FFF #19

FFF is Flash Fiction Friday. JJ asks us to write an anecdote, short story, etc, beginning with the sentence below. Visit Purgatorian for the details.

*****

I think it was her photograph that made me realize that perhaps I could DO something to help.

When the baby's mother handed that photo to me, I immediately noticed the scar on the child's torso. She'd recently had surgery. Breathing tubes covered most of her mouth.

I thought of the rolls of film I used when my daughter was born. I happily clicked away, every time a new family member arrived to visit and hold her, adorable in her Carter's outfits with teddy bears and yellow rocking horses stitched on the fronts. Those moments were routine, in a way, even though I cherished them all. I had the luxury of dozens of Kodak moments.

The first few days of life are not always a parade of visitors bearing flowers and balloons, and a portrait in the hospital nursery with a special outfit picked out by mom. Sometimes, there are tubes and monitors and a need for critical care from one moment to the next, and being so tiny that most clothing doesn't fit.

"I can edit this," I said, and I did.

I had the mom mail the photo to me. I opened some photo editing software I'd never touched before, and began to experiment. First, the scar. I found a "clone" tool that would take soft, unblemished skin and paint it over that heartbreaking cut. A lump formed in my throat when I began to stroke away that scar, making it look as though the surgery never happened. I wished that I had some magical power, and by simply erasing that mark, I could actually remove it from her delicate skin.

I was trying to make that part of her mother's experience a bit easier. To console her, in some tiny, miniscule way, for the fact that she couldn't just pick up a camera and take a typical snapshot whenever she wanted. That while her baby would have her own portraits, and her own story, I could give her a little bit of something that other moms cherish and take for granted all at once.

There is a photograph I'm working on now. This baby is gravely ill. His mother heard about the work that I do, and asked if I would do a picture for her. How could I say no? What holiday preparations could possibly be "more important" when I think of her, spending her days by his side?

She had a picture from his first day of life. He has the same little bow-shaped upper lip that my babies had. It's covered by a breathing tube and tape but I can see the edges of it, and I know what it SHOULD look like. Perhaps it's there in her mind's eye, when she takes a few moments to close her eyes and rest. I wonder if she dreams of a peaceful baby face, unobscured by tubes and tape.

When I'm finished editing the picture, the bruises and scrapes on his head will be gone, and the bluish veins showing so harshly through his paper thin flesh will be soothed away. No tubes will cover that heart shaped mouth.

The last thing I will add is a soft focus, dreamlike effect. I can only hope to be able to give her an image that she can cherish, so that when she thinks of her son, it will sometimes be a snapshot of a tiny angel.