If Reverie Survives Today

If Reverie survives today, she will have officially outlived Valor.

I just put her down for her morning nap. The same nap, at the same time, as her brother who was the same age as she is today.

She is so small. So young. So new. 357 days new.

If her life were to mirror his, in exactly 1 hour, I would go to wake her, and find her cold, greyish blue, and lifeless in her crib.
Blood curdling screams would escape me as I carried her limp body to the front yard where her dad and an ex friend would be.

Everything would happen in slow motion, and yet at lightening speed as the friend would take her and lay her on the grass and begin CPR.

Our house cleaner would be calling 911, as I would be too. My hands would shake as nothing I did was fast enough. Like in a dream when you’re trying to run from terror, but it feels as if you’re running through drying cement.

The longest rings of my life that would seemingly take hours for someone to finally answer.
I would have an incoherant conversation with a woman, as I gasped for air, gave my address, and pleaded for them to hurry.

I would run back and forth up and down my yard, inside, outside, holding my head. Watching as my husband would yell, and go into a rage. I would zone out like the whole world stood still and everything went black and would say, “she’s gone. She’s gone. She’s gone. She’s gone. Oh God, God she’s gone.”

I would rush back to her body and breathe into her lungs, instinctively screaming and praying for her to wake up. I would watch liquid drip from her nose. Search her eyes and find no life.

The friend would be on the phone with 911 getting infant CPR instructions. I would move to get out of the way and continue looking up and down the street screaming inside “where are they? It’s too late. It’s too late. It’s too late.”

I would scream at an innocent woman on an innocent walk, to go away, look away.

The firetruck would pull in first, and police cars and an ambulance, I would run to them “Help, me, help me help us! My daughter.”
Words barely able to escape between gasping for air that I would feel wasn’t there.

The police, or paramedics or someone- I wouldn’t remember, would rush me inside and begin asking questions. My mind would dizzy and I would stumble over words as nothing I said made any sense. I was hyperventilating. They would ask me to sit. I would fall to the ground.

If Reverie’s life mirrored Valors, soon, I would be screaming with no tears coming out- “I can’t feel anything, I can’t feel anything! What is happening to me?!” As all I could do is groan and moan as I crawled all over the floor like a zombie.

At some point my aunt would show up- and fall face to the floor in our living room as she cried out to Jesus on our behalf.

I would look at her and say “WHAT DO I DO?!” And tears would flood her eyes as she said “I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.” And she would cry out to God.

If Reverie’s life mirrored Valors,
I would be pacing the house and looking out the window, but turning away as the police would tell me to beg me not to look.

I would cry out loud into someone’s arms, I don’t remember who “Please God, LET THIS CUP PASS FROM ME! I’M NOT READY TO LOSE HIM. PLEASE GOD, I DON’T WANT THIS TO BE MY STORY!”

Soon we’d be asked by paramedics which hospital we wanted to be transferred to because they perfomred CPR as long as they legally could and they had to move, now.
I’d say the closest one- and they would load her body up while they told us to gather things and head to the hospital.

I would frantically grab my purse, and phone and rush out the door where they would be putting up crime tape around the perimeter of our home.

I would ride in the front seat of my best friends car. She would have arrived at some point, but I won’t remember when. Someone called her.

Justice would ride in the back seat.
I would repeat “please God. a miracle. Please God. Please.” As I rocked my body up and down unable to remain still.

We would get pulled over on the way to the hospital by a motorcycle cop for speeding. My best friend would explain what was happening and he would tell us to slow down but to head on our way.

I would feel anger and rage at that stupid cop for stopping us from getting to the hospital sooner.

If Reverie’s life mirrored Valor’s- we would arrive to the hospital not long from now.

And nothing, would ever, ever be the same.
I would arrive a certain person.
And leave the next night, a different one entirely.

Empty handed.
Throbbing Hearted.
Open wounded.
And begin, what would be the worst most agonizing journey of my life.

….

That’s all of the story I could stomach to relive today.
I’m sitting in my bed, watching the clock tick closer and closer to the time that I would enter her room, and be slaughtered by the reality that swallowed me.

But she’s not him.
And I know, that she will wake from her nap soon. And she will live.
She will live through today, and tomorrow. And likely the day after and the one after that.

And because of it, after today, I will have known her for longer…. than I ever did Valor.

And somehow, that reality- slices my freshly healed wound, pours a little salt in, and stitches it back up.

Do I want my daughter to live past today?
With my whole heart.

But after today, a new part of Valor, a new part of this story, gets laid to rest.

A new healing, and a new wound all at once.
A new joy, and a new sorrow.

From tomorrow onward, it’s new territory entirely.
There is nothing left to mirror him, in her.

After today, everything with her, is new ground.

I have felt like Valor held a superiority, up until today.
I knew him better, longer, than I knew her.
But now?
She and I, us, our family, and her- go onward in this story, further into the book than he was ever allowed to go.

I don’t know if any of this makes sense.

How can it, unless you’ve walked it before? I try my best to line up word after word, sentence after sentence, to some how be an elevator down to the depths of what it’s like to lose a child. For my reader to exerience not the pang itself, but the echo of it. The reverberation of the blow that almost took me out entirely.

But nothing I ever say or write feels like it does it justice.
While I want you to feel this pain, I simultaneously hope you never do.

Today is the last date on the calendar of my life that is a new milestone of loss.
From here on out, it’s just his death anniversary. His birthday. His death. His birth. Year after year, after year after year. Until my time is up and I enter my own heavenly birthday.

Speaking of, Reverie’s first birthday- is a week away.
The one Valor never made it to.

And I’ve been holding my breath her whole life it feels.

I’m not ready to inhale new air, and exhale him.
But I am ready to breathe.

Later: She woke up.