Page 32 of Insidious

And she’d just look at me with mischief, like a little imp. She’d invented a brand-new form of torture just for me.

I called it cruel and unusual punishment.

She loved it, and secretly, so did I.

The machine beside her beeps steadily, matching the beat of her heart.

That sound becomes everything, proof that she is still here.

***

After what feels like hours, we reach the hospital.

I don’t remember the transition. One moment, we are in the ambulance. The next, there are bright lights. Doors crashing open. Loud voices and doctors and nurses in scrubs, converging.

“Let’s take her to Resus,” I hear someone shout.

They take her from me. I follow in a daze and stay outside the curtain like they ask me to.

Hands are everywhere again. People who know what they are doing.

I stand off to the side, out of the way.

And suddenly, Lily is here with Amelie wrapped in a swaddle.

I didn’t even realise she had arrived.

I am glad she is here for Amelie because I am fucking useless, flopping around like a bloody penguin, not knowing where to go, what to do, who to be.

A husband? A father? I can’t manage either.

All I can do is let them lead me to the waiting area and hold my breath, like that might somehow keep Luna alive. Amelie starts whimpering, and Lily takes a flask out of the baby bag she has slung over her shoulder. I take my baby, her familiar weight a comfort, and then take the bottle that Lily silently hands me. She doesn’t say anything, but I can see she is holding back. As I feed Amelie, I find myself praying—possibly for the first time since I became an adult.

“Heavenly Father, hallowed be thy name …”

***

Time blurs.

They move her again from Resus to ICU.

More doors. More people. More words I don’t understand.

Or maybe I do, and I just don’t want to.

“We had to intubate her,” says the ICU doctor. She looks tired, sitting in the waiting room, talking to us. Mum and Dad are here, as is Lily. Nora and Oliver are on their way.

I remember the term as if it belongs in a textbook or a TV show, not attached to Luna.

They’ve intubated her.

And all I can think is, please don’t let that be the last thing I ever hear about her. “We had to intubate her.”

***

Time seems to lose its meaning. Nora and Oliver have arrived.

Another doctor comes out—scrubs, cap still on, mask hanging loosely around his neck. He is young, and he has asked us to call him Dr Gupta. He tells me he is the consultant.