How do the next minutes go? You must have run upstairs to the neighbor who let you in and somehow convinced him to help. Did he try to break the bedroom door down before the ambulance arrived? He must have tried, he must have given up. Did the ambulance come screaming down the street pulsing blue and white? You must have been watching out for it on the fire escape, you must have run down to meet the two paramedics stepping out of it. You must have shown them the way up. The three of them—the paramedics and the neighbor—must have forced the bedroom door open. Someone must have turned the bedroom lights on.

Seema is on the floor beside the bed, lying on her side. Her head is raised, propped up at an unnatural angle in the niche between the bed and the dresser, her eyes closed. One hand is thrust up, as if trying to hold on to the side of the bed. A dark red smear on the sheets trails off at the edge of the bed where her fingers curl. Under the curve of her belly, which looks enormous, as if she were pregnant with a lifetime’s worth of babies, a thick wide pool glistens red-black against the hardwood floors. Merging into the pool of blood is a colorless pool of water, with scattered flowers—the calla lilies—lying in it, among shards of glass.

You stagger back to the splintered door, unable to stand any closer, unable to take your eyes off her, unable to watch. The two paramedics bustle around her, setting her on a stretcher. They call out to each other instructions and observations that you can’t comprehend. They ask questions that you don’t realize are directed at you, because they’re looking at your daughter. The neighbor repeats them to you, nudging you out of your trance.

You must have tried to answer their questions. They tell you that your daughter’s pulse is present, though weak, since she’s lost much blood. They think they can still hear my heart beating. They won’t know for sure until they get to the ER. You clutch at the small glimmer of hope their words give you.

They must have carried the stretcher down. You must have remembered to grab Seema’s maternity bag before you followed them. You don’t remember locking the apartment but do remember noticing for the first time the color of the carpet that covers the stairs—crimson—and the dark mahogany-red stain of the handrails.

Bill must have arrived by then. You feel relieved: you’re no longer alone. At least there’s one other person to share the unbearable weight of this moment with you. You embrace him, grateful he’s here. Bill must have asked what he can do to help.