SYNOPSIS:

Bill’s BlackBerry beeps; it’s Jessica’s birthday. His background is a picture of him and a beautiful woman, glowing and elegant in her wedding gown, arm in arm, grinning from ear to ear. He’s in the parking lot of a Mothercare. He takes a deep breath, smiles and then strides in. When he returns to the car, he has a bag full of baby accessories, bottles, feeders, diapers, etc. He fits a sturdy car seat into the back. Satisfied with his work, he drives home. When he gets home, he places covers over all the plugs. He puts on overalls and gets out a tin of paint. On one door, he bangs a nail. On that nail, he hangs up a hand-made cross-stitch sign that says “Baby’s room”. He goes in. The room is completely bare. He places paint tins on the ground and paints a swatch. Blue or pink? He agonizes a little. Then he mixes the two. Purple! Yes! Grinning again, he begins to paint. Night falls. He has just finished the last wall. It is beautiful. He leaves it till the next morning, when he begins to pull furniture into the room; a beautiful old style crib with an exquisitely hand sewn blanket. He pulls in a chest of drawers. He brings in a picture to hang. In it, he is in a paramedic’s uniform, radiating cheekiness as he holds a gigantic umbrella in one hand and his wife in the other. In a rush, the sounds come back. The screaming, the ambulance sirens, and the whispered ’I love you" and his own tortured sobbing. Bill’s lips tremble but the tears don’t fall. He looks down. There are other pictures. He holds each one of them up to his face in a torturous slideshow. Jessica’s now familiar grin holding a positive pregnancy test. Jessica showing off a slightly round bump. The first sonogram. Suddenly Bill lets out a guttural scream. He swivels and begins to wreck the room. Pulling apart the beautiful crib. Crashing the chest of drawers to the floor. His beefy hands seize the picture and he is about to send it crashing to the floor. When he sees her face looking up at him. Bill slumps to the floor as if the air has been let out of him. Tears streaming down his face, he kisses the picture. Later in the day…the nursery stands empty. The crib has been mended. But it is empty. The chest of drawers too, mended. But empty. The pictures are up. And full of memory. Bill is standing outside the nursery looking at the cross-stitch Jessica made for their baby’s room. Above it, he tacks up a handwritten sign. It says "Jessica and."