

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92 comments

12:11 Oct 21, 2023

This was really, really hard to read — in the best possible way. And that ending is the final punch in the gut. Powerful storytelling.

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Geir Westrul
23:56 Oct 18, 2023

Danielle, this was so powerful, and so well written, and such a poignant take on the prompt of "a monster trying to become more human" — because she is not a monster, but she feels so guilty that she has become a monster in her own mind, and she is trying to find her way back to feeling human again. Chilling. Congratulations on a well deserved win! I actually read your more recent win first, so let me also congratulate you on two wins in short succession. You're on a roll !

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Guy Felton
22:48 Oct 18, 2023

I've recently joined Reedsy and this is the first story I've read. I hate to admit I enjoyed it, but at least in a bittersweet way. I've never had a child, but I'm not without empathy nor compassion. I felt the anguish, the unearned guilt and internal blame, the loneliness.

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Jeannette Miller
16:22 Oct 15, 2023

Congratulations on the win. Really well done :) It's hard to take people along with a story like this without it feeling forced which this does not. The flow is natural and realistic without being "told", if that makes sense? Anyway, good job :)

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Nix Apuzzo
13:51 Oct 14, 2023

Oh wow, this is just amazing. But I’m confused. How is it her fault if she did nothing wrong? Did I miss a part in the story? But overall, a gory yet fantastic short story. You deserve the win.

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Danielle Barr
14:02 Oct 14, 2023

Thank you so much for reading. It was not actively her fault, but mothers are often aggressively blamed for accidents, in the vein of “why wasn’t she watching her daughter?”

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Nix Apuzzo
15:36 Oct 15, 2023

Of course. Society is a strange place. In addition to the fact that your story was very poetic and moving, I love the way you questioned morality and forgiveness and not just the fact that you need seek it from others, you need to seek it inside of you. A fantastic story. Really well done!

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16:17 Oct 13, 2023

Heart-breaking. I wish I could forget reading this - but I don't wish I had never read it.

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05:24 Oct 13, 2023

This is so painful and full of so much truth.

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Mary Richards
13:05 Oct 11, 2023

My heart broke in a million pieces as I read this. Must have been difficult to write. Great job.

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Amanda Lieser
23:54 Oct 10, 2023

Hi Danielle! Holy cow! What a stunning story! It was a well deserved win. The way you wove in the memories and the thoughts of your protagonist truly drew us in. You handled the delicate nature of each subject with grace and compassion. I also loved the way this story concluded on a single word. It created so much power for the piece. Nice work and congrats on the win!

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Luciano Cortese
19:42 Oct 08, 2023

This was haunting, and also it made me cry. I have no words. Thanks.

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Jfs Sevin
18:48 Oct 05, 2023

One of the worst losses, the loss of a child. Thank you for the story..

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Sue Schroeder
18:35 Oct 05, 2023

What a beautiful, sad, poignant story. Well written and very convincing.

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Lynne Boyd
16:05 Oct 05, 2023

Loved this! So descriptive and placed me right there with you.

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Aliah Turner
00:25 Oct 05, 2023

This is for my Jrotc class! Donate today or buy popcorn! Please and thank you. https://instaraise.com/tahlequahjrotc/popcorn/aliahturner?a=17

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Klara Loubser
20:11 Sep 28, 2023

This was AMAZING. Ur detailed descriptions are amazing. I could feel the pain. It was def worth it to read!

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M. M.
22:22 Sep 27, 2023

What a beautiful and sad story; so real and packed full of emotion and perfection. A well deserved win. My brother recently passed away and I had a tear reading this story. Again congrats on the sad well done prose, I loved it.

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Danielle Barr
22:42 Sep 27, 2023

I am so sorry for your loss 🧡

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M. M.
18:34 Sep 30, 2023

Thank you. I miss him every day, maybe someday I will write a story about him.

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Rose Lind
04:06 Sep 26, 2023

Danielle when I saw the rawness I knew you were writing from an experience, it can be cathartic. I'm sorry for your loss. I wrote a story, drunk and never have edited it or reread it. In my mid 50s life I have heard many stories similar to my own and wrote the story intertwined plus the conclusion, you are not the trauma,the power you gain by your own understanding is valuable. Buddha fountains, lavender incense sort of appears as contempt and that is what I would feel too. Couples usually break up under extreme stress. They are bound by an...

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Olive Silirus
19:47 Sep 24, 2023

Each word written in this story was nearly painful to read, they were so drenched in anguish. And then that last word, "Mama", was like the final blow. Very well-written. Congrats on the win.

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Danielle Barr
21:10 Sep 24, 2023

Thank you so much, Olive!

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Samaira S.
11:10 Sep 24, 2023

I can still feel the chill down my spine even though I finished reading the story over a minute ago. It was like I was paralyzed throughout the entire story until the last word, where I could feel the tears prick my eyes. Terrifyingly well-written story. Congrats on the win!

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Philip Ebuluofor
10:37 Sep 24, 2023

Hard one here. Congrats on your win.

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