“You’ve been the best thing that ever happened to me.”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“I need you to promise me something. Say yes before I tell you what it is.”
After thirty-six years together, there was no reason to hesitate.
“Anything.”
Carol slowly drew in a breath.
“Find Anna, please. You’ll understand everything once you find her. And please… forgive me in advance.”
The name hit me like a stone dropped into still water.
Anna.
A woman I hadn’t seen in forty years.
“Carol, what are you talking about? Anna who? What do you need me to forgive?”
She only shook her head, barely moving, her lips pressed together as though saying anything more might destroy something.
A nurse appeared in the doorway and quietly told me Carol needed to rest.
I leaned down, kissed my wife’s forehead, and walked into the hallway with my heart pounding against my ribs.
Three days later, Carol was gone.
The house on Maple Street felt hollow in a way I’d never known a house could feel.
Her reading glasses remained on the arm of the recliner.
Her unfinished crossword still rested on the kitchen table.
But all I could hear was her final request.
Find Anna.
Anna had been my first love.
In 1985, I asked her to marry me.
Her answer came in a letter.
‘I can’t follow you, Walt. Not with you moving away. Please don’t come looking for me.’
For forty years, I’d believed every word.
For two weeks after Carol’s funeral, I tried convincing myself she’d been confused by medication or half-dreaming when she asked me to find Anna.
But every night, I heard the other part.
‘Forgive me in advance.’
Forgive her for what?
Eventually, I searched through old college groups until a former classmate gave me the number of Diane, one of Anna’s closest friends from those days.
The moment I mentioned Anna, Diane fell silent.
“I have nothing to say to you about that.”
Then she hung up.
A week later, she called me back.
“Anna’s sister married a man from Pittsburgh.”
“You know her name?”
“I remember the married name.”
“Give it to me.”
Three phone calls later, a woman answered.
“Hello?”
I closed my eyes.
Even after four decades, I recognized that voice.
“Anna? This is Walter.”
For several seconds, all I heard was breathing.
