A Mother Whispers Goodnight

By Charlie Nitric

Smashwords Edition

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Published By
Charlie Nitric 

A Mother Whispers Goodnight
Copyright © 2012 by Charlie Nitric

This essay is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. Please feel free to gift and/or share this work, with compliments of the author. If you feel moved by the story, and wish to show appreciation for the work, please visit http://www.charlienitric.com/ and donate to any of the listed reputable charities, who strive to assist with childhood disabilities.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.
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Thank You

Every month, I interact with thousands of fabulous mothers. These moms give countless hours of love, devotion, and genuine kindness, not only to their loved ones, but to others they interact with, as well. It’s impossible for me to list y’all here in this mention, however, I need to comment on two special mother’s that assisted me in bringing my heartfelt story to you on this Mother’s Day weekend, 2012.
Author Elyse Draper, mother of a beautiful 13-year old daughter and wife of 15 years, contributed to the creation of my e-story. Elyse performed her technical wizardry in formatting my document for publication. Mrs. Draper’s careful inspection of “A Mother Whispers Goodnight” also provided me with a necessary fourth and final edit. I’m a firm believer in multiple sets of editing eyes. Knowing that Elyse performed this most important quality control tasking is to me, invaluable. Thank you, Elyse.
Author Elyse recently released her sixth published piece, entitled “Freewill.” It’s the first novel in The Freewill Trilogy of dark fiction fantasies. She talks about the new trilogy on her website, “We are not defined by the choices that are made for us; but by the choices we make when we believe that all other options have been taken away.” The second edition of The Freewill Trilogy (Consequences) will be released next month (June, 2012). For more on Author Elyse Draper and her work, please visit her at:

Webpage: ElyseDraper.webs.com/
twitter: @AuthorElyseD
facebook: www.facebook.com/AuthorElyseDraper

Author Gale Minchew, mother of two lovely children (daughter age 13 and a son age 11) and wife of 14 years, also contributed greatly to my e-story. Gale performed the first and third edits of my manuscript. Dr. Minchew also designed my simple and eye-appealing book cover; exactly how I asked her too create it. I’m very happy with the result. Gale has been assisting me in the creation of my new author website. Her fine work is actually helping me to look halfway decent, online that is. Thank you, Gale. 

You can see my new website here: http://www.charlienitric.com/ 
Author Gale’s debut novel, “Shadows of Destiny” was released January 2011. She describes the paranormal mystery thriller on her website, “A lost soul is nestled in the piney woods of East Texas, waiting and watching in the darkness of the shadows. He is feverishly seeking the past but is inevitably snared in the present and will stop at nothing to find his destiny.” Gale’s follow-up novella, “Shadows of the Past” was released in July 2011. The third installment in the series, Shadows of Truth is scheduled for release summer 2012. For more about Author Gale Minchew and her work, please visit her at:

Webpage: http://www.galeminchew.com/ 
twitter: @galeminchew
facebook: www.facebook.com/galeminchew

To Author Elyse Draper, Author Gale Minchew, and to the thousands of wonderful mothers, who are kind to me each and every day, thank you.
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A Mother Whispers Goodnight
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My earliest memory of my mother is a comforting one. I was a little cruiser back then, about four years old, and it was my bedtime. I was a wound up bundle of energy, but I wasn’t ready for sleep. At least, I didn’t think I needed a siesta. I had sisters to tease, an older brother to wrestle, races to run, and beds to do flips on. Like usual, my mother coaxed me into bed, and with great reluctance, I went. As she tucked me in, my mother knew exactly how to calm me down. She sat on the divan beside me and gently caressed my face with her fingertips. This always relaxed me, kept the closet monsters at bay, and captured my attention like nothing else. Then, like many nights before, my mother enchanted me with a heroic tale that went something like this:
Once upon a time … in a galaxy far away, up in the heavens, past all the stars you can see in the night sky, a loving mother was very sick and dying. She was also pregnant with a baby boy. The child she carried was strong and unusually active, and kicked hard inside of her stomach. To feed the child’s hefty appetite, the petite mother ate six meals a day. She snacked on whatever she could find to fuel her precious baby’s growth. Her boy took all her energy, and the mother could sense that her body would not last the full term.
Her doctor had never seen a baby drain a mother like this before. Feeble and faint at 29 weeks into the pregnancy, the woman was admitted into the Space-post Hospital. A few hours later, she collapsed into unconsciousness and drifted into a coma. All tests showed the unborn child was healthy, but the mother was surely fading. The doctor must take the baby from the mother’s womb ten weeks prematurely. This was the only chance to save the dying mother.
As the boy’s head and shoulders emerged in the hands of the doctor, the baby appeared healthy. He fought with determined resistance to remain inside his dying mother. A body scan of the mother identified that the boy was clinging to the womb with his legs, refusing to leave her warmth. The nurse, a mother herself, helped the doctor carefully extract the boy from his dying mother and the life cord was cut. In that moment, a large, unhealthy baby boy was born into the solar world of Titan.
Within seconds, the newborn's skin turned yellow, and his breathing became ragged as he gasped for air. The sterile hospital room bustled with nurses rushing about as the doctor checked the newborn’s vitals.
“The boy’s heart rate is dropping fast,” he shouted.
“Move him to Incubation,” the doctor ordered as he quickly handed the infant to the nurse.
She scampered out of the room with the child and rushed him to Incubation. Like his mother, the premature child’s light was fading fast. A technician administered tests, but could not determine why this tiny body was failing. With shallow respiration, poor circulation, and a compromised immune system, the infant lad was dying. The baby lie in an incubator for days, connected to tubes and wires and every unimaginable gadget possible to support his frail life.
Down the hall, the battle to keep the mother alive continued. She spent three days in a coma. When the fourth day arrived, she finally opened her eyes by the light of dawn and steadily recovered as the day wore on.
On the fifth day, the mother uttered her first words in almost a week.
“I need my baby,” she whispered.
“You’ll see him soon, after you sleep,” the nurse said, forcing a reassuring smile for the weakened mother. The nurse then passed her hand across the medication dispensary pad and tapped it with her finger. The mother quickly drifted off to sleep as her medication took effect.
By the sixth day, the infant boy could no longer open his eyes. His heart rate had weakened and his liver was failing. The hospital staff continued to fear the worst. Early that morning the doctor advised he wanted the mother to be more stable when she learned of her son’s poor condition.
The mother awoke as dawn melted into morning and she promptly rang for the nurse.
“Can I see my son?” she pleaded. 
“We’re running tests on him now, but you can see him later today,” the nurse offered, hoping to placate the drained mother. She could see great sorrow filled the mother’s eyes.
After awhile, the mother’s breakfast arrived. Although she only picked at her food, by noon her vitals returned to normal.  Despite her improved condition, her sorrow remained.
On the seventh day, the doctor told the staff the child would not survive this fight. The baby’s anatomic systems had all but shut down. He commended the young boy’s will to survive and was surprised the infant still clung to life. 
Each nurse who passed through the ward heard the mother softly weeping in her lonely room, never having held her precious baby in her arms. The mother’s tears were insistent. She feared her child would feel abandonment and rejection within his heart because she never had the chance to hold him or tell him how much she loved him.
Finally, the hospital staff could bear no more of this mother’s heartache. They pleaded with the doctor to explain the boy’s expiring condition to his mother. As he delivered the news, the mother held her heart and tears streamed from her eyes. The heartbroken mother said nothing while an aide wheeled her to the nursery where she was finally united with her dying baby boy. She stared at him lying in the lonely little box with wires dangling all about him. This was the first time she had even seen her newborn child. She reached out and touched the warming box, anxious to hold her baby and provide him with the comfort only a mother could give. The nurse carefully lifted him from the blanket and placed the dying child in his mother’s arms. Now one week into life, she finally held her son for the first time.
A single question buzzed through the hospital: why was this baby still alive?
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Word spread throughout the Titan colony that the baby was clearly an underdog for this galactic world. At the ancient "Crater Temple," community members of the space outpost held a cosmological vigil. The clergy presented the case to the congregation.  They offered the infant’s destiny into the hands of the Universe God. The dying child’s fate rested on the solar winds gusting through galaxies of space and time. The people gathered ancient lava dust from the Titan floor and tossed it up, into the solar winds and stars above. They determinedly chanted in prayer as one unified voice.
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The mother ran her fingertips across her baby’s tiny face and forehead, caressing his tender yellow skin to comfort him. She named him, Charlie Bravo. It was a prodigious name taken from a galactic "Solar War" hero. Legend had it that: fearing the doom of his beloved Titan homeland by a warring fleet of astral battleships from another world, a fearless 14-year old boy, Charlie Bravo, leapt onto an asteroid as the desolate space rock raced towards the attackers. During the asteroid’s pass of the flaming stellar mass called, Arcturus, Charlie Bravo lassoed the mighty star and flung it across the cosmos like a gigantic, fiery bowling ball. Like bowling pins, the enemy spaceships were struck down, thwarting the impending attack. Still today, Charlie Bravo was a symbol of peace, strength, heroism, and love.
The nurse only allowed the mother to hold her son for a few minutes. When she told the mother she must put the baby back in the lonely, warming box, the mother refused to let go of her dying hero. A doctor passing by stepped in to assist.
“Please, ma’am. Your child must be inside the incubator,” he insisted.
Still hesitant to let go, the doctor kneeled at her side and gently placed his hand upon her shoulder before carefully taking the baby from her trembling arms.
“My son needs me.” She murmured with weary eyes stinging from tears of sorrow. She wept as the doctor stepped away with her baby and carefully handed him to the waiting nurse. Returning the fragile boy to the ugly box, the attending nurse rushed out of the room, weeping herself. She knew that once the mother was united with her son, she would refuse to leave his side. After the nurse collected herself, she explained to the doctor that a mother’s love is unwavering, and knows no bounds. With some persuasion, the doctor agreed to let the desperate mother remain with her son, for he knew the boy would die soon. 
For hours on end, the mother sat next to the dreadful box that held her waning child and prayed. She continued to pray as the night time ticked away into morning.
By the eighth day, little Charlie Bravo’s lips turned blue; his condition became more critical through the morning hours and into the afternoon. The mood in the hospital became tainted by anguish. Later that day, the medical unit attempted one final life-saving technique. None of the procedures helped to improve the infant’s condition, however, and the doctors knew of nothing else they could do to save him. Death was imminent. In the next few hours, little Charlie Bravo would expire. The final moments for this dying baby were at hand as evening approached. The medical staff tried to comfort the mother. 
“Little Charlie will not have to suffer much longer.” A doctor consoled. 
A holy man, who was present, suggested a more optimistic take on the upcoming loss.
“The Universe God has a great plan for your son. Any moment now, Charlie will be joining our creator and fly among angels.”
Finally, one by one, they left the room to allow the mother time to grieve in peace.
“Did you notice the mother’s eyes? It’s like she looked straight through us, as if we weren’t standing there at all,” whispered one aide to another.
The last to leave, a doctor and nurse, were stopped by the mother. She turned to them with fierce conviction in her eyes and an amazing calm in her voice.
“I need my baby now.” 
The doctor was indecisive, unsure of the right decision to make in the last moments of a life so young. He found his answer in the pleading eyes of the nurse.
“A mother’s love,” she explained with a whisper.
She continued to hold the doctor’s gaze, nodding her head in silent request for him to relent to the mother’s last request; a simple request to love her dying son during the last moments of his innocent life. It was clear the doctor struggled with the decision and his own need to maintain some sense of composure.  
“Yes, all right.” He uttered with a voice full of emotion.
The nurse reached into the little box for the last time and gently lifted the baby. With tears running down her cheeks, she carefully placed the child in his mother’s loving arms. The nurse softly wept and sniffled, tamping her own damp face with a tissue. The doctor leaned over the mother, struggling for the right words to say in this unspeakable moment.
“I’m so sorry. There’s nothing more we can do now. Your boy will die very soon.” He explained, wondering what words he could say to soothe this mother’s fear for her child’s fate.  The doctor bowed his head in helplessness as he and the nurse left the room.
The infant and his mother were finally alone. For one last day, she was able to love her near lifeless child, cradled in her arms. As she removed the life sustaining machines connected to her young son, the mother gently sang to him. One by one, the wires, tubes, and gadgets fell away from his pale yellow skin leaving only the beautiful baby she had carried within her for so long.
One faithful mother, a believer in the hymn of prayer, sang her heart song of love into her baby boy’s ear. She gently traced her index finger across the baby’s cold, blue lips, and sang to him a tranquil song of a mother’s love. All around her, alarms sounded and lights flashed. The machines that had once monitored and supported her baby’s frail body sent out alerts of despair. The mother and child were oblivious to it all.  
Panicked, the medical staff rushed to the area. Outside the room, they tried desperately to open the door. One staff member repeatedly jiggled the handle, banging her fist on the door, attempting to gain the mother’s attention. A male nurse scurried over, and drove his large shoulder into the side of the door. The big man slammed into it a second time, and then a third. The out of breath nurse, sweating from his frantic effort to dislodge the door, continued to slam into the door with his shoulder. The loud bangs from his body hitting the door made onlookers flinch, but the door refused to budge. 
“These doors don’t have locks!” One nurse exclaimed, clearly bewildered.
“She jammed the door!” Another nurse hollered, flustered that she couldn’t get inside.
Security guards were called, but all of their attempts to free the door with tools were futile. It remained resolute. The nurse who helped deliver the baby, who was also a mother herself, was unruffled by the scene. She gazed through the window at the relaxed mother singing lovingly to the child in her arms. This wise nurse turned and calmly asked the doctor to leave the grieving mother in peace to spend these final moments with her baby. Frustrated that their attempts to gain entry were thwarted, the doctor and security guards ignored her request and continued their attempts to dislodge the door. 
The nurse gently placed her hand on the doctor’s shoulder.
“Stop.” She calmly ordered the men.
The doctor, offended by her insubordination, said nothing. His glare of discontent for the nurse was evident to all. Unfazed by his glare, she continued her quest. 
“Please stop.  Let the mother sing.” The nurse pleaded.
Reluctantly, the doctor acknowledged that it didn’t matter anymore. The boy was all but dead, whether they entered the room or not. 
“Go back to work people.” He ordered in frustration. 
“Leave her alone with her child.”
The mother, unaware of the commotion outside the room, peacefully sang her simple song into the waning hours of the morning. As her son’s tiny body continued to fail and his breathing became non-existent to the naked eye, he loosely clenched his mother’s finger with the last ounce of energy his dying body could muster. Little Charlie lay still, barely clinging to life while the mother’s sweet voice resonated with her serene, faithful song.
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Word of the dying boy’s fate reached an elderly woman in one of the other wings of the hospital. The old gal yelped out painful wails of sorrow and grief. Her cries seemed to echo throughout the infirmary and all who heard the old lady’s pain wept along with her. Her agonizing bellow ushered in the fatal dawn. In a cold, dark hospital room, a faithful mother holds on in song.

Outside the death room, a young pregnant nurse held a vigil of her own. She closed her eyes in despair, bowed her head, and sobbed a singular prayer. She murmured her words of faith in between sniffles. As she finished her silent plea, the expectant mother returned her gaze to the viewing window and gasped at the sight before her.
“Oh my…” She exclaimed.
"What is it?"A passing intern asked.
"Come look, hurry-hurry!” The expectant mother motioned to the others in the hallway. 
Doctors rushed over and a crowd gathered along the corridor. Through the window, once a cold and desolate view, everyone stared in amazement at the joyful mother, singing and playing with her baby boy for the very first time. Before them was a healthy child with brilliant blue eyes, wide open in wonder, and a tender smile on his soft, pink lips. He gazed up at his mother, dancing his tiny arms to her joyous rhythm. She sang her sweet song directly to his heart. Little Charlie Bravo was yellow no more!
As they pressed closer to the window, daughters, sisters, grandmothers, girlfriends, mothers, and little girls, all hummed what is now called, “The Charlie Bravo Hymn.” Sunrays illuminated the baby’s room and the door slowly opened wide with no obstruction to be found. The tranquil glow filled the corridor with warmth and joy.
“It’s a miracle!” A grandmother uttered, witnessing the joy before her.
“Little Charlie is an angel among us!” Voiced another.
The mother and son were unaware of the events around them. Young Charlie Bravo was strong and healthy and playing in his momma’s arms. The mother knew that her child beat the odds, and soon she would take him home. At nine days into life, all the boy knew was that he was loved. 
That is the story of the infant angel, Charlie Bravo. I was always relaxed and at peace when my mom got to the end. With my eyes closed and me nearly asleep, she pulled the covers to my chin and sang the hymn.  
The words of, The Charlie Bravo Song, danced through my mind, and with one final brush of her fingers through my hair, my teary eyed mother leaned over and kissed my soft cheek. Wandering off into dreamland, my Mom whispered with a smile and a sniffle, “Good night, Charlie.” With a baseball in my right hand, cuddled close as if it was my teddy bear, and a tiny smile formed by my pink lips, I drifted off into another stellar dream … off to lasso a star of my own. Swim the oceans, climb the mountains, leap the rivers … little man … tell the tale about how angels fly … tell the story about angels opening your eyes.
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About the Author

Charlie Nitric holds three college degrees; a Bachelors in Speech Communication, a Masters of Management Degree in Human Resources, and a Masters Degree in Marketing.
He is also the father of two fantastic boys. Still very much himself a kid at heart, Charlie is constantly observing the world around him. Then, with the incredible imagination of a child, he plays with those experiences until the unimaginable becomes the imaginable for his readers.
Through his blog, Nitric entertains countless online readers with his storytelling ability. From a good, hearty laughing fest to crying out in anticipation, readers can’t help but become completely mesmerized with whatever he puts before them.
With writing that is astonishingly relatable (even when it is totally and completely implausible), he always manages to illicit one emotion or another. Whether that emotion is inspiration, frustration, belly-busting laughter, or simply joy, Nitric’s constant goal is to have his readers feel each scene right along with him.
“Strive each day towards your own joy,” Nitric writes to his blog readers, encouraging them to be grateful each day for what they have in their lives. His writing is proof that if you take in all the experiences around you and simply let yourself smile about them, life truly is an enjoyable ride.


To connect with Charlie:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CharlieNitric
Webpage: http://www.charlienitric.com/
Blog: http://charlienitric.wordpress.com/