Same Old Song

by Brenda Dorantes

  I look over at my son and wife. Elizabeth has settled after an entire day of being restless, but that all could change soon and I don’t want to have to leave my wife alone only because my brother wants to get back at his wife's argument that he acts like a child.

  "I don't know if I can go, I have things to do," I said. "I promised Kathy I would help her out with something."

  Katherine shakes her head and mouths to me go.

  "Katherine knows it’s me. Come on, I want to see my nephew and hang out with you." He keeps insisting and I know this argument with my brother is not an argument I’m going to win. "Please, just have a couple of beers with me."

  I look up at the ceiling and groan. This guy just never gives up, does he?

  "Fine, but we're only staying until eight. Charlie's bedtime is at nine."

  "The poor kid. He's three and has a bedtime. Let the kid live a life.”

  "He's four years old, what is he going to do?" I roll my eyes.

  "I don't know, I don't have kids." Alex laughs. I roll my eyes again and sigh. The next three hours of my life are going to be long. "Okay, I'll see you at my house in an hour and you better not be late."

  Oh, boy.

  I tell Charlie to get his shoes on while I said my goodbyes to his mother and sister. Elizabeth is already asleep in my arms by the time I hang up the phone, so I lay her in her crib and turn to Katherine.

  "Are you sure you're okay with me leaving?" I ask. I know she's tired and I don't want to leave if she wants to rest.

  Charlie jumps down the stairs and runs to me. I catch him in mind-air and swing him on my side.

  "It's okay. I'll lay down with Elizabeth for a while. You go check on Alex, he needs you more than I do.”

  If that wasn’t the case, trust me I wouldn’t be leaving right now. I give her a quick peck on the lips. Charlie glares at me for kissing his mother. Katherine chuckles and licks her thumb, wiping the little milk mustache from his upper lip.

  "Your face is always dirty," she whispers and slides his glasses back up his nose. "Be good for Daddy, okay?"

  "Yes, Mommy." He leans over, takes her face between his chubby hands and kisses her nose in return.

  The night with my brother is pretty calm. I have the opportunity to catch up with Matthew and his now six-year-old son, Matt Junior. He has always been more of a friend to Alex than mine, but it was nice seeing him after almost six months. The Play Date, as Alex liked to call it, was more like chips and beer date. We spent time chatting in-between guys, watching the football game and having a few beers, not a lot. I didn't have more than one because I still had to drive back home. Matt played with Charlie around the house, jumping up and down, playing with the new toys Alex bought them earlier today. At some point during the evening, Leila came out of her hiding to greet us and make some snacks for the kids. She completely ignored Alex, she gave him the cold shoulder and everything. Like that wasn’t awkward.

  Alex mentions nothing about the baby situation or getting his sperm tested at all during the night. I would ask, but I chose wisely against it.

  By 8:30, Charlie was ready to go home.

  "Hey, little guy, what happened?" I asked and sat him up on my lap.

  "I wanna go home, Daddy.” He yawns. "I want Mommy to tuck me in bed."

  "Come on, big guy, don't you want to stay with fun uncle Al?" Alex rubs Charlie’s head, messing with his crazy locks.

  "I'm tired."

  Matthew stands up, carrying his son in his arms. "Sorry, Al, this guy has a bedtime," he said.

  "Alright, I'll see you guys later." He waves at us from the couch as we make our way out. I stop by the kitchen and say bye to Leila, who gives Charlie a big kiss and sends us on our way.

  Charlie is battling against his sleep when I strap up in his car seat. His head bobbles side to side and his eyes fight to remain open.

  "Hey, you go to sleep, okay? Mommy will tuck you in bed once we get home," I assure him and kiss his forehead.

  "I want Mommy goodnight kiss." He yawns again, touching my nose faintly.

  I smile at my son. "Alright, let's go get that kiss."

  "I wanna go... home."

  "Yes, home."

  The drive back home is quiet. I can see how my son battles to stay awake, wanting to be there consciously for his mother's goodnight kiss. He loved his mother so much. He wanted to see her, he missed her even when we were only a couple of hours at Alex's house.

  The road was dark and silent. There was barely any car to be seen. I drove under the speed limit, looking ahead, aware of all of my surroundings, letting the piano music fill in the small space in the car. I don’t know when I went wrong.

  I never thought that there would come a point in my life where I would regret it. Regret of not being able to say I love you more. I wish I could have hugged and kissed those I loved more than I did before. I never thought I would hate everything that made me me. I never thought there would come a point in my life where I would hate. Hate every single beautiful thing I had in my life that later turned wicked.

  I never thought that the point where my life flashed before my eyes meant the very end of who I was. Not until the big headlights hit the side of the car and everything went black.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Aidan

  Kathy walks into the room with a wet towel in her hands. She pushes me back against the chair and sits on my lap, each leg on the side of mine. She takes the warm towels and wipes the blood off my bottom lip and the scratches on my face. I lay my hands on her waist, which is slightly gone due to the little baby bump she's just beginning to show.

  I stay still, letting her wipe the blood off my face in silence and not once wincing at the pain when the cloth comes in contact with my flesh. When she's done, she grabs me by the chin and makes me look at her. Her face is serene. Not at all what I expected after witnessing the heated fight I had with my brother.

  "You're going to be okay," she whispers, pulling my hair away from my forehead. She leans with a gentle kiss. "You may not feel like it, but you are, okay?"

  I nodded, leaning forward and kissing her lips. My free hand travels to her front touching the small bump she has. Our first baby. I lay my head on her chest as my hand continues to stroke her growing stomach.

  "I love you," I told my child...

  "Sir. Sir? Can you give me your name?" A woman asked but I could barely hear her. There's a really loud pounding in my head. My entire body is in pain. "Sir, I need you to tell me your name," the woman insisted.

  "A-Aidan," I groaned. "Aidan Ca-Callahan."

  "Alright, Mr. Callahan, we're on our way to the hospital," she said.

  Hospital? Why am I going to the hospital? Everything is so confusing. There's too much noise around, sirens, yelling, too much noise. My head is pounding. It stings. I can hear people talking amongst each other, shouting orders left and right. I could barely make out what was going on. What happened? What was I doing?

  Moments later, I could feel how they transported me from one place to another. The crowd of people didn’t leave me, they were rushing me somewhere, urgent to get me there. The lights were very bright, they blurred my vision. I could hear talking and whispering, I heard breathing. Was it me?

  All this was sending me down a tight spiral. It wasn’t long before my own subconscious gave up.

  When I opened my eyes again, I found myself in a hospital room. The pale white walls and the annoying beep sounds gave it away. The ache in my head has not gone away. I groan, letting my head fall back on the pillow.

  "Aidan?" I look at Kathy who stands up from her chair and throws herself at me. What is she doing here? "Oh, my God, I'm glad you're okay."

  "What happened?" My voice is hoarse. I would kill for some water right now.

  Kathy sits beside me. Her eyes are red and swollen, her cheeks are flushed and her skin looks paler. An evident sign she’s been crying.

  "You had an accident. A stupid drunk crossed the red light and hit you."
She pulls my hair from my forehead and says, "You've been unconscious for a couple of hours."

  An accident? I search in my mind for any memory of an accident but there’s nothing. I just remember the big pair of lights, that's all. How long since this happened?

  "What time is it?" I asked.

  "It's barely eleven," she said.

  "And the kids?"

  "Elizabeth is with Jessie and Matt. They took Charlie into surgery, but they haven’t given me an update," she answered. "Alex and your parents are in the waiting room."

  I sit up, ignoring the pain that shoots down my back. "Update on Charlie? What about Charlie?"

  "You don't remember?” She leans back, confused. I shake my head. "Aidan, you took Charlie with you. He was in the car."

  He was with me?

  "Where is he?" I immediately try to get off the bed, but Katherine pushes me back. “Katherine, where is he?”

  "The nurse said the doctor will talk to us as soo-" she's interrupted when the door to my room opens. The doctor walks in with his hands in his pockets. The look on his face was neutral. Something about it sent red flags.

  "Mr. Callahan, how are you feeling?" He asked me.

  "I'll be better once you tell me how my son is," I reply. Why haven’t they said anything to Katherine?

  “Dr. Bennett, is my husband okay?” She asked.

  Dr. Bennett nods, though nothing about his facial expression changes. "Yes, he'll be fine. You just had minor injuries, Mr. Callahan, that's all."

  "And my son?" I asked.

  He bit his lip but did not answer my question. Neither of us took that silence as good news.

  Kathy takes my hand and holds it tightly. The anticipation was making my heart race to the point that the machine I was connected to started to go crazy. He needed to speak and he needed to speak now.

  "Dr. Bennett, my son is okay, right?" Kathy asked, her voice croaking. He sighed and rubbed his eyes. "H-he is okay, isn’t he?”

  "Doctor," I insisted.

  He looks up at us and says, "I'm truly sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Callahan. I don't like to give families news like this."

  No, this is not happening. I'm dreaming. This has to be some kind of nightmare and I’ll wake up soon and we’ll be home. Charlie is okay, but Katherine doesn’t seem to believe that.

  "About what? Y-y-you're sorry about what?" I can feel her body shaking, just like her voice as she spoke.

  "There was a complication during surgery. His heart couldn’t take it. I am truly sorry. They did everything they could."

  Fatality.

  "No," Kathy cried, shaking her head. "No. No, that can't be right. You're telling me that... That my baby... No, no!" Katherine stumbles over her own feet, but the doctor catches her before she could hit the floor. Her cries filled the room. Her cries were the only thing I could hear.

  Pain.

  Fatality.

  I'm not the fatality. It was not me, but my son. Charlie was in the car with me. Charlie was the fatality.

  I'll never see him run around the house or play with his sister. I'll never be woken up by his little arms pulling me away from his mother so he could hug her. He'll never get jealous when I hug or kiss her. He'll never ask me to toss him into the air. I'll never see Kathy clean his little face or kiss his little nose. He'll never get to see his mother again, he'll never get that kiss he wanted. He'll never grow up to become a pilot. He'll never meet the girl of his dreams. He'll never have kids.

  I will never see him again. All because of me...

  "No." I finally found my voice. It’s just as broken as I am. "No. That's my son! That's my boy! No!" I sobbed. My heart was torn to shreds. "Not my son! Not him!"

  I didn't realize I started shaking until Kathy's arms wrapped around me and held me in place. She was shaking, too. She was crying. I caused this... I killed him. It’s my fault.

  I remember that night clearly. I cried, screamed, cursed and my wife tried to get me to stop, even when she was at her own breaking point. It came to a point where she couldn't take it anymore. She walked out of the room. I heard her cry from the other side of the door, I heard her trying not to make it obvious by muffling her cries with her sleeve. I heard her slide down the door until she was sitting on the floor. I remember saying sorry to her over and over, begging her to forgive me. Because of me our son was gone.

  They let me out of the hospital that same night. My injuries were not that bad, at least not the physical ones. Katherine asked to see our son's body before he was sent to the funeral home. We went in hand in hand. The thing I hated the most about that room was that it was cold, quiet but very cold. He shouldn’t be here. The feeling in the room was sad and depressing. I didn't want him here. I wanted him home… where it’s warm. He likes the warmth. He likes the warmth that he gets from his mother.

  We walked to the silver table where there laid the small form of our son covered by a white sheet. Katherine’s hold on my hand grew tighter and her body started to shake. I was the one who pulled the sheet down so we could at least see him one last time.

  He looked like he was asleep, so peaceful and so beautiful. For a moment I thought if I touched him, he'd wake up and smile at me, hug me, ask his mother for that goodnight kiss he always wanted. I wanted him to wake up, tell us to take him home and tuck him in bed, but that never happened. His heart stopped here. He was gone and there lay nothing but the carcass of what he was.

  I lost it all over again. I cried again and again. I took his small, cold body in my arms and held him against my chest, begging God or whatever greater force to have mercy and not take my boy.

  "It's my boy," I cried. "Don't take my boy. Not my boy." I looked at his face, his beautiful little face. "Charlie, please. Let's go home, baby. We can go home. You want to go home, right? Please. Let's go home, baby, Momma is here. She's here, baby. Let's go home. Don't leave me!"

  "Aidan," Katherine cried.

  "Let's go home, please, baby. Don't leave me!"

  Katherine hugged me from the back and cried against me. We stayed like that, both of us were crying, holding our son's body one last time until it was time to go. Until it was time to let him go. I placed him back on the table and when I was ready to cover him up, Katherine stopped me. She leaned forward toward our son, her tears fell on his white cheeks. She kissed his little nose and his forehead and whispered, "goodnight, Charlie. I love you. Always."

  The day after that was the funeral and everyone was going to come. Friends, family, people who invited themselves to see our son in a small white coffin.

  I helped get Elizabeth ready, more for the fact that I needed something to occupy myself with or else I felt like I was going to go insane. I was scared to even touch her. I carried her, but the fear was still there. I held her against my chest, but the pain was still there. Nothing could make the pain go away.

  "I'm sorry," I told my daughter. "I'm so sorry."

  I walked to the living room in search of her mother, but she was nowhere to be seen. I walked around the house with Elizabeth looking for Katherine until I found her in his room. She was sitting on his small bed looking at his favorite blanket she had in one hand and his favorite airplane in the other. She pulled the blanket to her face and inhaled his smell. She cried again, quietly like we both did last night.

  I wanted to walk in. I wanted to hold her but for a strange reason I couldn't walk in. It was like a force prevented me from doing so. I couldn't walk in this room.

  "Katherine," I said instead. "Baby, it's time."

  She nodded and placed the blanket and the plane down. She grabbed his glasses and brought them with her. She stroked Elizabeth’s cheek. She looked at me, but I continued to look down. I couldn't look her in the eyes.

  She pressed her hand against my cheek and she whispered, "stop blaming yourself."

  "I didn't deserve you, that's God's way of saying so," I whispered back.

  "No. No, Aidan." She made an attempt to make me look at her, but I didn't. "Aidan,"
she cried. "There's no one in this world who didn't deserve him more than you did. You gave him the best life any kid would've wanted. Even if it was for a really short amount of time. Your son loved you, just as much as you love him."

  I clench my eyes, shaking my head as the tears continued to pour. She pulled us in a hug. She pulled me together, the three of us as one.

  The funeral was hard to bear. Everyone gave us their pity looks, their I'm very sorry for your loss bullshit and pity food. My family was even worse. Mom was all over the place, helping Katherine out with serving coffee, etc. Leila insisted on taking care of Elizabeth, but I wouldn't let her go. The rest kept quiet, telling me everything was going to be fine, but it wasn't. They didn't send their kids to their grave. They didn't have to bury their own child.

  The burial was worse. I couldn't take it. I couldn't stand there watching how they slowly buried my son, but I didn't walk away. I stayed with Katherine, I stayed with Elizabeth. I held both of them. I carried Elizabeth even when I feared to let her down; I held my wife even when I feared she hated me.

  By midnight, I got to convince my parents to leave us, that we needed alone time. I heard Katherine lock the front door before the entire house went silent. What a silence... It felt different. The entire thing felt... empty. I expected him to walk down the stairs, to be singing or running but the house remained silent. Lifeless.

  I never heard Katherine walk toward me until I felt her hand on my shoulder. I didn't look behind, I remained looking at my hands.

  "You haven't said anything," she whispered from behind. "You haven't even looked me in the eyes." I remain silent. What could I tell her? What could I possibly say after I took what mattered the most to us in an instant? "Please, just talk to me," she begged.

  I couldn't say anything so I stood up and walked away.

  "Why won't you talk to me?" She yelled as she followed me. "Don't you think that I'm hurting too? Don't you think that I need you?"

  "I'm aware of that," I said under my breath.

  "What?"

  "I'm aware of that!" I snapped and looked at her for the first time all day. I regret the moment I do. All I see is pain. "I'm aware of the pain you feel because I caused it! I took him. He died under my care! You shouldn't be her trying to console me, you should hate me!"