Those were the moments I treasured most after he died. Not the hospital photographs or the carefully preserved medical reports, but the ordinary moments when neither child had any reason to suspect that their future might be shorter than they imagined.
Felix had been born with a serious heart condition. For years, we managed appointments, medications, and hospital stays around the ordinary business of raising children.
He learned to recognize the nurses by their footsteps. He knew which waiting-room vending machine occasionally swallowed money. He could make Emma laugh even when she was frightened.
And he hated being treated differently.
When classmates asked Emma questions about his health instead of speaking directly to him, he would interrupt.
“I’m right here, you know. My heart is the problem, not my ears.”
His teachers admired his intelligence. His friends loved his humor. He was a terrible basketball player who insisted that the hoop was positioned incorrectly.
