The joyful noise of children playing is common near the playground at the Galena Park Apartment complex in the 4800 block of the East Sam Houston Parkway North.
"I'm very, very sorry to hear this," neighbor Phillip Semien said.
But early Friday evening, there was a terrifying scream from the same place. A 2-year-old boy had fallen from an open window of his family's two-story apartment. He pushed through the screen, landing on the concrete below.
"He was alive. He was breathing. He was screaming," one neighbor, who wanted to remain anonymous, told us. "Poor baby, he was in pain. From what I saw, he had a knot on his forehead, his nose was bleeding, his mouth."
The neighbor helped the boy's panic-stricken mother until emergency crews arrived and transported him to Children's Memorial Hermann Hospital via LifeFlight in critical conditoin.
"I said just sat with him right here and held him and kept talking to him, just keep talking to him. And he did -- he held on, poor baby, he did," the neighbor said.
The more people heard about what happened, the more parents said they'll keep their children within earshot; perhaps now, even closer.
"She's my only daughter, my two-year-old, so I keep her away from windows that's for sure," concerned parent Renada Gonzales said.
No word yet from managers of the apartment complex.
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