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I was eating caviar and drinking champagne when my son died.
 

I don't wish to leave the impression that I was decadent or uninvolved. This was a celebration, of sorts. I had achieved a promotion to district supervisor in my capacity as a child protection social worker, and was holding forth before a select group of close friends at my home, feeling vindicated and fiercely proud.
 

Someone – Andrew Laidlaw, I think – had just raised a glass to toast me, when there was a god awful flash from the direction of my son's room, and a loud popping sound. I think at first I believed a light bulb had blown, but as we moved in that direction, a burned hair aroma began to fill the air, and my own hairs proceeded to stand on end the closer I approached his bedroom door.
 

Let me back up a little here. Earlier in the evening, before my friends arrived, my son Ryan and I had become embroiled in one of those inevitable family quarrels. They are truly unavoidable, sometimes; these clashes of incompatible needs and wants. I try to remember this in my work, and I think it helps me find compassion for others when I weary of the often-dull predictability of human conflict. Ryan, who was eight years old, had wanted to stay up and watch The Simpsons on television. Knowing my guests would be arriving some time after 8:00 pm, I had said no, that he needed to get ready for bed early tonight. Ordinarily, he would have accepted this with minimal fuss, but I think on this occasion he was feeling particularly rejected by his parents, probably with some justification. His mother, my ex-wife Linda, had been refusing to take Ryan for some time due to her stated priority of cementing her relationship with a man she had met very recently. She believed – not necessarily wrongly – that children cannot possibly feel safety and stability if the adults in their lives display neither of these attributes, so she determined to begin her new relationship with chillingly conscious parameters. She figured she'd introduce Ryan to his new stepfather (his name was Brad, or was it also Ryan, I forget?) at the appropriate time. Needless to say, Linda worked in the field of therapy, was a clinical counselor in fact. And god help me, I agreed with her in theory, despite said theory's application having the practical effect of leaving me a single parent more often than not in recent weeks. I suppose that night I was especially irritated by it, and consequently was short with Ryan when he complained about his early bedtime. We yelled a bit back and forth, and he stormed off, heartbreakingly scrawny in his new Beyblade pj's.
 

I remember thinking we could smooth it over the next morning before school, that I would apologise for my raised voice, over a toasted cream cheese bagel. Only the next morning would never arrive in such a prosaic manner.
 

Two things. When we entered his room, I recall a blue glow and a humming fizzing sound, and then I saw my boy splayed on the floor convulsing and actually burning at his hairline and from his fingertips, which clutched a radio. I went to grab him, but someone held me and yelled "NO!" in my ear. A foot flashed out, and kicked at the electrical cord that still hung from the wall socket. There was another flash, and the blue lightning abruptly ceased. Ryan's eyes were rolled back in his head, and I pried the short-circuited radio from his smoking hands. The smell of burning skin and hair was thick in the dry air. I think I yelled his name, hysterically, shaking him. I don't really remember. John Mitchell apparently attempted CPR, while Emily Naughton phoned 911, but somewhere in the deepest most wretchedly certain part of me, I knew without a doubt that my wonderful, athletic, funny, pragmatic son had been taken from me forever…
 

2.
 

I am cycling along Main Street on my yellow and black mountain bike. It is as chunky as a hornet and as cheerfully fierce. There is a bus turning ahead of me at the intersection of Main and Laidlaw. I have to catch up and then make it past the bus. Somehow, everything hinges on this. I pedal harder, loving the burn in my legs and lungs. I won't make it. Someone is yelling. I reach the bus; I bank hard right, following its silver flank, squeezing between it and the curb. But there's something wrong. The bus is becoming less solid, its pulsating sides more mercury than silver, coruscating in the spring afternoon air. I am going to become absorbed by it. I try to brake, but like the bus my bike is also more vague and amorphous. I am about to be eaten by a city bus. I scream at the top of my lungs: Ryan! Daddy's here!
 

But the street scene shifts, and returns to normalcy once more. The bus driver is a solid Christian woman by the name of Emily who enjoys solitary card games. She has a blank expression on her face, and her knuckles are pearly white.
 

3.
 

I decline the promotion. I want to work on the front lines, I tell them, in the field, seeing real people deal with real problems, helping babies escape the terrible confines of their parents' awful needs, witnessing children gulp pockets of rare air despite their flash flood families.
 

4.
 

"Mr. Bradshaw?" A kindly concerned voice. Brad Shaw? Is that me?
 

"Mmm-hmmm?"
 

"Do you know where you are?"
 

"I'm back at work. I had a terrible dream. I'm so happy to be working with kids again now."
 

"I'm afraid you've lost me."
 

"I dreamed about a bus."
 

"You had an accident, sir, and yes it did involve a bus."
 

"Their suffering is unbear…" My voice catching. "Who are you?"
 

"Doctor Simpson. The school bus you were driving, sir, do you remember what happened?"
 

"No, no. I don't drive a school bus, I'm a social worker."
 

"You are in the hospital, Mr. Bradshaw, and you were in an accident."
 

"No. My son was in an accident."
 

"Sir… Mr. Bradshaw, you don't have a son…"
 

Oh. My heart screams like a thousand shrieking tires on dry asphalt. I don't have a son. I don't have a son. I don't have a son. I don't have a son. I don't have a son. I don't have a son. I don't have a son…
 

5.
 

The mailman is backing away. I don't understand it. I am trying to explain something to him. He is a human being, and he should listen to me, especially since I don't get out so often these days, and the stories of terror on the 6 O'clock News occasionally fill me with a horrible sorrow beyond anything I've ever felt before. He thrusts the bills and flyers at my face and tries to turn away.
 

"Wait. I want to show you his model bus, he glued it all together from a kit, and painted it with chrome and some metallic teal colour, a pretty colour, and the doors open and close, and the wheels even turn, you have to see it…"
 

"Pal, the only thing I have to do is deliver this sackful o' mail…"
 

"Just two seconds, okay? Come on."
 

"Bring it here then, and hurry it up."
 

I enter his blue fizzing X-Ray room, open the mesh lid of a modified aquarium, and return with the body of his dead hamster laid out in my palms. His name had once been Midnite (yes, spelled that way – on his door, he'd fashioned a crude sign with the words Midnite plese wisper in deference to the rodent's finely tuned startle reflex) and he now has tire tracks across his grey lifeless body.
 

"Get that thing away from me, ya freak. I'll report you! What the fuck…?"
 

I laugh for a long time, at least until Linda, the lady who reads the News with such sincere melancholy, appears magically on the television screen to talk of suicide bombers in a place called the Gaza Strip. What madness can that be? Strapping explosive to one's body and detonating where women and children congregate?
 

There is no relief. I try a sports channel, and the hockey players look enraged and discard their equipment so they can punch each other as hard as they need to. Over and over again, in the face.
 

What am I now? Me? Me. Mitchell Bradshaw. Brad Mitchell. Whatever. How do I begin again?
 

6.
 

None of this happened. Or only some of this happened. My disorder makes me see catastrophe ahead, everywhere. Catastrophic thinking, they call it. My son Mitchell grew up and became a veterinarian, even had his own TV spot for a while, talking animal care to the terminally compassionate and making me very proud. And once I received treatment for the Vicarious Trauma that haunted me (thanks in part to all those hurt babies), my own career was moderately successful up until I retired just last year. Emily and I got back together, too, and the world actually smiled on us at last, miracle of miracles.
 

7.
 

None of this happened. Or only some of this happened. I still drive for a living. Cabs mostly, part time for a limo company. I left my girlfriend Linda, soon after the crash. All those kids. I could never have kids myself after that. I play solitaire a lot. And sometimes I dream about a different life.
 

8.
 

Who were you, Ryan? Were you my son? Were you real? Flesh, blood? Or were you a thousand dead sons, neglected sons, mistreated boys? When I am at last able to go back to work, I will see you everywhere as I drive that long yellow bus, that rattlesnake bus, that sly wasp, trying to avoid a tragedy, watching the eyes of the children with their odd secrets and implacable looks.
 

Why can't I remember who I was before? Before death stole in and took something which did not belong to it. Took some children, took a secret black hamster, took a gentle boy who may or may not have ever even existed. While the grownups ate expensive food and drank bubbling wine.
 

laura: This has a very cool progression--I was initially drawn in, then saddened by the character's tragedy and confusion, then confused myself and expecting a key to explain it all at the end, then realizing there wouldn't be one and chilled. Very strong. david_a: Laura, thanks. That was pretty much the progression of emotions I felt writing it. I wasn't sure whether the disappointment over not having it unambiguously clarified might end up being annoying. In keeping with its dreamlike (nightmarish) nature, it just wouldn't resolve itself, no matter how hard I tried ;-) cgroom: This comes across as a mood piece of confusion and loss, stressing feeling rather than a particular plot or character arc. That said, what I felt was strongest about this was your ability to really get into the characters, especially the launguage of the dad in the first section. I think this piece would work better if there was some kind of character growth through the confusion. Interesting read -- thanks! j_moody: I think this is brilliant-- and like Chuck said, more would be welcome. But still, as it stands, completely brilliant, and wonderfully structured, down to every character trait and every physical detail. Hats off! david_a: Thank you, all. I am relieved more than anything, as I thought it too disjointed, too fragmented. But perhaps that is its strength. Having said that, working on a way to flesh it out and perhaps resolve at least one of the realities here, might be a good idea. Your comments were very helpful. j_moody: Is this you as well? http://www.vachss.com/guest_dispatches/david_antrobus.html david_a: Yes, written in my former life as a street youth outreach worker (cf references to vicarious trauma in this story for explanation of why "former"!). Re-reading it now, I can see some of the indicators of burnout in it. Check out Vachss' site if you haven't already -- it's definitely interesting. j_moody: Yeah, I found it very compelling. I work with emotionally disturbed kids in a group home-- have for the past two years. There's always more to learn about the system, and the wider situation of our kids nationwide, continentwide, and worldwide. I thought it was a very good read (your essay). david_a: Thanks. And yes, I worked in group homes and homeless shelters before working the streets. Very intense. You probably know this already (although I thought I did at the time) but emotional self-care is crucial if you're to stay in the field long term. Good luck with that work, it can be rewarding as hell (now, there's an ambiguous phrase!). sprice: I don't have much to add to the discussion except to thank you for posting this, and for the conversation following it. It's interesting to hear the background to the story, the story of the story. Add comment