her away from that coffin. To make them both feel even a fraction of what my daughter had endured.
But I didn’t move.
I clenched my jaw, fixed my eyes on the casket, and forced myself to breathe—because if I spoke, I knew I wouldn’t be able to stop.
My daughter, Emily Carter, had come to me weeks earlier… wearing long sleeves in the middle of summer.
“I’m just cold, Mom,” she said.
I pretended to believe her.
Other times, she smiled too brightly—eyes glassy, like she had cried and
quickly wiped it away.
“Ethan’s just stressed,” she kept saying, as if repeating it would make it true.
“Come home,” I begged. “You’re safe with me.”
“It’ll get better,” she insisted. “Now that the baby’s coming… everything will change.”
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I wanted to believe her.
I really did.
Back in the church, Ethan dropped into the front pew like he owned the place. He wrapped his arm around the woman in red and even chuckled when the priest spoke about “eternal love.”
I felt sick.
That’s when
