I didn't sleep that afternoon.<\/p>\n
Not even for a few minutes.<\/p>\n
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Paige on the changing table.<\/p>\n
The green sleeper.<\/p>\n
The swollen thigh.<\/p>\n
The beige coating.<\/p>\n
The little patch where the wipe had exposed the bruise.<\/p>\n
Those images stayed together in my mind.<\/p>\n
I couldn't separate them anymore.<\/p>\n
A nurse came in to check Paige's comfort.<\/p>\n
She spoke softly while she worked.<\/p>\n
I watched her support the injured leg.<\/p>\n
She was careful.<\/p>\n
Every movement seemed deliberate.<\/p>\n
I appreciated that.<\/p>\n
The nurse noticed me watching.<\/p>\n
"She's being monitored closely," she told me.<\/p>\n
I nodded.<\/p>\n
"I know."<\/p>\n
But knowing didn't stop me from worrying.<\/p>\n
I had become frightened of every little sound Paige made.<\/p>\n
If she whimpered, I wondered whether she was hurting.<\/p>\n
If she became quiet, I wondered whether she was simply exhausted.<\/p>\n
I couldn't find a comfortable middle ground.<\/p>\n
Kate had stepped out briefly.<\/p>\n
Ryan had gone with her.<\/p>\n
I was alone with Paige and the nurse.<\/p>\n
I looked toward the doorway.<\/p>\n
Part of me was relieved to have a little quiet.<\/p>\n
I loved my sister.<\/p>\n
I had known Ryan for years.<\/p>\n
But being in the room with them had become difficult.<\/p>\n
Every unanswered question seemed to stand between us.<\/p>\n
The nurse finished checking Paige.<\/p>\n
Then she left.<\/p>\n
I moved my chair closer.<\/p>\n
I rested one hand beside Paige's blanket.<\/p>\n
I didn't want to disturb her.<\/p>\n
She had finally settled enough to rest.<\/p>\n
I watched her face.<\/p>\n
Her cheeks were still flushed.<\/p>\n
Her dark hair lay softly against her head.<\/p>\n
I remembered how excited Kate had been when Paige was born.<\/p>\n
I remembered holding my niece when she was tiny and sleepy.<\/p>\n
Back then, I couldn't imagine anything more frightening than dropping her.<\/p>\n
I used to pay attention to every movement.<\/p>\n
One hand supporting her back.<\/p>\n
One beneath her head.<\/p>\n
Always careful.<\/p>\n
Now I was looking at a baby with a fracture no one had explained.<\/p>\n
I didn't know how those two pictures of Paige's life could fit together.<\/p>\n
A few minutes later, the resident returned.<\/p>\n
She asked whether Kate and Ryan were nearby.<\/p>\n
I told her they'd stepped out.<\/p>\n
She said she would speak with them when they returned.<\/p>\n
Then she asked whether Paige had been resting comfortably.<\/p>\n
I told her she'd been quieter.<\/p>\n
The doctor checked her condition.<\/p>\n
She looked at the chart.<\/p>\n
Then she turned to me.<\/p>\n
"Ally, I understand you've already spoken with the investigator."<\/p>\n
"Yes."<\/p>\n
"Thank you for giving a detailed account."<\/p>\n
I nodded.<\/p>\n
I didn't know what else to say.<\/p>\n
She explained that the medical team was continuing to review the additional imaging.<\/p>\n
There were specialists involved.<\/p>\n
They were trying to understand what the findings meant and what care Paige needed.<\/p>\n
I asked whether the second area of concern was definitely another fracture.<\/p>\n
The doctor answered carefully.<\/p>\n
She said the images were concerning, but interpretation and timing required expert review.<\/p>\n
I was grateful she didn't pretend to know more than she did.<\/p>\n
I had already learned how dangerous assumptions could become.<\/p>\n
I wanted the truth.<\/p>\n
Even if it took time.<\/p>\n
The resident explained that unexplained injuries in infants could require evaluation for several possible causes.<\/p>\n
Accidental injuries.<\/p>\n
Medical conditions.<\/p>\n
And injuries caused by someone else.<\/p>\n
I felt my stomach tighten when she said the last part.<\/p>\n
I had been thinking it.<\/p>\n
Of course I had.<\/p>\n
But hearing a doctor include it among the possibilities made it harder to push aside.<\/p>\n
I looked at Paige.<\/p>\n
"Do you think somebody did this to her?"<\/p>\n
The doctor didn't answer with an accusation.<\/p>\n
She said the team was concerned about the pattern of findings and the absence of an adequate explanation.<\/p>\n
Their priority was to determine Paige's medical needs and protect her from further harm.<\/p>\n
I looked down.<\/p>\n
I understood.<\/p>\n
They couldn't tell me who had caused the injury.<\/p>\n
They couldn't even tell me exactly when every injury had occurred.<\/p>\n
But they could tell that something wasn't right.<\/p>\n
That was enough to require action.<\/p>\n
The doctor asked whether I remembered anything else about Kate's arrival.<\/p>\n
I shook my head at first.<\/p>\n
Then I thought about the conversation with the investigator.<\/p>\n
"She looked exhausted."<\/p>\n
"Anything unusual about how she handled Paige?"<\/p>\n
I paused.<\/p>\n
I tried to picture Kate standing in my doorway.<\/p>\n
The diaper bag over her shoulder.<\/p>\n
Paige in her arms.<\/p>\n
Her tired smile.<\/p>\n
I hadn't noticed anything that frightened me then.<\/p>\n
"I don't remember her moving Paige roughly," I said.<\/p>\n
"Did she seem hesitant to let you hold her?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"Did she tell you to avoid touching any part of Paige's body?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
I looked toward the baby's left leg.<\/p>\n
"That's what bothers me."<\/p>\n
The doctor waited.<\/p>\n
"If Kate knew something was wrong with her leg, why wouldn't she tell me?"<\/p>\n
I felt tears in my eyes.<\/p>\n
"Why would she let me pick her up without warning me?"<\/p>\n
The doctor listened.<\/p>\n
She didn't tell me what my sister knew.<\/p>\n
She couldn't.<\/p>\n
Neither could I.<\/p>\n
I wiped my face.<\/p>\n
"I'm sorry."<\/p>\n
"You don't need to apologize for being worried."<\/p>\n
I nodded.<\/p>\n
The resident explained that other people would continue gathering information about the timeline.<\/p>\n
She said the medical team would document what they found.<\/p>\n
I was beginning to understand how much depended on that distinction.<\/p>\n
Medical findings were one thing.<\/p>\n
What people said happened was another.<\/p>\n
The investigation needed both.<\/p>\n
When Kate and Ryan returned, the doctor spoke with them.<\/p>\n
She asked Kate to describe Paige's behavior the night before.<\/p>\n
I remained in the room because Kate didn't ask me to leave, but I stayed quiet.<\/p>\n
I didn't want my questions to interfere.<\/p>\n
Kate sat down.<\/p>\n
She rubbed her eyes.<\/p>\n
"She was crying a lot."<\/p>\n
The doctor asked when it started.<\/p>\n
Kate hesitated.<\/p>\n
"Late evening, I think."<\/p>\n
I remembered what she'd said earlier.<\/p>\n
During the night.<\/p>\n
Now she was saying late evening.<\/p>\n
That wasn't necessarily a contradiction.<\/p>\n
But I noticed the difference.<\/p>\n
The doctor asked whether Paige had been fed.<\/p>\n
Kate said yes.<\/p>\n
She described trying to settle her.<\/p>\n
The doctor asked whether she had noticed pain when moving Paige.<\/p>\n
Kate looked down.<\/p>\n
"She got upset when we picked her up."<\/p>\n
I felt my chest tighten.<\/p>\n
That was the first time I had heard her say it that way.<\/p>\n
I had described Paige screaming when I adjusted my hold.<\/p>\n
Now Kate was saying something similar had happened the night before.<\/p>\n
The doctor asked,<\/p>\n
"Did she cry more when you changed her position?"<\/p>\n
Kate nodded slowly.<\/p>\n
"I think so."<\/p>\n
Ryan moved in his chair.<\/p>\n
The doctor turned toward him.<\/p>\n
"Do you remember that?"<\/p>\n
He hesitated.<\/p>\n
"She was crying. We were both tired."<\/p>\n
I watched the exchange.<\/p>\n
I didn't want to assume that exhaustion meant anything more than exhaustion.<\/p>\n
Parents of infants were often tired.<\/p>\n
But a baby crying in pain was different from a baby who couldn't settle.<\/p>\n
That was what I had learned that morning.<\/p>\n
And now Kate seemed to be describing signs that sounded painfully familiar.<\/p>\n
The doctor asked whether they had considered contacting a medical professional.<\/p>\n
Kate shook her head.<\/p>\n
"We thought it was teething."<\/p>\n
Ryan added,<\/p>\n
"She'd been fussy before."<\/p>\n
I looked at Paige.<\/p>\n
I wanted to know how severe her crying had been.<\/p>\n
Whether she'd screamed.<\/p>\n
Whether her left leg had been still.<\/p>\n
Whether the swelling was already visible.<\/p>\n
But the doctor continued methodically.<\/p>\n
She asked who had changed Paige overnight.<\/p>\n
Kate said they had both helped care for her.<\/p>\n
The physician asked whether anyone remembered a particular moment when Paige suddenly began crying.<\/p>\n
Kate looked at Ryan.<\/p>\n
He looked back.<\/p>\n
Then Kate said,<\/p>\n
"I don't remember anything like that."<\/p>\n
The doctor wrote something down.<\/p>\n
She asked whether there had been any fall.<\/p>\n
Both said no.<\/p>\n
Any accident while bathing?<\/p>\n
No.<\/p>\n
Any difficulty transferring Paige from one person to another?<\/p>\n
Neither described one.<\/p>\n
I listened.<\/p>\n
The more questions the doctor asked, the clearer one thing became.<\/p>\n
They were describing a baby who had cried through the night.<\/p>\n
But they were not describing an event that explained a fractured bone.<\/p>\n
Kate said Paige had been difficult to settle.<\/p>\n
Then she said Paige seemed especially upset during a diaper change that morning.<\/p>\n
I remembered her saying that earlier.<\/p>\n
I watched the doctor.<\/p>\n
"When you changed her," the resident asked, "did you notice whether she moved both legs?"<\/p>\n
Kate hesitated.<\/p>\n
"I wasn't looking for that."<\/p>\n
I looked down at my hands.<\/p>\n
Neither had I.<\/p>\n
Not at first.<\/p>\n
I had only noticed because Paige screamed and I became frightened.<\/p>\n
The doctor asked whether Kate had seen swelling.<\/p>\n
My sister shook her head.<\/p>\n
"Not until today."<\/p>\n
"Did you see any bruising?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
"Did you apply anything to her thigh?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
Ryan shifted again.<\/p>\n
I glanced toward him.<\/p>\n
He was looking at the floor.<\/p>\n
The doctor asked him the same question.<\/p>\n
"Did you put any makeup, cream, or other substance on Paige's leg?"<\/p>\n
"No."<\/p>\n
His answer was short.<\/p>\n
I looked toward the diaper bag.<\/p>\n
I couldn't stop thinking about the concealer.<\/p>\n
It was the part that seemed hardest to explain accidentally.<\/p>\n
A bruise could come from an injury.<\/p>\n
A fracture could come from force applied to a bone.<\/p>\n
But makeup didn't appear on a baby's thigh by itself.<\/p>\n
Someone had put it there.<\/p>\n
That seemed undeniable.<\/p>\n
Yet both parents said they hadn't.<\/p>\n
I looked at my sister.<\/p>\n
Her eyes were wet again.<\/p>\n
I wanted to ask her whether she was certain.<\/p>\n
Whether she had seen anyone else handle Paige.<\/p>\n
Whether she remembered putting something on the baby's skin without thinking.<\/p>\n
But the doctor had already asked.<\/p>\n
I didn't need to repeat the questions.<\/p>\n
The resident finished speaking with them.<\/p>\n
She explained that the team would continue reviewing Paige's condition and the circumstances surrounding the injuries.<\/p>\n
Then she left.<\/p>\n
Kate sat quietly.<\/p>\n
Ryan stood.<\/p>\n
He walked toward the doorway and stopped.<\/p>\n
"I need some air."<\/p>\n
Kate nodded.<\/p>\n
He left.<\/p>\n
I watched him go.<\/p>\n
I didn't know what was happening inside his head.<\/p>\n
I only knew he hadn't offered an explanation.<\/p>\n
When we were alone with Paige, Kate looked at me.<\/p>\n
"Ally, do you think I hurt her?"<\/p>\n
I felt the question strike me.<\/p>\n
I hadn't expected her to ask it so directly.<\/p>\n
I looked at Paige.<\/p>\n
Then back at my sister.<\/p>\n
"I don't know what happened."<\/p>\n
Kate began crying again.<\/p>\n
"I would never want her hurt."<\/p>\n
I wanted to believe that.<\/p>\n
I wanted to take her hand and tell her everything would be fine.<\/p>\n
But I couldn't honestly promise either thing.<\/p>\n
So I said,<\/p>\n
"Then help them understand what happened."<\/p>\n
Kate wiped her cheeks.<\/p>\n
"I don't remember anything happening."<\/p>\n
I nodded slowly.<\/p>\n
"Then tell them everything you do remember."<\/p>\n
She lowered her head.<\/p>\n
For a while, neither of us spoke.<\/p>\n
I thought about the investigator.<\/p>\n
The timeline.<\/p>\n
The diaper bag.<\/p>\n
The makeup.<\/p>\n
The morning change.<\/p>\n
The restless night.<\/p>\n
I couldn't force those details into an answer.<\/p>\n
I couldn't decide what they meant simply because I was frightened.<\/p>\n
But I also couldn't ignore them.<\/p>\n
I looked down at Paige.<\/p>\n
She was resting between us.<\/p>\n
So small that her hand barely covered the end of my finger.<\/p>\n
I thought about the way she'd screamed when I moved her.<\/p>\n
Then I thought about Kate saying Paige had cried when they picked her up the night before.<\/p>\n
Those two details seemed connected.<\/p>\n
I couldn't prove it.<\/p>\n
But I couldn't forget it either.<\/p>\n
The afternoon light had begun to change outside the hospital window.<\/p>\n
I was tired.<\/p>\n
Kate was tired.<\/p>\n
Everyone seemed tired.<\/p>\n
Paige had been tired long before any of us reached the hospital.<\/p>\n
I looked at her little face.<\/p>\n
I wanted her to wake up comfortable.<\/p>\n
I wanted her to take a bottle without pain.<\/p>\n
I wanted to hear her make the happy little sounds I remembered.<\/p>\n
I didn't know when that would happen.<\/p>\n
I only knew that the doctors were still trying to understand injuries no one had explained.<\/p>\n
And that my sister's account of the previous night was no longer as simple as saying Paige had been teething.<\/p>\n
I didn't sleep that afternoon. Not even for a few minutes. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Paige on the changing table. The green sleeper. The swollen thigh. … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37725,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-insightdrama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37735","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37735"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37735\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37755,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37735\/revisions\/37755"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37725"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37735"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37735"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37735"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}