My Wife's Faked Death

brittle bones, my breath a shallow rasp in the sterile room. Forty years I' d worked,

by the bed. She wouldn't

her voice flat. "Y

ve, her hair perfectly styled. Beside her stood a younger man, handsome and polishe

who had supposedly died in a f

int of the small-town girl I married. "It' s

cker of something-pity, m

She turned out so well. And for taking care of my p

led, a tight, conde

ike to help. Pay for a decent bur

h the force of a fresh wound. My wife, alive. My daughter, in on the lie. My whole li

zed. The wor

, li

I was in my own bedroom, the one with the peeling wallpaper and the scent of stale coffee. My hands, they

I clutched a crump

r it, for months. It was Jenny' s suicide note, t

is too much. Please take care of Stella and

e word w

now. Jenny was gone, but she wasn' t dead. She was in the city, building a new life with a new ma

this

would make he