From the moment Vicky heard what had happened, she'd never really been able to let the reality of the situation seep in.

It was always that way at the hospital. She'd walk down every desolate corridor on the basement floor, searching for her 12-year old son's room. She'd found it within the first few weeks, of course. And it came easier with every year after that. And her daily routine of handing her smiling little boy his teddy bear and sitting on the edge of his bed and watching new episodes of Goosebumps never ceased. Not for her, anyway. Not until the day she walked in on him, carrying a basket full of mini muffins and miniscule stuffed plush tigers bought fresh from the second-floor gift store, and he simply refused the offer. She'd felt a surge of shock, standing there with the little wicker basket, complete with a well-tied navy blue ribbon, staring back at her son who held no interest in the bundle. She'd forgotten, after all those years. After those four years of what seemed like a straight edge tradition. Her son was no longer her little boy. From the way his six foot frame crammed itself onto the pearl-white hospital bed, and from the newly penetrating echo of his deepened voice, she new he had changed. Four years had passed. Her little boy Kevin was sixteen.

And then, as if sixteen seemed like too much of a privilege, Kevin was taken away from her. He'd died. Soundlessly, they'd told her. Peacefully. In his sleep. He hadn't felt a thing. Of course, he hadn't, she'd thought. Why would he? No sixteen year old boy ever laid there in his bed, having to wonder what death would feel like. They had nothing to worry about. Even Kevin. No one knew that the handsome, smiley young man who had made such a positive impact on the hospital, would never wake up that morning. So why would he feel anything? He hadn't expected it. The dice was rolled, and he was chosen. Simple as that.

Vicky had felt nothing all those years. She'd held onto whatever Kevin had claimed when he'd died. He'd been fine, so she'd been fine. Like mother, like son. They'd always been accused of their likeness. Except for that moment at the funeral home. Staring down at her son, his skin soft as it'd always been at his young age, his eyes shut, never to view the world again. She knew then, gazing down into his flowered casket, decorated with everything from his freshman yearbook to his baby blanket, that she and Kevin held one thing indifferent – Acceptance.

He'd died. He'd accepted. But she lived. And the pain he hadn't felt fed on her.

Vicky left the funeral that day, her hair strewn in every direction from the heavy winds, her cheeks still blotchy from crying. Everyone around her, she knew. Kevin knew. Yet she recognized no one. Her sister Florence, also Kevin's godmother. Kevin's former girlfriend, Chloe, who was still crying ceaselessly as her father helped her down the stone steps of the church. Kevin's grandparents, speaking mournfully with the priest at the foot of the parking lot. His aunts and uncles. His best friends, Michael and Leon. His next door neighbors. No one was familiar. No one felt what she was feeling.

Standing next to the black limousine, the soft misty rain eventually soaking through her light-weight black dress, Vicky began to feel a wave of depression come over her. Not just anything small, either. What she felt was heavy, traumatizing. As if all those quiet years of visiting her little boy in that sickeningly sterile hospital had finally touched her, affected her deep inside. She let her eyes fall to the wet cement of one of the fading parking spaces, tears still blurring her vision. Kevin didn't want this. He hadn't seen this coming. Neither had she.

Her gaze remained fixed down at the ground, even as her sister-in-law approached her, holding her newborn son in one arm, a black bundle of what seemed like an oversized wool coat in the other. Vicky looked up momentarily, forcing a smile to her lips. She didn't get a smile in return.

"Vicky…" The woman standing in front of her sounded sympathetic, almost on the verge of tears, carefully hitching the quiet baby into a better position in her arm. "I'm so sorry."

Vicky nodded slowly, waiting for the words to register. I'm sorry. She'd heard it one too many times from other people, and it'd never affected her. It was meant to give some feeling of comfort, of acceptance. But how could she accept something that simple? Something that had no meaning? No amount of I'm sorry was going to bring her son back.

The front face of the church stared Vicky down as she shuffled across the parking lot slowly, hands shoved into her pockets. She noticed her husband David out of the corner of her eye, making his way towards her. She frantically wiped at her face with the end of her sleeve, as if crying were something she shouldn't be expected of at the time. She made the craziest decision then to just turn away and drive off in the family Buick, but before she could even comprehend her own thoughts, David reached out for her hand.

"Honey…" He swallowed momentarily, his pale eyes still wet from the tears he had shed earlier in the funeral parlor. "You're okay, right?"

Vicky nodded on instinct. But she could tell by that familiar look in his face, that look he could register to her without saying a word; He knew she was far from okay.

"Vick, we can do this…"

Vicky pulled her hand away firmly, staring her husband in the eye. "Do what, Dave? What are we doing? Are we bringing Kevin back?"

The hurt on David's face as he completely retracted his arm from her immediately made Vicky feel sick to her stomach. Ever since Kevin's death, only days before, her connection with her husband had… Died. She didn't want to be around him anymore. She even blamed him for Kevin's death whenever she ran out reasons to blame herself. She felt that without Kevin, David was nothing to her. They couldn't go back to being 'just a couple, young, flaming, no children' again. Kevin had already entered their lives. And now that he'd left it, Vicky's relationship with her husband, the love of her life, was finally reaching a path with too many bumps to handle.

David, finding nothing else to say to his wife, made a semi-circle around her and muttered a cold, "I'll be in the car," before heading off into the midst of the parking lot.

Vicky closed her eyes, guiltily biting down on her cheek. She listened as her husband's footsteps faded off, along with those of Kevin's other family and friends. She brought her sleeve to her eyes again as she stared across the parking lot and grassy lawn of the church, and into the eye-like windows of the bell tower. The bell chimed softly now, as if speaking for Kevin…

"Don't worry, Mom. I'm still here, I'm still here…"

Vicky shivered involuntarily, her son's handsome voice echoing through her mind. She shoved both hands into her pockets again, shifted her black leather purse onto her shoulder, and headed off to find her husband.