The Broken Miracle

by J. D. Netto

  Mom was parked right in front of the ER, Dad sitting beside her.

  I quickly handed over Neil and helped Olivia into the ER, rushing to the receptionist behind the front desk.

  “My wife, she’s pregnant and bleeding. We need help!”

  “Please stay calm, sir,” she said while typing something on her computer. “You’re in the best place you could be in a situation like this.” The waiting room was packed with patients.

  “We’re very busy tonight as you can see.” Her attention remained on her computer. “The on-call doctor will see you soon. Please take a seat.”

  “Take a seat?” My cheeks flushed. Olivia leaned forward, using the edge of the desk to hold herself up. Her face scrunched as she moaned. “Look at her. We have to see a doctor right away. We can’t wait!”

  “You need to wait, sir.” She stiffened her posture. “He’s currently with a patient. I’m sorry, but there’s a process. The doctor will be with you as soon as possible.”

  “This is ridiculous,” I contested. Sawyer wanted to jump out of my chest and strangle the insensitive woman.

  The bleeding continued as we waited. The chair was stained red, blood trickling down its wooden legs, spreading on the floor. Olivia trembled and shuddered. Her grip around my hand was so tight I thought she was going to break it. My eyes flitted around the room, stunned there was no one available to help. All watched in horror and shock.

  I marched to the front desk after waiting for almost half an hour.

  “We need to see a doctor right away, for crying out loud!” My hand slammed on the desk. “We’ve had miscarriages before. This cannot wait.”

  “We’re doing the best we can.” The receptionist’s voice wavered. “We have people here who’ve been waiting longer—

  “Are you serious?” Blood rushed to my face.

  A woman stood up from her chair, an eye patch on her face. “His wife is bleeding!” she shouted in a hoarse voice. “She can have my turn. She needs a doctor.”

  A nurse emerged from the door behind the receptionist.

  “What’s going on—” Her jaw dropped at the sight of me. “Paul?”

  “Yes?” I said, confused.

  “Purple Plum?” She frowned.

  “Do we know each other?” I asked.

  “It’s me, Michelle from middle school, remember?”

  I squinted at the memory of my first day back in school after my endocarditis surgery. I recalled the sound of her voice, the blue of her eyes, and the freckles on her face. She was the girl who nicknamed me Purple Plum. She had transferred schools a few days later, and I never heard from her again.

  “Michelle! Please, please help us.” I rushed back to Olivia and grabbed her hand. “My wife’s bleeding. We’ve been waiting for—”

  “Get me a wheelchair now!” The receptionist stood at the sound of Michelle’s blaring words. “Now, please!”

  “I was just following proto—”

  “Now!”

  The receptionist appeared seconds later with a wheelchair.

  Michelle rolled it toward us and wheeled us into a room with three other patients and a vacant bed. Olivia was pale, tear streaks stained her cheeks. The blood on her white pants resembled a crime scene.

  “I’ll get the doctor right away,” Michelle said as a team of nurses stormed inside the room and closed the curtains around us, helping Olivia undress.

  A doctor joined them seconds later.

  “Dr. McConkie, we need you now!” yelled one of the nurses. He stood in the way, blocking my view.

  They laid her on the bed after she was clothed in her blue hospital gown.

  My head moved left and right in an attempt to see what was going on. “Move, move!” I shouted at the nurse in front of me. “I can’t see anything!”

  Olivia let out a scream.

  The room fell quiet as I shoved the nurse to the side. Sawyer stopped. The world stopped. On the bed was an almost fully developed baby girl, encircled by a blood stain. She was so small she could fit in my hand. Her fingers and toes were fully formed, heart-shaped lips ready to cry, but still.

  “No, no, no, no.” I pressed my hands to my head, turning to McConkie, and then scanning the mask-covered faces of every single nurse in the room. “Can’t you do something?” I begged. “Please?”

  “She’s gone, Paul,” Dr. McConkie said. “I’ll have an ultrasound machine brought in so we can check on the other.”

  A nurse wrapped our daughter in cloth and put her on a table by the foot of the bed. Everyone left the room. Mumbles and chatter echoed from the other three patients on their beds.

  My daughter’s lifeless body was soaked in blood. My mind gazed into a future that could have been. What would her cry have sounded like? Would she have loved music like her daddy?

  Olivia whimpered quietly. Her blood-smeared clothes were a bundle on the floor.

  I remained rooted to the spot, still as a rock in the desert. Dr. McConkie wheeled in the ultrasound machine.

  “Hurry up,” I said, defeated.

  He examined Olivia’s belly, and as he was about to run the transducer over her stomach, she released another gut-wrenching scream. Another blood clot. The body of another baby followed.

  I closed my eyes and counted to five in my head, hoping I’d wake up after I was done. But I didn’t. My children were still dead in front of me.

  Dr. McConkie wrapped him, laying him beside his dead sister. He left the room without uttering a single word.

  A frightening silence. Olivia and I alone. We stared into each other’s eyes for a while. A dark ocean of agony drowned out the light in her soul. I ached to find words to fill the void, but death was the only answer between us.

  I sat on the edge of the bed, observing their corpses.

  Michelle came into the room but left as soon as she glanced at our dead twins.

  “Sarah and Abel,” Olivia said, voice caught in her throat. I turned to her. “Their names.”

  “Our children,” I mumbled. “Sarah and Abel.”

  I wanted to take in every moment I had with them. I wondered what they’d say if they could speak. Maybe they’d tell us how they were suffering inside her belly for a while. Two nurses stormed into the room, disrupting my thoughts. They took their tiny bodies away.

  It had been a week since the traumatic incident. Olivia kept to herself most days, bursting into tears again and again. I tried consoling her, but I knew there was no way out of this void, only through. Neil remained his excited self, playing with dinosaurs, building towers out of pillows, and humming made-up songs. To him, he was lucky to have both parents at home for a whole week.

  Our family and friends overwhelmed us with love every single day, constantly calling to check on us. A few wanted to visit, but we asked for privacy.

  Dr. McConkie called to apologize for not asking if we wanted to have our twins prepared for burial. He explained the hospital takes care of them if they’re less than twenty-five weeks old—something I knew; something Olivia knew. But hearing it from him made the pain even more real.

  I sat at the piano, replaying the past few days, my thoughts filtering into songs. Neil was going to be dropped off at my parents’ so we could go on another trip to the hospital. Our family probably deserved some kind of award for all the hospital visits. Olivia needed a dilation and curettage—or D&C, a procedure to clear her uterus from any remnants of the pregnancy.

  My fingers suddenly abandoned the keys. I looked around the silent room, imagining Abel and Sarah running around and playing with Neil. I wanted a life of peace for my family and me but wanting wasn’t enough. The keys were under my fingers once again, my left hand in an arpeggio flow in the lower register. My right hand joined in as I closed my eyes, darkness my companion. As images of an impossible future flooded my mind, I composed a song I eve
ntually called “Monday Morning.” The melody reflected the things I wanted. I wanted to hold on to hope, but Sawyer’s every thump reminded me of everyone’s downfall, my twins and my own.

  Olivia appeared dressed in a white robe, wet hair running down her shoulders. She held Neil’s hand while approaching the piano.

  At the sight of my smile, Neil let go of Olivia and ran to me, the melody exciting his little heart. He tapped my arm, signaling me to scoot over so he could sit on the bench with me.

  Olivia retreated upstairs without a single word.

  “Daddy,” Neil said with pouted lips. My hands left the keys, silence settling.

  “Yes, buddy?” I wrapped an arm around his shoulders.

  His broad smile revealed his crooked teeth. “Daddy, when babies arrive?”

  The question was a blade to my heart, a sharp breath my weapon against the knot that formed in my throat. The sunlight spilling from the window lightened his brown eyes. I stared deep into them. “God needed them for something really special. So they couldn’t stay.” It was the best—and probably the worst—explanation I could find at that moment.

  “Why?” A frown creased his forehead.

  “I don’t know,” I replied. “All I know is they had to go be with Him for a while. But you’ll meet them someday.”

  He folded his arms with great determination. “They don’t want to see me?”

  My lungs pulled in a breath. “Oh, Neil, it’s not that. Sometimes babies are so comfortable in their momma’s bellies, they decide to make that their only home while on this Earth.”

  “Oh,” he cooed.

  “And when they’re born, they don’t open their eyes or cry because they’re already with God in Heaven.” I fixed the collar of his little polo shirt. “But the good news is that we’ll all get to meet them someday.”

  “Okay.” His hands dropped to his lap. “Will they like me?”

  “Neil,” I whispered. “They already love you.”

  “Okay!” He ran to the couch and tossed the cushions on the floor.

  I watched as he started building his pillow tower. But then he halted, two pillows in his grasp. His gaze turned to me. “Only you, me, and Momma live in the house now.”

  “That’s correct,” I replied, wishing life had given Olivia and me what we wanted.

  For a quick second, I envied my son’s innocence. The only comfort he needed was his father’s voice. He believed what I said without a doubt. My explanation was vague and full of plot holes but enough to calm his little mind.

  The melody of “Redeemer” filled the house as my fingers danced over the keys. My son’s giggles joined the melody.

  Olivia walked downstairs and joined Neil in the living room, ready for her appointment. She watched Neil play with the cushions and pillows from her seat on the arm of the couch.

  “Mom, it’s a house for us.” Neil’s voice complemented the music.

  “It looks beautiful.” Olivia smiled.

  “Babies will come one day.” Neil fixed a pillow at the bottom of his tower. “You’ll see.”

  Olivia’s posture stiffened. “They will?” she asked, clearly holding back tears.

  “Yes, Mommy.” Neil looked at her with determination, his hair a mess. “I want to be ready!”

  I expected Olivia to break down. But instead, she knelt in front of Neil and held him by the waist. “We’ll meet them, and we’ll all be together. And when that happens, we’ll all build a house for us to live in. But let’s finish building later. We’re going to see Grandma and Grandpa now.”

  Neil rested his head on Olivia’s shoulder.

  The three of us hopped in the car, Neil strapped in his chair. He hummed and sang his own songs until we got to my parents’ house. Silence loomed between Olivia and me after we dropped him off.

  “In the mood for some music?” I asked in an attempt to break the tension.

  “Sure,” she answered in a flat voice, nibbling on the side of her thumb.

  I turned on the radio and pressed play on whatever CD was inside.

  Olivia shuffled in her seat and let out a long sigh as Rush’s “Tears” came on.

  What would touch me deeper

  Tears that fall from eyes that only cry?

  Would it touch you deeper

  Than tears that fall from eyes

  That know why?

  A lifetime of questions

  Tears on your cheek

  I tasted the answers

  And my body was weak

  For you

  The truth

  “Are you alright?” I lowered the volume after the chorus came to an end.

  “The thought of going back there…” She pressed her eyes shut.

  “One day, we’ll be going back to the hospital for the birth of our second child.” She stilled at my words. “And when that day comes, that child will be worth all the problems that don’t make sense right now.”

  My affirmation was met with the usual questionnaire as to why our lives were so broken. She questioned our trials, our suffering, and spoke as if the future held nothing but darkness and toil. Eventually she turned up the volume of the music, lips sealed in silence.

  I remained in the waiting room while they saw Olivia. They assured us it wasn’t going to be a long procedure. The patients around me sparked unwelcome memories of my twins wrapped in cloths covering their frail bodies.

  I paced around, visited the water fountain, stared at the paintings, read the brochures scattered on the coffee tables, and even grabbed a few snacks from the vending machine. How long until the memories became scars? How long until Sawyer gave out completely? How long until it was Olivia’s turn to wait for me while I was in an operating room?

  Into the Fire

  AUGUST 1987

  “Paul,” said a distant voice while something shook me by the shoulder. I searched the darkness with eyes half-opened. “Paul, time to get up. It’s five a.m.” I recognized my mom’s voice. “You have to get ready.”

  I rubbed my eyes to the sound of her fading footsteps. I eventually got up and wobbled my way to the bathroom without bothering to turn the light on. I had dreaded this day for a year. I was going back to that freaking hospital.

  My reflection in the dark mirror stared back at me, but the scar on my chest made everything else fade away.

  They had to pry me open again. Sawyer was going to literally see the light of day one more time. Doctors explained the surgery would help my blood flow smoother so it could pick up oxygenated cells. I was conflicted when they said my blueish fingertips and lips would look normal after this. I kind of enjoyed being called Purple Plum.

  I showered and crept back into the bedroom to get dressed. Dan and Jonahs were fast asleep in their beds. It was still dark outside. My lungs begged for oxygen every few steps. Dressing and walking upstairs for breakfast took all the wind out of me.

  My parents chattered in the kitchen, the table already set with a jar of orange juice, Cocoa Puffs, milk, and waffles. The downside was that I wasn’t allowed to have anything.

  “Morning, Paul,” Dad said. His graying hair was combed to the side, perfectly sprayed into place. There wasn’t a single wrinkle on his white button-down shirt. A quick glance and one would assume he was studio-ready, a moment’s notice from appearing on television to report the news.

  “Morning.” I sat in front of Mom as she poured herself some Cocoa Puffs.

  “Ready for today?” Dad asked.

  “Sure.” I shrugged.

  My sure was like a ticking grenade.

  Mom gently laid a hand over my arm and said, “It’s just another step for you to get better.”

  “And another addition to my scar collection.” I said, watching her dunk the spoon into her bowl. Every time she munched on the cereal, I heard the tic
king of the grenade growing louder and faster. Tick. Tick. Tick. Then it finally exploded. “Why do I have to go through all this? The other day, I was thinking how 99.9% of my friends will never in their lifetimes experience what I have this past year. I should be worried about starting freshman year soon, not my heart seeing the light of day again.”

  “I get that you’re scared,” Dad said in a calming voice. “I would be too. But our God has scars. And right now, you’re in His fire. Things can get warm, but you’ll never be burned.”

  I scoffed. “Why do I have to be the only one in this family to walk through this so-called fire? That makes no sense. I could’ve inherited some heart disease in my fifties because of how much Cocoa Puffs and banana bread I eat.” My chest raised with a ragged breath.

  “Fire refines gold.” Dad seemed too calm as he drank his juice.

  I shrugged in response.

  “The impurities of gold are removed when it’s thrown in the fire,” he continued.

  “Dad, don’t take this the wrong way.” I scratched the side of my head. “But you seem too calm. Like, very calm. Your son is about to be cut open so doctors can play house with his heart and get a nice paycheck for it.”

  He laced his fingers and brought them to his chin. “Let me tell you something that only your mother knows. You can believe it or think it was just a dream. Do whatever you want with what I’m about to share. After your first surgery when you were born, I heard a few doctors whispering in the hall. They said you were not going to make it. They probably didn’t know I could hear them. The words killed me.” His eyes glistened. “I went outside. I imagined your mom hearing the news. How devastated the family would be. But something unexpected calmed my storm.”

  “What was that?” I asked.

  “I heard your adult voice in the wind.”

  I frowned at his answer. Dad had never been one to talk fantasy. He was too much of a reporter for it.

  “It’s true.” Dad smiled after noticing my expression. “You whispered, ‘Don’t worry, Dad. I’ll be alright.’ And that stopped my fear.”