My Son Said Monny Picked Him Up From School. My Wife Died 8 Months Ago.
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The kitchen smelled like burnt toast and forgotten coffee. Henry Logan stood at the sink, staring at the dirty dishes from 3 days ago, his hands gripping the counter edge until his knuckles turned white. 8 months. 8 months since Emily Douglas, his wife, his anchor, had been found at the bottom of Crimson Lake. Her car submerged in 20 ft of murky water. The police called it an accident. Wet roads, sharp turn, no guardrail. Case closed. Henry hadn’t believed it then. He still didn’t.
“Daddy.”
He turned to find his son Cory standing in the doorway of their suburban home, backpack hanging off one shoulder, his sandy hair sticking up in the way Emily used to fix every morning. The boy was seven now, growing taller, but his eyes still held that wounded look that had settled there the day they buried an empty casket.
“Hey, buddy, how was school?”
Cory walked in slowly, setting his backpack on the kitchen table with unusual care. Something was off. The kid normally bounded in like a retriever, dumping his bag wherever it landed. Today, his movements were measured. Nervous.
“It was okay,” Cory said, not meeting his father’s eyes. “We had art.”
That’s good. Henry grabbed the coffee pot, pouring the sludge into the sink.
“Want a snack, Daddy?”
Cory’s voice dropped to a whisper.
“Why did mommy pick me up yesterday?”
The coffee pot slipped from Henry’s hand, shattering in the porcelain sink. Glass exploded across the basin. Brown liquid spattering the white tile backsplash. He didn’t move to clean it. Couldn’t. Every muscle in his body had locked.
“What did you say?”
Cory’s lower lip trembled. His small hands fumbled with the zipper on his backpack. Yesterday, when you were in that long meeting, the school called mommy and she came to get me.
“Cy.”
Henry’s voice came out strangled. He crouched down, gripping his son’s shoulders maybe too tightly. Sweetie mommy’s. Mommy’s gone. She’s been gone. You know that.
“But it was her.”
Tears welled in those hazel eyes. Emily’s eyes. She looked just like her. She sounded like her. She knew things.
Henry’s mind raced. Yesterday afternoon, he’d been in a client meeting at Morrison and Associates, the architecture firm, where he’d been partner for 6 years. The meeting had run long, nearly 3 hours. He’d gotten a text from the school saying Cory was sick, that his emergency contact had picked him up. He’d assumed it was Lauren Britain, their neighbor who was listed as backup.
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