Lips as red as rose, skin as white as snow, body as still as stone. Yet this was not the fairy tales that I had been raised to believe in. This had no happily ever after.
The heavy weight of the melancholy anguish fell awkwardly on my shoulders. I was barely old enough to even understand what sorrow was, let alone what to do when every person I had ever admired was now helplessly crumbled in the solid white room. Unthankful walls stared bleakly down at us, as they were numb to these feelings by now. It was a hospital, after all. They had seen their fair share of the dead.
Something strong, pressuring, and overwhelming continued to force itself into my chest, burrowing itself deeper and deeper. Nothing had ever felt like that, as if it was eating me until I was nothing myself. When I glanced around to my family, I could see that it had them too. Consuming them in this helpless, dark pressure, the kind you only pretend to escape. Drying them of the good memories and replacing them with pain and despair. Squeezing them until tears fell from their eyes so much I had almost forgotten what they looked like without them.
A voice beckoned me to the side of the bed. The smile that had filled my childhood was replaced with broken eyes and a grin that I knew was a lie. I wanted nothing more but to crawl into her arms and cry until everything stopped hurting so much, but I was too afraid. For in my mother’s eyes I saw she wanted more than anything to do the same.
Dad’s arm came around me and held me tight, he needed it as well. It was terrifying, to be able to compare my parents to how I looked after a nightmare. They were kids again, frightened, and desperate, and alone. All they wanted was a hug and smile and someone to tell them it would be okay, that the terror was nothing but a dream. Sadly, we would never wake up this time.
The nurse came around with a camera, and I knew then that this was the last time we would see him. I glanced down at the perfect little face I realized I would miss for the rest of my life. With the pressure eating my heart, I said inside goodbye to the little boy I had dreamed to know. His body, small and teaming with untapped potential and dead life, was an image I would never be able to forget. Yet he never even got the chance to see his big sister’s face. Maybe it was better that way, never seeing what he lost as we saw him. Things were going to be different now, without him. Things would never be the same. A nurse started to count.
And in a broken photograph, I smiled.