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All she could do was stand there and numbly watch as a part of herself was lowered into the ground. The casket was shockingly small, smaller than she had ever wanted to see. It was one of those things, she knew baby sized coffins existed, but she never planned to see one, let alone encase her own baby in one.
At this point, Linda wasn’t sure what was worse - knowing that she would never again get to see her little Danny, or knowing that he was dead because of her. She killed her own child. Maybe she didn’t stab him or neglect him or anything like that, but she was there when they decided to pull the plug. She agreed because of the tiny life currently residing within her. She tossed her sickly child aside for one that had a chance. It all made sense in the moment, but now? After seeing the consequences of that choice and having to live with the anguish as she went about her everyday life, reminding herself that gave up on her own flesh and blood, she wasn’t so sure.
She swallowed back her tears. If she could, she would break down, start sobbing and screaming and begging and throwing things. There was all of this sadness and anger and guilt just swirling around and building up within her, desperately searching for an outlet. The second she would allow all of that to come to surface though, she knew there was no stopping any of it for a while and that wasn’t a luxury she had right now. If she couldn’t keep calm she could lose that baby and there was no way that she could even consider continuing her life with the blood of another one of her children on her hands because she was too selfish. It was all beginning to be too much, her head spinning as the back of her throat burned. She needed to get away from this somehow.
“I can’t,” she muttered, her voice shaky before she turned and forcefully shoved her way through the crowd.
Bob froze for a second, not fully processing the moment as it happened. He had been worried about his wife all morning, only hearing her utter a few words here and there. This was the longest that she had ever gone without speaking, at least as long as she had been with him. It was deeply unsettling.
“Excuse me,” he said, beginning to go after her.
He spotted her not too far off from everyone else. She sat on the grass, leaning back against the mausoleum.
“Lin?” He called as he approached her.
“I can’t even mourn the death of my own son,” she stated, looking down to the ground. “I don’t even get to miss him like I want to. I thought I would’ve earned at least that.”
Bob stopped before her, unknowing how to react. There was nothing he could say or do. Danny was dead and she was right, if she did get too upset something could happen to this baby. Neither of them could handle losing another one, not now.
“I’m tired too, Lin,” he sighed. “It’s not like any of us wants to be here, but we have to be. We have to or else we’ll regret not being there.”
Linda sat there, unmoving. She didn’t care about this funeral, she was there for everything else. She was there when he was born and the nurses took him away before she could hold him. She was there for little fits of laughter when they played peek a boo, his cuddles after story time. She was there when his fever shot up and they had to sit in the emergency room for hours, holding his tiny hand day after day waiting for him to wake up. She was there for his first words, and still right there holding him as he took his last breath.
She felt some of her greatest joys and her deepest sorrows. That was all while he was alive. His death did nothing more but leave her with an emptiness, wiping away every single emotion she had encountered, rendering everything she had worked for utterly worthless. All that remained now was a persistent dull ache that physical, mental, and emotional, and a desperate need to hold her baby.
This funeral meant nothing to her. It didn’t bring back her son, nor did it give her a second chance to say good bye. All it did was remind her of what she couldn’t have, rub it in her face that she couldn’t save the one person in this world that meant everything to her. This was nothing more than a show of her failure and how it punished her innocent little baby.
Besides, she didn’t want this to be her last memory of Danny. If she was going to cling onto certain memories, it was going to be the small family outings, playing together, bringing him home. And she wouldn’t mind remembering the spit ups and the tantrums and the all nighters. Even in those frustrating moments, they were still part of his time as a somewhat healthy baby. She cherished every bit of it.
Squandering all of that by watching him get dirt buried all over him was disrespectful. It wasn’t worth it to stand there and suddenly feel how final his last moments were.
Bob nodded at her silence. All he wanted to do was get this over with so that he could go home. Throughout this entire thing he had been watching Linda, making sure she was okay, bottling everything up for her. Going home and getting her to bed would give him a few minutes alone to just break down. That was all he needed.
Funerals were something that had grown almost routine to him over the years. Bob was well aware of how much better everything felt as soon as you got through the first night after the actual service. Upon waking up that next morning, there’s this surreal feeling, as if the past few days could have been some nightmare. As the day goes, reality starts to slowly sink in. It’s painful, but it’s also nice in the fact that you can’t fight it anymore. What’s done is done and there’s a certain finality to that. It’s over, and now you can move on.
It took him a second, but he remembered that she Linda wasn’t used to this. This was pretty new to her, a lot newer than it was to him. And this wasn’t just some relative that you’ve talked to once or twice on Christmas, this was their son. One of her first funerals and she was being slapped in the face with the absolute worse form of loss one could ever experience.
And that feeling of relief he would get as soon as he were able to yell or scream or do whatever he needed? She wouldn’t get that. Even if he thought that a small outburst wouldn’t hurt the baby, there was no way that Linda would risk it.
In that moment of realization, all he wanted was to be able to erase her suffering. It hurt even more to know that there was nothing that he could do for her.
“I’m sorry,” he finally told her. “You don’t deserve this, any of this.”
Linda looked up to him, not sure how to react. It was nice, hearing that she wasn’t the one at fault. It wasn’t like anyone had been accusing her of killing Danny, but she had felt guilty this entire time.
“You should be at home right now, trying to get him to take a nap or feeding him. This isn’t right, and it’s not fair,” he explained, tears of frustration gathering in his eyes.
Linda went to speak, but stopped herself. The words were just too much at the moment, and allowing them passed her lips would only make things worse. Maybe I could be. It had crossed her mind only a few thousand times that she may have pulled the plug prematurely. It seemed as though there were no other alternatives, but she had to wonder.
What if they let him live? Most likely, they would still be sitting in that room and staring at a comatose baby. There was that very slim chance however that they would be celebrating his return home. And she would forever kick herself for not taking that chance.
He paused, closing his eyes for a second and regaining his composure. “But it did happen, and no matter what, we have to handle it,” he bluntly stated, the harshness even taking him by surprise.
“Now please, come back with me. I’ll hold your hand, stand in front of you so you don’t have to see. I’ll do whatever you need, I just don’t think I can handle this place much longer,” he pleaded.
Linda looked up, seeing a pain in his eyes that she had neglected earlier. Perhaps it simply wasn't present, but it was more probable that she just hadn't noticed, ignored it to focus on her own suffering. As bad as she felt, she couldn't bare to bring herself to go back and join the rest.
“I can't, Bob. I'm sorry,” she said, beginning to sob.
Bob was about to protest, but he couldn’t. As bad as he was hurting, as much as he ached to get out of this all too familiar playground for the dead, he couldn’t do that to her. Just because he was used to how these things worked, didn’t mean that she was, and he didn’t want her to have to be used to it. He didn’t want her to know exactly how long these events were and know the sequence of events by heart, continuously counting down the moments until it’s over and hoping that no one decides to drag it out further than it has to go.
“Fine,” he sighed. He went and sat down beside her on the ground.
Linda looked over to him, surprised. In the back of her mind, she actually believed that he would just go ahead and return to the service and then just come back for her later. She didn’t know why, it was a ridiculous idea, but that was what she had convinced herself.
“What are you doing?” She asked, sniffling.
“I promised you that I wouldn’t leave you, so I’m staying,” he told her. “If you decide that you want to go back, we’ll go. If you want to hide here for the rest of the day, we’ll hide.”
“Thank you,” she replied before leaning onto him, her face buried into his shoulder.
“Yeah,” Bob absently replied, wrapping his arm securely around her. “You’re welcome.”