I’d straightened up and looked at Allison. “I’m so sorry that you and your family are having to go through this.”
“Thank you.” Her eyes had brimmed with tears. “I just can’t believe this is happening. It’s so horrible.”
“Let’s step out in the hallway for a minute.” I hadn’t wanted Janie to overhear anything. “Janie, me and your aunt Allison are going to be in the hallway right outside your door if you need us, okay?”
She’d nodded.
Allison had followed me into the hallway and started talking immediately. “What were they doing in the bathroom? You don’t bathe babies in the regular tub. I never did. Hannah didn’t either. She was hysterical at the hospital. Did they tell you that?” She hadn’t waited for me to answer. “I’ve never seen her that way before. She was completely unhinged. It was awful. She kept letting out these animal-like shrieks, and I couldn’t calm her down. Nobody could. I’ve never seen anyone act that way before. Is that normal? I mean, what’s normal? It just doesn’t make sense. None of it. Hannah tried to attack Janie when she came into the room. She went after her. Did they tell you that?”
“Nobody has told me much of anything yet.”
She had grabbed my arm. “Cole’s going to be okay, though, right? I mean, he’s going to make it through this, isn’t he?”
There had been too much desperation in her face to tell the truth.
“Absolutely,” I had said.
FORTY-EIGHT
CHRISTOPHER BAUER
Every time one of Cole’s monitors sounded, I was sure we were going to lose him, even though the doctors assured me his scans looked clear. He was no longer intubated and was breathing on his own, but he still hadn’t woken up. His CT scan showed he’d suffered a seizure after hitting his head. They assured me infants often had difficulty breathing when they came out of seizures, but their words did nothing for the fear surging through me.
I paced the room. Six steps from the back wall to the door. Four steps across. My head swirled with questions. What had they been doing in the bathroom? Why had the kids had their clothes on? How had they gotten so wet? If only Hannah would talk. She held all the answers, but she still wasn’t making sense or acting right.
I was as worried about her as I was about Cole. The effects of the Valium had long worn off, and she’d barely moved from the chair. Every now and then, she’d get up and robotically move to Cole’s enclosed crib. She’d stick one of her fingers through the hole and stroke his arm, tears streaming down her face. I asked her what happened twice, but she acted like she didn’t hear me. She’d disappeared somewhere inside herself, and I couldn’t reach her. Nobody could.
“What’s wrong with her?” I kept asking the doctors.
But none of them cared all that much about her. Their primary concern was Cole. His was the life in danger, not hers. The only one who paid attention to her was the hospital social worker, Holly.
The first time she entered the room, she washed her hands at the sink like she was one of the doctors, serious faced and all business. She introduced herself to us with her back turned, blotting her hands with the paper towels above the sink. Since there was only one chair in the room, we stood facing each other in front of Hannah.
“Hannah, I’d like to ask you a few questions about what happened today.” She turned toward Hannah and peered down at her, taking in her disheveled state.
Hannah didn’t make eye contact. She twisted her hands on her lap.
Holly didn’t waste any time getting down to business. “Can you tell me how Cole got injured?”
Hannah didn’t respond.
“How did Cole get hurt?”
Hannah’s hands trembled. Something registered on her face, passed through her—a memory—and then it was gone. That was more than I’d gotten from her, so maybe we were going to get somewhere.
Holly knelt in front of her. Hannah kept her head down. “Your son is seriously injured, and we need to know what happened. I understand you’ve been through a lot today, but we need answers.”
A lone tear escaped from Hannah’s eye and traveled down her cheek.
“Hannah?” Holly prompted.
I jumped in to save her. It was cruel to push her like this. “The doctors gave her Valium to help settle her down, and she always has strong reactions to drugs,” I explained.
Holly didn’t acknowledge me. She kept her attention focused on Hannah. Nobody had pushed her to talk yet. What would happen if Holly pushed her too hard? My heart twisted in my chest.
“You can ignore me all you want, but eventually you’re going to have to talk, and the sooner you talk, the better.” Her gaze never wavered. “I’m having a difficult time understanding what kind of mother wouldn’t do everything she could to help her child.”
“It was an accident.” Hannah’s voice was barely audible.
Holly nodded, pleased she’d broken through. “Go on.”
But Hannah didn’t know how to go on. I watched helplessly as she struggled to find words. “It was an accident.”
“Yes, you said that. Tell me more about the accident.”
She waited for her to answer. Hannah’s body trembled. She gripped the armrests with both hands.
“Please, stop,” I said. I couldn’t take any more. By the looks of it, neither could Hannah.
Holly finally shifted her gaze to me. “She seems very upset.”
“Are you serious?” My finger shook as I pointed to the crib. “Have you seen our son? Read the reports?”
She stood up, facing me. “Yes, I have, and that’s why I’m here.” We stood in an awkward stare-down. The silence stretched out between us until it was uncomfortable. Finally, she spoke. “Were you angry when you got home?”
“Me? Why would I be angry?”
“It’s understandable that you’d be angry about having to leave work again for something going on at home. I mean, that can only happen so many times before it starts getting on your nerves.”
Who had she been talking to?
I forced myself to stay calm. “I wasn’t angry.”
“Was Hannah angry?”
“No.” My voice was clipped.
“Did Hannah ever get angry with the baby?”
“Cole?”
She cocked her head to the side. “Is there another baby?”
“Can’t we do all of this with Piper?” I asked.
Piper would never talk to us like this. I was sure it had something to do with Holly being so young. She compensated by being cocky and arrogant, trying to establish some kind of authority over me, but I didn’t like it.
She glanced down at her iPad. “Piper Goldstein?”
I nodded.
“Piper will be involved as well. We’ll be working as a team. She’ll work more directly with the Department of Children’s Services, and I’m the social worker assigned by the hospital.”
“Why do we need two social workers?” I asked.
“We always assign two social workers in cases like these.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Cases like what?”
“Investigations of child abuse.”
FORTY-NINE
HANNAH BAUER
I wanted to speak, but I was locked in the background of my head and had lost the ability to communicate with the world outside me. The world pulsed and thrummed around me, warping my vision into blackening fear. The hospital lights were too bright and jarring. My thoughts moved so fast I couldn’t discern any particular one except the constant desperate begging of my psyche to every god in the universe: Please don’t let my baby die.
I could see and feel everything. I felt the prick of the needle and the wetness of the cotton swab when they shot me full of Valium. I heard everything the doctors and nurses said as they swarmed the room like bees. Their discussions about the CT scan not showing blood on Cole’s brain and how they would do an MRI to catch anything the CT scan might have missed. Their assurances that his brain just needed to rest after what it
’d been through.
Everyone kept asking me what had happened, and I wanted to tell them. My mind told my body to speak the words, but it refused. The connection between the two was unplugged, severed. Parts had folded into blackness and created a void. All I could do was listen helplessly as Holly drilled Christopher with questions. I’d never seen him look as furious as he did when she mentioned child abuse.
“Child abuse? Are you serious?” The anger radiated off him.
Holly didn’t skip a beat. “Weren’t you questioned the last time Janie was in the emergency room?”
“Yes, but that was different.”
“How was that different?” She crossed her arms on her chest. “Didn’t a hospital social worker interview you then?”
He unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt and loosened his collar like it was choking him. “He did. He asked us what happened to Janie, and we told him. End of story. He never accused us of child abuse.”
She balked in mock surprise. “I didn’t accuse you of child abuse either.”
“Yes, you did.” The cords on his neck stood out.
She shook her head. “No, I said we are investigating the possibility of child abuse.”
“How is that any different?” He glared at her.
“Mr. Bauer, I understand that you’re upset. Today has been a very difficult day. I’m just trying to do my job.” She took a step back from him, creating more space between them. Christopher took a deep breath and ran his hands through his hair.
Relax, Christopher. Just relax.
We needed him to be strong. All of us.
He cracked his knuckles and stretched. “So what do you need from me?”
“We need to know what happened at your home today. Is there anything you can think of that might help us figure it out?”
He let out a deep sigh. “I wasn’t there.”
“Who was there?”
“Hannah and the kids.”
“And you’re sure of that?”
He nodded.
The questions went on and on. They spoke around me like I wasn’t there. I couldn’t keep up with the plot or process the information correctly. The sound of Cole’s skull as it cracked against the side of the porcelain tub interrupted everything they said, everything that was going on around me. It forced its way in unbidden. He was never supposed to get hurt.
CASE #5243
INTERVIEW:
PIPER GOLDSTEIN
“Is it common for parents to act the way Hannah did in the hospital?” Luke asked.
“Yes.”
“So you’d seen it before?” He and Ron exchanged another glance like they’d been doing all afternoon.
“I have.” Previous cases flashed through my mind in snippets. The teenage mother who’d given birth in the locker room after hiding her pregnancy from everyone and hadn’t spoken for two weeks afterward. The nine-year-old boy who’d gone into catatonic depression after being removed from his mother’s care. And the Vaughn baby. “Sometimes the brain shuts down after trauma for a while.”
“That’s what everyone believed was going on with Hannah? Some kind of traumatic shock?”
“We had no reason not to.”
“But not Holly. She filed a Child in Need of Protective Services order given the nature of Cole’s injuries.” He tapped his pen on the table.
I understood Holly’s concerns even if I hadn’t agreed with filing the report because I’d seen the type of injuries Cole had had before. They were rare in babies who hadn’t been shaken, but just because it was unlikely didn’t mean it was impossible, and he was missing all the other signs. Nothing else pointed toward abuse. He didn’t have any of the rib fractures, seizures, or bruises that you typically saw. But mostly, I knew it wasn’t abuse because it was the Bauers. There was no way Hannah had hurt Cole. Not even a chance.
“Take me through what happened after the Child in Need of Protective Services order was filed.”
“Because of the Child in Need of Protective Services order, Janie had to be removed from her home during the preliminary investigation. Cole would’ve been removed, too, but since he was in the hospital, it was basically the same thing. It’s standard practice when there’s been more than one report made on the parents.”
“How long does it take to complete the investigation?”
“It usually only takes a few days to determine whether there’s probable cause for child abuse. They automatically remove children from their home until they can determine they’re safe from any harm.” I looked at Luke because he was the one I’d spoken to about it earlier. “I told you before that we always try to place kids with relatives first rather than in foster care, and Janie’s case wasn’t any different. It made the most sense for her to stay with Allison.”
“Did she go home from the hospital with Allison?” Ron asked.
“Yes.”
“Allison agreed to take her?”
“She did.”
“And you felt comfortable with that? You didn’t have any concerns?”
“None.”
FIFTY
CHRISTOPHER BAUER
The neurosurgeon and pediatrician walked into the room together still wearing their green scrubs from surgery. Their faces were blank, unreadable. I gripped Hannah’s hand. The neurosurgeon wasted no time getting down to business. “We were able to find the brain hemorrhage and stop the bleeding.”
Relief flooded my body. Cole had had another seizure, and they’d rushed him into surgery afterward when the MRI had shown a bleed the CT had missed.
His neurosurgeon went on, his hands in continual motion as he spoke. “His brain stem reflexes are working. His pupils are reacting to light, and he reacts appropriately to external stimuli. I expect him to experience a full recovery.”
Hannah’s hand shook in mine.
Two other nurses wheeled him in from the recovery room. Hannah and I shuffled to his side, afraid to look. His eyes were closed. His head was wrapped in bandages. He was pincushioned with needles. Hannah stuck her finger through one of the holes and stroked his leg. He opened his eyes.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. The pain in her voice was so thick it was tangible. I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and brought her close to me. Her body was stiff, unmoving, like a pile of bones next to mine.
“We’ll watch him overnight to make sure everything continues to be okay and probably for the next twenty-four hours, but if he continues to do well, we can start talking about discharge plans.”
His pediatrician spoke up. “We’ll watch him closely for the next few months, but it was only a cranial bruise, so we shouldn’t expect to see any long-term damage.”
I squeezed Hannah. “Did you hear that? He’s going to be okay.”
CASE #5243
INTERVIEW:
PIPER GOLDSTEIN
“It says here that your colleagues expressed concern that you were too close to this case. That there were important signs you could’ve missed. What do you think about that? You think there’s any truth to their claims?” he asked.
“Absolutely not. I’m good at what I do because I care about the people I work with.” I’d never apologize for it.
“But you missed the bruises on Janie’s neck, didn’t you?”
Dread crept into my throat.
He motioned to the tape recorder in front of him and asked the question again.
“Yes, I did, but only at first.”
“Was there anything else you could’ve missed at first?”
I winced. “No.”
“When did you finally notice the bruises on her neck?” he asked, emphasizing the word finally for effect.
“By law, you have to check on the child in the new home within twenty-four hours, so I stopped at Allison’s house the next day.”
Allison had looked like she’d aged overnight. No amount of makeup could hide the bags underneath her eyes. She’d offered me tea just like Hannah, and I’d said yes to her in the same wa
y. We’d sat in the breakfast nook in her kitchen.
She had rubbed her temples. “How is Cole?”
“He’s still doing well,” I’d said. “He took a bottle this morning, and the doctors said that was a really good sign.”
“That’s great. And what about Hannah? What are they doing to help her?”
“I’m not sure what the plan is.”
“Have you seen anyone turn into a zombie like this before? Why is she still out of it?”
Janie had run into the kitchen screaming and waving a toy truck while one of the twins had chased her from behind. The boys looked so much alike that I couldn’t tell them apart.
Allison had raised her voice. “Stop running in the house.”
They’d ignored her, and their footsteps had thundered through the kitchen and into the family room.
“Greg?” Allison had called out. “Greg?”
“What?” a male voice had responded from somewhere in the house.
“Can you please take them outside? They need to run off their energy, and they’re giving me a headache.”
“On it,” he’d said. I’d heard footsteps on the wooden floor in the next room.
Allison had sighed. “I don’t know what I’d do without him these past few days. I’m so glad he’s home.”
“I bet.” I’d shifted into the reason for my visit. I hadn’t wanted to, but I’d been pressed for time. “There have been some changes in the kids’ case, though, and that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.” I’d paused, giving her a minute to settle back into the conversation. “The Department of Children’s Services works as a team, and different social workers have different roles. There’re social workers that work within the hospital setting and workers like me who work outside the hospital setting. It gets confusing because I often visit families in the hospital but only if I’m already working with them or if one of the hospital social workers files a report. Does that make sense?”
She had nodded.
“A hospital social worker was assigned to Cole’s case. Her name is Holly, and she filed a Child in Need of Protective Services order given the nature of his injuries.” Allison had looked as confused as I’d expected. “Any children that are in the home have to be removed until the preliminary investigation is complete. Basically, it’s an emergency order designed to keep the kids safe until they rule out child abuse.”
The Perfect Child Page 24
