I dragged K to the lake one Sunday, when we were restless and bored and sick of each other. It was just two weeks past Christmas and already the novelty of new games and books had worn thin; my half-hearted suggestion of another round of Sorry! was met with a sigh. I had the Sunday dreads, a particular mix of guilt and anxiety over lists I didn’t complete, fatigue from trying, and overwhelm at the thought of another work week on the horizon.

Sleet pelted our faces on the trail. We walked stiff legged in our snow pants, as though frozen to the core. I gripped the dog’s leash in my fist and grit my teeth.

The lake was in a mood, too. The slate grey waves sloshed onto the rocky shore, tossing a group of ducks and gulls like bath toys; they huddled in clumps between miniature ice floes, their beaks tucked into their wings.

K launched rocks into the water and tried to smash the floating ice. Watch this, Mommy. Did you see? Okay, but look. Are you looking? Watch. Watch me.

I threw a few boulders and winced against the spray. The dog pulled. I let her sniff a fish carcass and shuddered. She pulled again. My arm was tense and tired from holding her back on the trail, so I eased up, letting her drag me along the shore as K’s voice disappeared on the wind behind me.

***

The dog and I were nearing home. It was not late, but it had been dark for hours. She trotted along and checked over her shoulder for a murmur of encouragement, then halted and looked up, hearing it before I did, the sound of a distant helicopter closing in. I slowed to a stop so I could watch it pass. It was flying too high to land at the airport across the bay, so I guessed it was hospital-bound. As it neared, I saw that it was orange, an air ambulance, and something familiar ran through me.

A memory: gripping my mother’s arm, following behind my dad’s hospital bed, en route to the OR. Nurses turned their attention away from patients and faced us, bowing their heads as we passed, bearing witness to our impromptu procession. The walk through the ICU was endless.

A surgeon in scrubs introduced herself. She blinked back tears as she acknowledged the gift that came at great sacrifice, to him, and to you.

We were given a moment to say goodbye. I watched my mother bend down to kiss him. I stood at a distance, because I could not do it, I could not touch him for the last time.

It was so quiet, this finale ending three days of hushed horror, the darkened hospital room.

So quiet, but I wanted to scream.

The dog snuffled as I watched the helicopter disappear, and I realized that I was holding back tears. I thought of a family gathered in grief, while others held their breath with renewed hope.

***

The dog stops pulling to mouth some snow. I look down to see fresh blood, not hers. Red prints mark a stretch of the beach, growing in size and frequency so that I can almost picture the struggle. We never find the body, either devoured, or dragged into the forest.

I grew up with the lie that there is harmony, a natural balance between life and death, suffering and joy. Someone dies so another can live. But I know better now. The trick is holding the truth with both uncertainty and optimism, and without belief that the math works out in the end.

K calls to me. We wave at each other. He shouts something else I cannot hear. He picks up another rock and chucks it, and I try to hold this in my mind: we are here. At this very moment, in this strange alchemy I will never understand, the scales are tipped in our favour. I call back, my voice reaching him over the crashing waves, and he runs to me, laughing, the dog jumps up to greet him and my boy looks at me, all wonder and light, and then we are running into the wind.