A Father's Love

7 pounds and eighteen inches. When that nurse handed me that little pink bundle, I was astounded that in one moment, someone so small could become my whole world.  A lump rose in my throat, and tears sprang to my eyes. I have cried exactly twice in my life. Once when I first held my beautiful baby girl, and the other when I thought I’d lost her. A week ago, when I heard a knock on the door, I’d assumed it would be my wife, home from picking Clara up from school. She was always losing her house key. Why she didn't keep it on the ring with the key to Chevy, I never could understand. When I opened the door, I was shocked to find a police officer standing on the front stoop. He had a grim look on his face and had trouble meeting my eyes. He talked in low tones that I suppose were meant to be soothing, but I didn't hear a word he said. I was too focused on what he was holding in his hands; a plastic bag marked evidence. Inside it laid a stuffed elephant with an ugly red stain across its belly—Ellie. 
Clara had gotten Ellie for her sixth birthday, with a portion of the check her Grandma McMillen had sent. Right as we entered the mall, Clara started tugging on my coat sleeve and pleading to go into the Rainforest Café gift shop, where there was a large display covered in stuffed elephants. I suggested she wait to make a purchase until she visited a couple more stores, to which she responded by bursting into tears. So I took my puffy eyed daughter into the store, where she carefully examined each elephant to decide exactly which one would be her new best friend. When I remarked that it didn't matter which she chose because they all looked the same, she stuck out her chin and crossed her arms. 
I laughed and said, “Okay, you’re right it does matter. Continue.” 
She finally chose an elephant on the right side of the stand and gave it a very long hug, and said,

“I think I’ll name her Ellie.”

It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship. Ellie was the Hobbs to Clara’s Calvin. Clara never went anywhere without Ellie. She would even buckle the elephant into the seat next to her on the way to and from school. So, when I saw Ellie coated in what I could only assume was blood, I felt sick. The office kindly escorted me to the hospital where my wife had been admitted with a few broken ribs, a fractured ulna, and a concussion. The doctor explained to me that she had been lucky; the rear passenger side had taken most of the impact. He actually said that. “Lucky.” No, that wasn't lucky. Lucky would be a car accident where no one got hurt. Lucky would be not sitting weeping beside my wife’s hospital bed. Lucky would be getting to see my baby girl again. When I returned home the next day to shower and pick up some clothes, I realized that the doctor was right. I was lucky, because Clara’s room was open as I walked by, I saw Clara asleep in her bed. I didn't even think anything of it at first. I was so accustomed to seeing her little sleeping form. But the words of Officer Panetta rang in my head, as I raced back to her room.

“I’m sorry sir, there’s been an accident. Your wife has been taken to Lake Forest Hospital, but your daughter was dead on arrival. I’m so sorry for your loss”

The police were wrong. The paramedics were wrong. My wife was wrong. I had been wrong. Against all odds we were all wrong. We had to be. Because as I entered her room I looked down at her bed, I saw her sound asleep, with her arms wrapped around the neck of that damned elephant.