Part 2

The blanket moved.

Only slightly.

But it was enough.

Clara stumbled backward as the pale hand beneath the covers twitched weakly,”s” the old silver ring glinting in the morning light like something dragged up from the bottom of a grave.

“No…” she whispered.

Her husband pushed himself upright too quickly and nearly lost his balance. He looked as though he had not slept in days. His shirt was wrinkled, his jaw covered in uneven stubble, and there were dark bruises beneath his eyes.

“Clara, wait—”

“You told me she was gone.”

The words came out sharper than she intended. Not loud. Worse than loud. Thin and shaking.

On the floor beside the bed, their son Daniel lifted his head slowly. His face was pale from exhaustion. A blanket had been wrapped around his shoulders, and for one terrible second Clara thought he might be sick.

Then she saw the dried blood on his sleeve.

Clara’s breath caught.

“Daniel?”

“I’m okay,” he said immediately, though his voice cracked. “Mom, please don’t panic.”

Don’t panic.

As if panic had not already rooted itself inside her chest the moment she recognized that ring.

The woman in the bed gave a weak cough.

Clara froze.

She had not heard that sound in almost eight years, but memory snapped into place instantly anyway. Some sounds never leave the body. That cough had once echoed through narrow apartment walls at midnight. Through hospital corridors. Through endless winters Clara had spent pretending she was not afraid.

Slowly, the figure beneath the blanket turned her head.

Older.

Thinner.

Her dark hair streaked heavily with gray now, her cheeks hollowed by illness or time or both. But the eyes were the same.

Clara felt her knees weaken.

“Mama,” she breathed.

Her mother looked at her as though she were seeing a ghost.

For a long moment, nobody moved.