Free Stronger by Jeff Bauman

trying to make him laugh. I’d pull on my oxygen mask, breathe deeply, and say in my best Darth Vader voice: “Chris, I am your father. Now get your daddy a cheeseburger and fries.” Chris was supposed to be with me at the marathon, but I had invited him too late. He couldn’t get the day off from his job at McDonald’s. He had this idea that he could have changed things if he’d been there. That’s how you think when you’re twenty-two.
    So he slipped up, and an article claiming I had identified the suspects (really only partly accurate) appeared on Bloomberg News that morning. This was the middle of the manhunt, and everyone—everyone—picked up and repeated the news. We turned to a news channel after Erin called, and my face was in continuous rotation. Bauman. No legs. Jeff Bauman. Identified the bombers. Tsarnaev. Bauman. Tsarnaev. They kept showing the photo of Erin and me that had been pulled off Facebook. Bauman the hero. Bauman and his girlfriend. Did we mention he lost his legs?
    Erin called back half an hour later, while Tim was on hold with the Brighton police. She had talked with an FBI agent who told her not to worry—the bomber was on the run, and she was in no danger. She called her father, who told her to stay put, he was on his way. She sounded better, although she later admitted that she was hiding under the covers of her bed.
    Stay strong, I texted her.
    And then, slowly, the tension eased, and everything settled down. The hours passed, and nothing happened. Thursday had been a shit-storm at BMC. Reporters, family members, and celebrities were everywhere. Word went around that Oprah was going to be in the building the next day, that she wanted to meet with survivors. Mom came out of her shell at that one. Mom loves Oprah.
    But even Oprah couldn’t defy the lockdown, and on Friday the hospital was quiet. Without Mom, my aunts, and my dad, the atmosphere was peaceful, and I found myself drifting in and out of sleep. I still hated being alone, but maybe the nurses had been right all along; maybe I did need more time to rest.
    Or maybe the way Tamerlan Tsarnaev died eased my mind.
    My biggest fear had never been that we wouldn’t catch the bombers. I had complete faith in the police. That’s why I don’t think my information was that important. Those guys were never going to get away with this. You don’t bomb a marathon and walk away. Not in this city. The best I can say is that my information may have sped up the process.
    My biggest fear was that the bombers would deny it. If Tamerlan Tsarnaev surrendered peacefully and proclaimed his innocence, it would have been a circus. I’d be in the news. I’d have to spend a year, at least, meeting with the FBI and being grilled by defense attorneys. I’d have to testify at his trial. Did I see this man at the site of the bombing? Yes. Did I see him with the backpack? Yes. Did I see the backpack explode? No, I didn’t.
    I know the FBI had pieces of the backpack that proved it contained the bomb. I know the bomb was remote-detonated by the control panel of a remote control car, so it would have been impossible to see both the bomb and the detonation device. But that small piece bothered me. How could I know for sure this guy was the killer, and not someone lucky enough to walk away at exactly the right time?
    Tamerlan had settled that problem for me. When he executed MIT police officer Sean Collier, he revealed himself as a killer. A cold-blooded bastard. A man who was all business. He was willing to die for whatever he thought he was doing, whatever purpose he thought he was serving, and he did.
    I slept easier on Friday, but not because Tamerlan Tsarnaev got what he deserved. I don’t believe in retribution. I slept easier because he proved who he was.
    I was still sleeping, off and on, when Kevin called around 3:00. The shelter-in-place order had been extended to the whole city, and nobody had been out of the hospital all day. So Kevin smuggled