And afterward he covered the injury, handed the baby to me, and gave me one precise instruction designed to keep me from finding it.
Do not take his onesie off.
I had wondered all afternoon why those words felt wrong.
Now I knew.
They were not the words of a tired new father trying to keep a baby calm.
They were an attempt to control what I could see.
The hospital kept Mason for observation while the case was documented and the appropriate child-safety process began.
No one rushed the next decisions.
There were interviews.
There were written statements.
There was a safety plan.
Thomas was not permitted to simply take Mason home and resume life as though the afternoon had never happened.
Ellie made her own decision before we left the hospital.
She would not go back to the apartment with Thomas that night.
When she told him, he stared at her as if she were betraying him.
