Saving Noah

by Lucinda Berry

I fell in love with him instantly, marveling at his perfection and that I’d grown him cell by cell in my body. My feelings stemmed from the deepest parts of me, parts I didn’t know existed until I had him. He wasn’t a stranger when they placed him in my arms. It was like a missing piece of myself had been returned.

If you did everything right and it still turned out wrong, then what was the point?

Time had dragged. Nobody told me time slowed down with tragedy and how each minute became excruciating when it was painful to merely exist. Just when I was gaining my footing, something would remind me of it and send me into an emotional tailspin. Most of the time it was the little things, like a college admission packet in the mail, an email about ordering hot lunches for the next month, or lyrics to a song he liked. The grief would pummel me, and I had no choice except to succumb to it until it passed.

I didn’t know how people broke rules. I’d always been that way. It wasn’t because I hated getting into trouble even though I did, but there was something fundamental inside of me that felt obligated to do the right thing simply because it was the right thing.

But I had to go on for Katie, because being a mother means you live your life as a living sacrifice.

She’d created necklaces with all her surviving children to serve as living memories of their sister and something they could touch whenever they missed her. I loved the idea.

There had to be a God, because there had to be a heaven. A time when I got to see him again, and he was the one to walk me home.