The coffin was waiting in my living room before I had even taken off my uniform. My mother stood beside it without a single tear and said, “Your wife died giving birth, Daniel.”
For three seconds, the world made no sound.
Then I heard the weak crying of a newborn somewhere upstairs.
I dropped my duffel bag and walked toward the coffin. The lid was open. Emily lay inside wearing the blue dress she had chosen for my homecoming, her skin pale, her dark hair arranged too carefully around her face. No hospital bracelet. No flowers from the clinic. No doctor waiting to explain what had happened.
Only my mother, Margaret, and my younger brother, Caleb, watching me like guards.
“Where is my son?” I asked.
“He survived,” Mother replied. “Barely. Emily was careless.”
Caleb leaned against the fireplace, drinking whiskey. “She always was dramatic.”
My hands shook as I reached for Emily. I had spent eleven months disarming roadside explosives, reading disturbed earth, noticing wires thinner than hair. Training had taught me that death left details behind, and everything in that room felt staged.
Emily’s right hand was clenched against her hip.
