I can't sleep. Each time I begin to doze I am sucked into a dream of looking for my son. My heart pounds and I feel the panic of not knowing where he is or if I'll ever see him alive again. I'm gripped by fear at the memory of men coming down the drive carrying long poles over their shoulder headed for the pond to prod the depths in search of him. Though time on that day passed with a unrealistic haze surrounding it, as if I stood somewhere outside my body only half hearing the voices that rang in my ear like a half echo as I was asked questions, asked to provide identifying information...clues to where he might go, why he might have wandered so quickly; in my dreams the moments return with stark clarity to grip my heart and hold it so tight I can't breathe. I struggle to bring myself to the surface of sleep - like drowning almost - I fight with all my might to break the surface of the water...so close I can see the sun glinting just inches away, but yet I can't make it to the place where there is air. I'm crushed by panic. I lie in bed afterwards paralyzed by the fear and weak with the helplessness of it all. I'm lucky enough to live in a place where it wasn't the tragedy of it's original design...unlucky enough to be scarred by the very real and devastating possibility of what could have happened. I think I will never see the day when the pain of it will not be sharp and clear like the wide blade of a knife digging deep into my heart. I have as little chance to recover from the trauma of it as it happened, as I would have been had they actually brought him lifeless from the pond.

I hate nights like this. Every time it happens, and it happens way more than I like for it too, I have to get up and go to him. I sit and watch him sleep for a while. Watch his chest rise and fall with the proof of life not taken from me - from us. I lean close enough to him to feel his breath warm on my face, lay my hand across his back to find the reassuring heat of life. In my mind I half heartedly scold him for sneaking off - me for thinking it was safe to leave him long enough for me to go pee. I sit watch over him, like the extra amount of protection I give at this moment can redeem my failure of that day. I let the floods of guilt and relief wash over me as I promise for the millionth time never to fail any of my kids that way again.

It does nothing to help me sleep.