It took Laurence nearly eleven hours to tend to his affairs at the hospital. It was his own fault; he could have left just a little past midnight, after he’d identified the photographs as…

Who they were.

But he couldn’t go after just looking at the pictures. He had waited in the wahiting room, devoid of most emotions. He sat in the uncomfortable little chairs, hunched over and cupping his chin in his hands. He was hollow inside, and he looked it. His cheeks seemed thinned and his eyes were sunken. He was pale, and his eyes were bloodshot. He hadn’t cried, but internalizing everything had left his stomach in knots, his chest aching, and his throat on fire.

He hadn’t been able to process that his parents were dead until he saw the body, and it took nine hours and fifty six minutes since he had first identified the deceased.

The deceased.

Like that was their name now.

Like they were any less ‘his parents’ today than they were yesterday.

A dull thought; he’d been having a lot of them, recently.

The identification process wasn’t quite like what it was in the television shows he’d seen, but that was no easy process it itself. It was more humane, the way the grief counselor had exposed him to it. He had been desperate to think that it wasn’t his parents, but there was no escaping the truth.

He had not brought his phone or wallet, so his time spent in the waiting room was done in solitude. He did not sleep, did not eat, did not communicate except when it was expected of him. A nurse had noticed him sitting there, stoic and staring blankly in front of him. Perhaps fearing he had some sort of head injury, she had kindly asked if he needed help.

It had been difficult to explain that he was waiting for the coroner. He couldn’t say the word. All he knew was that his name was James Lakewood, and after a few seconds of fumbling to explain himself, he finally managed to spit out the name.

She understood, of course, why he’d been so despondent. She checked on him several times during her shift, to bring him water, coffee, or some small snacks from the cafeteria. He’d had no appetite, but thanked her, and managed to ingest her gifts—albeit slowly. He didn’t know her name, but he knew her face. In the back of his mind, he thought he might like to send her flowers, but it seemed like each time he had a new thought, it devoured the last.

He’d spoken to two police officers, both who knew his parents and had been involved in Tobias’ case. They offered condolences; he considered himself on amicable terms with them, if only because they’d spent so much time together discussing his brohter’s disappearance.

One of them mentioned that they weren’t going to be involved in ‘this case’ but to call him if he had any questions.

‘This case’.

Laurence couldn’t wrap his head around that, either. It was a car accident. His parents were dead. The end.

Or, not, because he suddenly had a whole new list of things to do.

By the time Dr. Lakewood arrived to introduce himself, Laurence was still having a difficult time gripping what was going on. Maybe it was sleep deprivation, on top of stress, on top of the reality of it all, but none of this felt real.

Dr. Lakewood explained that he’d finished the examination, that he had to write up a report, but that Laurence could come in for a few moments to see them.

Though Laurence had been waiting all day for this, it was surreal. His body moved robotically, and he wasn’t certain if he’d changed expressions once since he sat down. It hurt to speak, but he thanked the doctor and allowed himself to be lead into a little room.

It wasn’t a cold, metal room like he had anticipated, with bodies lined on the tables and an ominous, foreboding air.

It was a sterilized room, he could smell that in the air. There were two tables, with blue sheets covering his parents from the chest down. He approached with caution, like these were dangerous creatures that could lunge at him at any point in time.

They didn’t move. Dr. Lakewood accompanied him, always staying just a step behind him. A police officer was already in the room, but even that didn’t surprise Laurence.

‘This case,’ one of the others had said. There was a stack of papers on the desk and Laurence vaguely wondered what information they had found that would warrant a case, but he kept reminding himself that his parents had been in the public spotlight a lot.

There would be media coverage of this, somehow.

This is how Tobias was going to find out that his parents were dead.

The thought choked him, suffocated him, but he didn’t show it. His hands were clenched into fists at his sides and though he was trembling, he could blame it on the coolness of the room, but the reality was the each step he took to them brought him closer to the reality.

The officer moved to stand behind them, though it wasn’t intrusive.

Vaguely, it registered that they must have done this often. How many people had come down here, saw a loved one, and gone down?

Even now, just a foot from his mother, he felt faint. He could see his father next to her, a few feet away.

Laurence looked down at her face; it was already more discolored than it had been in the photograph. For a moment, he didn’t move, and then his hand hesitantly reached out.

When no one stopped him, his fingers drifted through her wavy hair, smoothing it out just slightly. His lips pursed and he exhaled, guilt and fatigue and sadness palpable in the sigh.

He wanted to stroke her cheek, but his hand hovered just above her good cheek, as if he were afraid of the coldness. He didn’t want to leave, but his body was so tired. Time didn’t feel the same. Maybe he was there for a minute, or an hour, but in the end his feet moved themselves. He walked around his mother, to the table with his father on it, and looked down at him. The stern features had relaxed, and it was strange; even with the abrasions, the bruising, the broken nose…

He seemed peaceful.

It wasn’t right.

He stayed next to his father for less time than his mother, not because he loved him any less, but because he was feeling feint. He reached down to rest his hand on his father’s shoulder, hidden beneath the thin sheet. It was there, solid. It wasn’t an illusion.

They were both real.

This was all real.

Finally, he relented. His head hung, and he turned to face the officer and the doctor.

His voice wasn’t his own; it was thin, and strained, and hopeless.

“…What do I do now?”