Little Boy Blue

When I was young I was a little frightened of my uncle, who was an alcoholic. Sometimes he stayed with us for months at a time, and sometimes even when he wasn’t staying with us, we would get that knock on the door in the middle of the night, which meant he was drunk and had nowhere to go.

So when I was awakened by knocking and crying, I just knew it was him, and I was paralyzed in my bed in our little apartment on 6th Street. I wanted wake my mom and dad, but to get to their room I would have to cross the living room where the front door was rattling from incessant pounding. I was too afraid.

I laid in my bed listening to that knocking and wailing for what seemed like the longest time. Finally, I gathered up the courage to get out of bed and go wake them up.

As I ran toward the living room on bare tiptoes, mom and dad were just coming out of their bedroom. I stood frozen in the entryway, wide-eyed at what I might see when they opened the door to our apartment.

It turned out to be our neighbor from across the hall. She was cradling her tiny baby in her arms and crying.

“He’s not breathing.”

My dad took the bundle from her and laid him on the couch, and he began to perform mouth-to-mouth on the baby while my mother called the ambulance. And the distraught neighbor stood sobbing in her powder-blue nightgown, her hair in a low ponytail, mascara running down her cheeks.

I don’t know how long it took for the paramedics to get there, but I can still see them entering our apartment in their sanitary white coats, black medical bags in hand. I stood watching from the doorway as they worked on the fragile baby for a while, and then they took him away.

It was a few days later that I overheard my mother on the phone, saying “the poor little thing didn’t make it.” And I remember blaming myself… What if I had gotten out of bed sooner? Could the baby have been saved?

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After the birth of my daughter, my mother and I were talking about the importance of CPR and knowing what to do in case of emergency. I hesitantly brought up the baby from across the hall, wondering if she would recall the incident. “Oh, remember that? The poor little thing – he was blue when she brought him over. Your father tried to save him, but the little guy was long gone.”

So after 16 years of blaming myself I finally felt a bit of relief.

But to the little baby boy from across the hall, I wanted you to know that I remember you, and I wish there was something I could have done to save you.

“If only. Those must be the two saddest words in the world.”

– Mercedes Lackey