Just Another Day

If she had known what was waiting beyond the trees that morning, she might have packed faster. But the lake was calm, the air gentle, and nothing hinted at how quickly peace can shift to panic. Lena Hart brushed pine needles from the picnic table, unaware that in less than an hour, she would be holding a lifeless baby.

Lena Hart folded the last of the camp chairs, brushing pine needles from the canvas as sunlight spilled through the trees. Paul Lake was calm, glassy, and green, framed by dark pines and the faint scent of woodsmoke. Her kids, Noah and Maeve, were chasing each other through the gravel, bare feet slapping against the ground, their laughter mixing with the call of a loon somewhere across the water.

It had been the kind of weekend she wanted to bottle: sticky fingers from roasted marshmallows, tangled hair, the glow of late nights by the fire. Tomorrow would be Thursday, the start of “Dad Days,” so she wanted this afternoon to linger a little longer. She hitched their little Viking trailer, spread a plaid blanket near the shore, and began unpacking lunch. Peanut butter, apple slices, juice boxes. The ordinary magic of motherhood.

Then a scream cut through the air that made her drop the knife. It wasn’t the startled cry of a child who’d tripped. It was the kind of scream that reached down deep into your marrow, raw and absolute -- like someone was being raped, murdered or had lost her young child. Lena froze. The sound came again, from the trees near the picnic area.

Rising, Lena shouted, “Noah! Watch your sister!” Then she ran, barefoot, the sand cool under her feet, her heart pounding in her throat.

She pushed through the treeline and stumbled into a small clearing near the lake. Three young women stood by the water, their swimsuits bright against the sunlit sand. One of them, wearing a pink cowboy hat, was screaming, her face streaked black with two inverted triangles of mascara. Eyes wide and haunted. In her shaking arms was a very small baby boy, maybe ten months old. His body hung limp, his tiny limbs slack, his eyes closed.

Lena’s instincts took over. “Give him to me,” she said.

The young mom blinked, stunned. “He’s not breathing.”

“Let me take him.”

The young woman handed him over, sobbing. The baby’s skin was cold but not blue. Lena held the baby's mouth to her cheek. No breath. He appeared lifeless.

“You need to stop screaming,” Lena said, her voice low, steady. “I’ve got him.”

The woman’s mouth trembled. “I only turned around for a second,” she said, voice thick with shame. “He must have followed his sister in.”

Lena quickly scanned the immediate area. A small child stood nearby in the shallows, thumb in her mouth, her eyes wide and guilty. A rubber McDonald’s toy bobbed beside her in the shallows. The little girl was not wearing a life jacket.

“Alright,” Lena whispered, more to herself than anyone. “Here we go.”

She laid the baby face down across her arm, his chin in her palm, and little legs dangling, gave him one firm thump on his bare back. The sound cracked through the clearing. Then she flipped him over.

His eyes slowly opened. He blinked, but did not cry.

For a moment, no one moved. Even the air seemed afraid to move. Then the young woman gasped. “Oh my God. He’s awake. He’s breathing!” The others broke into tears, hugging each other, voices shaking with relief. Lena handed the baby back carefully.

“He’s breathing,” she said, “but he needs an ambulance.”

“There’s no cell service,” one of them said.

“Find the ranger,” Lena told her. “They’ll radio for help. Go!”

The woman ran, her flip-flops slapping against the dirt path. Lena knelt beside the baby's mother. “Keep him awake,” she said. “Don’t let him fall asleep. Pinch his thigh if you have to.”

The mother nodded, tears streaming down her cheeks, whispering to the baby over and over. “You’re okay, sweetheart. You’re okay.”

But Lena knew from the baby's mild reaction to being tossed around and slapped by a stranger, that he was definitely not okay. Half an hour later, the wail of a siren drifted through the trees. The paramedics took the baby, still drowsy but breathing. When they drove away, the sound of the engine faded into the stillness, leaving behind the faint rustle of water and wind.

Back at the picnic blanket, Noah and Maeve sat side by side, silent, sucking their thumbs, their sandwiches untouched.

“Is the baby going to be alright?” Maeve asked, her bottom lip trembling with worry.

Lena nodded, though her hands were still shaking. “He will be.”

As she packed up their things, an older man approached from a nearby site. His face was weathered, his eyes rimmed with grief.

“You did good,” he said quietly.

Lena looked up. “You saw what happened?”

He nodded. “My daughter drowned last summer. She was an Olympic swimmer. I came here to scatter her ashes. I almost didn’t come, but something told me to.” His gaze drifted toward the lake. “Maybe we were both meant to be here.”

That night, with the kids at their father’s and a glass of red wine in hand, Lena called her mother to tell her what had happened. Her mother listened in silence. When Lena finished, her mother said softly, “That’s strange. I sold a chair on Craigslist today. The man who picked it up told me his grandson almost drowned at Paul Lake this afternoon. He said a camper who happened to be there helped save him.”

Lena didn’t speak for a long time. Later she learned that the baby had been taken to Royal Inland Hospital, where doctors discovered a small hole in his heart. They repaired it. He was expected to make a full recovery. If that day hadn’t unfolded the way it did, the scream, the panic, the picnic gone sideways, they might never have found a much deeper, underlying heart problem.

And that is the strange thing about life. The moments that leave your heart pounding and your sandwich untouched can turn out to be the ones that matter the very most. But Lena never forgot that woman's eyes, wide and wild with terror, or the two black triangles of mascara carved down her cheeks. Sometimes, when she closes her eyes, she can still see them -- black flags tattooed across the inside of her mind.