A woman and her toddler daughter move into an apartment in the narrator's building. One day while the narrator is fixing a sink, the toddler crawls out the open bedroom window and falls to her death. Devastated, the mother withdraws from the world and is later found dead in her daughter's bedroom from self-inflicted wounds. The narrator reflects on how the open bedroom window was the catalyst that led to the tragic events unfolding.

1. Group Picture Story—FYS
A new spring and a new family is moving into the third floor of my building, well a
mother and a daughter. She’s a simple woman, with caring brown eyes and straight brown hair.
When she came to look at the rental space she held the hand of a bright-eyed little girl who
would often try and break away to wander. As the mother tried to get settled and start rebuilding
the toddler’s railed bed her daughter ran around the room admiring the dove wallpaper singing
“birdy, fly, fly.” The mother would watch her for a little while, chuckle and get back to work.
After about a week or so the mother was finally settled on her third floor suite.
Everything went fine until and accident occurred. It was a beautiful summer day. I had come up
from the floor below to fix her leaky faucet. Her daughter was laying on her bedroom floor
reading a picture book. The sweet summer breeze from the open window filled the room. I left
the room to work on the sink, while the mom returned to her daughter in the room a couple
minutes passed and I was almost finished when I heard the house phone ringing from the living
room. I could hear the mother walk through and answer the phone. The next thing I heard after
the footsteps passed me once more was the mother questionably calling for her toddler, and then
a scream. I rush into the room, where I saw half of her hanging out of the window screaming. I
quickly ran over and grabbed the hysterical mother away from the window as she fought against
me. She quickly ran out of the room and I heard the front door slam shut. I then took this time to
see what happened. I peered out the window to see the distorted body of the toddler. The mother
came out of the downstairs door and flung her body on the small body, crying. She was gone.
That weekend she held a funeral, and I attended. It was a small service. I felt obligated to
go. I’m glad I did go because unfortunately I was the only attendee, other than the mother and

2. the preacher. That’s when I realized that her baby girl was the only person the poor mom had in
the world.
A month later the poor, mourning mother was the talk of the building. The gossiping
woman on the fourth floor complained of loud sobbing late at night. It seemed she never left the
building anymore. Out of concern I visited her. It was almost winter now and as I climbed the
stairs I could feel the heat from my floor and mix with the frigid breeze of hers. I knocked on the
door and it swung open at my touch. My stomach sank. The room was so cold I could see my
breath in front of my face. I carefully walked through the floor looking through every room
until I came to the deceased toddler’s room. It was closed, unlike all the other rooms. I. knocked,
when there came no answer I tried to open it. When I found that it was locked I quickly rush to
the other room and call 911.
Again the funeral was little to no attendance, the other six residence in the building and the
preacher. Afterward, while cleaning out her floor to make room for a new tenant I actively
avoided the toddler’s room, which had turned into a place of mourning for her mother. That
room, the only room still furnished, haunted me. When I finally gathered enough courage to
enter the room of death I was taken aback. I hadn't remembered the condition that the room had
been in the last time I was there. When paramedics surrounded the bloody body of the distressed
mother. Her self-inflicted wounds showed me her pain and loneliness that she felt. But in all the
rush I had not noticed the torn wall paper and the destroyed hard wood floor. Fingernail
scratched dug into the wood where the little girl sat reading her book, moments before her
passing. And that's when I looked at that open window, that blew in the cold breeze so peacefully
and chilling. And I thought to myself "That, open window is what started it all."