Said
He said he was downstairs in the basement when it happened. He said the boy must have fallen off the bed. He said he found the boy, unconsciousness, on the floor in his sister’s room. He said his wife put the boy in his sister’s room because he seemed tired. He said his wife had to work, so she left the boy and his sister in his care. He said his mother was there to help him care for the children. He said, no, he hadn’t been in the basement when it happened happened, just that he’d been in the basement just before it happened. He said he had seen the boy on the bed and then, when he looked away for just a moment, he said he heard a thud, like a thud sound, and the boy was on the carpet next to the bed. He said the boy had been shouting and screaming. He said the boy sometimes got like that when he was tired. He said the boy was at that age when all he did was ask questions and have these little fits where he shouted and screamed. He said, what do you mean it couldn’t have happened like that? It happened like that, he said. He said maybe it had happened like that because he’d tripped and fallen on the boy when he was coming into the bedroom. He said he’d tripped over one of the boy’s Lego cats he left everywhere. He said yes, you could trip over a Lego cat, but anyway what he meant was that he’d stepped on it, without his shoes on, and had fallen forward, onto the boy. He said, have you ever stepped on one of those things, those Legos? They hurt, he said. He’d fallen on top of the boy, he said, and that’s how it happened. He said he didn’t tell police about stepping on the Lego cat because he might have blacked out afterwards. He said the police wouldn’t believe what he’d said if he told them he’d blacked out afterwards. He said he was worried the police would think he’d abused his son. He said he never hit his son, no matter how annoying the kid could be. He said of course he’d never hit his son. He said he didn’t remember telling his son to grow up. He said he did remember calling him a cry baby. He’d been crying, he said. He called him a cry baby, he said. He said he might have grabbed his son once or twice, when the boy was acting out or trying to do something he’d been told to stop doing. He said it was for the boy’s safety. He said the boy didn’t know any better. He said maybe he’d spanked him once or twice. Did I use my belt, is that what you’re asking? he said. Did I raise my hand? he said. Maybe, he said, but he’d never done it to hurt the boy, a cry baby. He said he’d told his son to pick up his toys, not to leave his Lego cats everywhere. He said they were cats, you know, like cats. He said they were made out of Legos. He said, What do you want me to call them? He said he’d blacked out because he was taking some medicine for his back. He said he’d hurt it at work. He said he knew he wasn’t supposed to drink more than three beers with it. He said, Oh, really? No beers? he said. I didn’t know that, he said. He said, See, that must be what happened. He said he blacked out, and when he woke up, his son was on the floor, not waking up. He said his son was still breathing. He said he knew he hadn’t hit his son, it didn’t matter what the doctors said, the doctors weren’t there, he said, how would they know? He said he’d stepped on the Lego cat and fallen on his son because he’d been so worried about his son. He’d run into the room without even looking around, he said. He said, That’s what I said.