cellulitis
Photo by Joshua Chehov on Unsplash After we left the hospital, I took him back to the hospital. His eye looks puffy, I told the pediatrician in the emergency department. (A Tuesday morning, nearly empty, but haunted by the specters of our first visit. The coughing unhoused. The vocal elderly. My own spouse with her lost voice.) I don't think the infection is back. Take a few pictures throughout the day to see if anything changes, but he's probably fine. He didn't know he was telling an alcoholic to make herself a cocktail. He didn't know that document lurks just behind fight and flight . Soon my photos were a grid of my child's face. More so than usual, I mean. Close-ups, not sliding-down-the-slide shots. His brown-black eyes and smooth brown skin. But was it smooth enough? Was that sudden blush evidence of the tantrum he just had (brother reclaiming iPad) or the creep of fever? Was that a scratch or the red slash of infection? I touched each photo and spread two ...