Forever Innocent

Then I saw it.

The frame held four images, two tall and two wide. The first picture was the sonogram, Finn’s shape clear in white on black. The next was the first shot, one I had taken, right after he was born, red faced and covered in a white paste. The last two were after they hooked him to the ventilator, the blue tape covering his mouth.

So much for keeping it easy.

She saw me looking and sat on the bed next to me. I wondered why she hung them up if she didn’t want anyone to know, and then I realized it was because no one came here. No one was in her room but her. She kept herself separate. Jenny said she only saw Corabelle at work.

How alone we’d both been. I’d busied myself with work, and playing pool with Mario, and paying girls to keep me company. But we stayed away from attachments, from closeness. We were the same.

“I just had the one from the funeral,” I said. “I didn’t take anything with me when I left.”

“I know. I thought you’d be back soon because you hadn’t packed so much as a toothbrush.” Her arm brushed against mine, but she didn’t move away.

“I really thought I’d come back. It’s just the farther I went, the harder it got to turn around.”

The moment had arrived to tell her what I’d done, and why I’d stayed away. Just get it over with and see if she hated me or not, if she could forgive me. Maybe she would just say, get a reversal. Or maybe she’d take it so personally that the rift would tear us apart a second time.

But she laid her head on my shoulder and I couldn’t breathe. Her fingers closed around my arm, and my blood rushed so hard, it was everything I could do not to pull her down on that bed, to love her mercilessly and without hesitation. Maybe we needed something stronger before we went down those dark paths. Maybe we could build again.

“Remember in the sunroom?” I couldn’t say anything else, not trusting my voice to hold together.

“Which time? We were busy in there.”

“The first time.”

“Ah. Yes.”

“Your parents thought it would be okay to leave us to go to that fire station fund-raiser,” I said.

“We were only fifteen.”

“Going on twenty.”

Corabelle squeezed my arm. “They had no idea.”

“What movie had done it this time?”

“How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days.”

“Yes, Kate Hudson. Hot.”

Corabelle smacked my thigh.

“You did the same thing that night,” I said, laughing.

“What was the scene that got us?”

“In the bathroom, when they finally decide they actually like each other. He takes off her shirt.” I remembered that so clearly. As soon as I saw it, I wanted to do it with Corabelle. When the movie ended, we went into the sunroom, our together space since her parents were weird about me going in her bedroom now. We turned out the lights and talked for a while, then I stood up and dragged her with me.

“Raise your arms,” I told her.

Corabelle had giggled. “What for?”

“Just do it.”

The seriousness of my tone sobered her up. “Like in the movie?”

“Like that.”

She looked up at me, dark haired where the actress was blond, but just as intense, just as sure, and lifted her arms in the air. I held on to the bottom of her shirt, barely able to breathe, and lifted it over her head.

We were young, and we fumbled, but Corabelle was already on the shot, so we had nothing to worry about except the how and the where. And once we began, there was no stopping us.

“You ever listen to that song anymore?” I asked her.

“I put the CD away with Finn’s things after you left.”

“You have it here?”

She hesitated. “Yes, but I can’t open that box.”

“Let me.”

“It’s under the bed. You’ll know it.” Her voice was unsteady.

I pulled away and knelt low, fumbling in the low light. But she was right. I remembered the box, given to us by the hospital just for the baby’s things. A blanket. A little outfit. A candle. A handprint kit. We’d gone through it in the two days between his death and the funeral. The box had been put together by some volunteer group for families like us.

I didn’t pull the box out, just lifted the lid a few inches. The CD was on top, and I was grateful, because just seeing the blanket was more than enough for me. “You got anything to play this on?”

“My laptop has a CD drive. Are you — are you sure we should?”

“I’d like to.”

Corabelle moved to a backpack in the corner and tugged out her computer. She passed it to me, so I opened it up, waited for the chime, and opened the CD tray.

The first song of the soundtrack wasn’t right, so I skipped down to “Feels Like Home.” Hearing that crystal voice sent me back in time so fast that I half expected to look up and see that we were in the sunroom and Corabelle was holding her arms in the air. I realized she was wearing the same white tank from that scene, and I had to wonder about fate, timing, and what exactly the world had in mind when it signed us both up for the same class at the university we had once planned to go to before everything else happened, before life got so dark that it split us apart.

Before I split us apart.

The enormity of my regret crashed over me. I wanted to shut off the song, stop it all. I reached for the keyboard but Corabelle knew what I was doing and grabbed my wrist. “Let’s just get through it. I know it’s hard, but let’s just tough it out.”