Trauma and Resilience

A teenage boy learns a dark secret about the day of his birth.

WARNING: This story deals with the issue of gun violence and the primary teller of this tale was six years old at the time of events. If that is not something you want to read, than by all means skip this piece of fiction. I hope that I have treated the issue of gun violence with the sensitivity that it deserves.

Trauma and Resilience

Tobias Schullmeyer was, in many ways, a typical thirteen year old boy: He had crushes on girls, a group of friends that he hung out with before, during, or after school, and he had all the typical issues that came with being a teenage boy. He had loving parents and an attentive older brother, Gregory, who could always be depended upon to give him advice on girls and how to choose good friends.

There were only two complications: Every year on his birthday, a letter always came in the mail that his mother never let him see from a woman named Betty Tobin. His mother would read the letter with shaking hands, rip it to pieces, and then proceed to make Tobias's favorite foods, something that was a family tradition. It made him wonder what those letters were all about and why their mother had such a strong visceral reaction to them.

Second, Gregory had been in therapy for years since he was six years old and he never told Tobias why.

Finally, just one day after his thirteenth birthday, he asked his brother about the letters and therapy when they were alone.

A haunted look came over Gregory's face when Tobias had asked. "Mother and father wouldn't approve of me telling you. But I guess you're old enough to understand and mother and father aren't here to stop me."

Gregory recounted, in vivid detail the day Tobias was born: He was six years old at the time and had been excitedly waiting outside the birthing room, waiting to meet his sibling, thinking of all the ways he would be a good older brother. His father had been out of the country at the time on a four month work assignment so their grandma and grandpa had accompanied them to the hospital. He was holding a stuffed bear and looking around excitedly for the doctor to tell them that the baby was here and that they could go and see him (or her. His mother and father and opted to not find out the gender of the baby until birth). His grandparents laughed at his excitement.

"The baby's not going to come any faster if you get whiplash." Feeling a little embarrassed, Gregory sat down.

He could remember, even at nineteen, how clean, cold, and clinical the hospital walls were. He could remember the texture of the walls. He could remember these things because he had been staring at those walls when he heard a sound like fireworks being set off.

At first, he thought that some kids had decided to play a prank by setting off fireworks in the hospital. And then people started running and screaming: Doctors, nurses, and patients ran wherever they could, running away from...what? His grandparents quickly grabbed him and pulled him into the room where his mother was. Too confused to object, Gregory let himself be pulled.

Two nurses were in the room as well, bent low while his mother was on the bed, enduring the motions of labor without trying to make a noise. That popping sound rang out again through the hospital halls. Gregory could remember seeing a nurse lying outside the door in a spreading pool of blood before it was slammed shut by grandpa.

That's when he began to get scared. Too scared for even tears. This wasn't a prank. Not even close.

Then the door opened again. A man entered the room. He looked gaunt, unshaven, and was wearing a white shirt and jeans with a blue cap that, to Gregory, looked like it said something like "It's a boy!" What caught his attention right away was what the man was holding in his hands: A shiny black metal object that looked similar to the shotgun his father kept safely locked away.

The man had a look on his face that Gregory could only describe as "deranged and crazy" when he recounted to Tobias the events surrounding his day of birth. The man walked to the side of the hospital bed where his mother lay and pointed the gun at her stomach. Gregory began to cry silently, his thoughts a repetition of "No! Not mama! Not baby!" It was illogical and some part of him had felt ashamed for some time afterwards.

But the gunman hadn't fired his weapon, just kept it pointed at her stomach.

Police had been called.

Gregory could see their vehicles parked outside in the hospital parking lot thanks to the large window in his mother's room.

His grandparents were praying silently and he followed suit, praying that they would all leave safe and sound.

And so began the siege, with his mother's labor progressing onward unassisted (the two nurses with her were too afraid to make a move, out of fear of agitating the gunman).

Gregory looked at the man's hat again and thought "Please don't let baby be boy!"

The hours passed on, day growing into night. Police officers in heavy armor and guns were now surrounding the hospital, while the man became increasingly agitated. Finally, at just half past midnight, the nurses had enough. "This baby is coming. We need to help her." The voice of the female nurse was firm and gentle at once, even though her hands were shaking.

The gunman, without saying word, backed off.

After a series of pushes, Tobias Schullmeyer was born a hostage at 1:05 AM.

Unlike most newborn babies, Tobias didn't cry. Oh he was alive and moving. Gregory could see that. But he wasn't crying. And that was what worried his mother, though she tried to not show it.

The nurses examined Tobias and determined that he had an at birth score of 8. So it was strange even to them that he wasn't crying.

The man began to get increasingly agitated as the police presence began to grow stronger.

Finally, at 6:05 AM, he left the hospital room and Gregory recalled hearing more gunshots as he left. He felt a sense of relief that the "crazy man", as he'd begun to call him in his mind, was gone.

He surrendered to the police shortly after leaving. Eventually, the police came and began to get statements from all the people in the hospital.

The man's name, as Gregory had later found out, was Alan Tobin. He was a married man and father to three children of his own. He had been angry that his wife had gotten her tubes tied, at the same hospital where they were, without his consent or knowledge. He had found out only when he got a letter in the mail.

He had gone there to get his revenge on the doctor who had done the procedure and killed not only the doctor, but a nurse and an innocent hospital patient (who had apparently been waiting for the results from his biopsy) along the way.

Even now, at the age of nineteen, Gregory couldn't make sense of his reasoning.

He could understand being angry. But taking a life was just inexcusable.

Tobias felt cold all over as his brother finished his recollection. "What about the letters?"

At this question, Gregory's face changed from haunted to angry. "That would be from his dear old mother." Gregory had intercepted one of the letters before his mother could get a hold of it and read it: "I can't believe you have the gall to still celebrate your son's birthday when it serves as a constant reminder that my son is imprisoned for the rest of his life. You should be ashamed of yourselves."

He had kept the letter hidden from their mother and now showed it to Tobias.

Tobias's face scrunched up in disgust. "Is she crazy?" He asked. "That's exactly what I wondered." He handed Tobias another letter from her.

This one read: "Well, he's dead. I hope you're happy." Tobias looked at Gregory questioningly. "He died a few months back. Cancer."

Tobias was so incensed by the unmitigated gall of Ms. Tobin that he didn't notice when Gregory had taken something off the dresser table. He put it in front of Tobias. It was a letter in Gregory's handwriting.

It said "Ms. Tobin, I can say for certain that when I read the letter of you announcing your son's death, I felt absolutely nothing.No joy, relief, or satisfaction. His death won't bring back the people that he killed, it won't undo the years of therapy that myself and his other victims had to go through just to feel normal. I will only give one warning: Stop sending these harassing letters to my family. My baby brother has nothing to do with your son having to spend the rest of his pathetic and miserable life behind bars. If you send one more letter, I will file a report at the police department."

When Tobias was done reading it, he looked at Gregory, REALLY looked at him.

"I'm sending this letter to her tomorrow. Maybe it'll stop her. Maybe it won't. Either way, I refuse to let that woman contaminate your birthdays anymore. You are innocent of anything shameful or wicked."

Before Gregory could take the letter away, Tobias spoke up again. “Wait.” He went inside his room and searched his desk. He found what he was looking for and attached it to the letter, signing his name. He walked out of his room and handed the letter back to Gregory. It was a photo that their mother had taken of him yesterday, smiling brightly as he blew out the candles on his cake. “I want her to see the face of the child she has resented for thirteen years."

END