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“This is it, isn’t it?”

Evelyn held the door and watched her husband smoothly pass through it and into the house.  He was wearing the same black suit that she’d buried him in.

“All I ask—-”

Her words came in a hurry, rushed and desperate.  She slowed to collect herself.

“I can’t go yet, okay?  I just need five minutes.  That’s all.  Okay?  Ann is stopping and I don’t … I don’t want our baby girl to find me.  Please.”

He nodded, but she took little comfort in the concession.  Something about his weary eyes made her uneasy.  They were always on her but remained constantly unfocused.  It was like he was looking straight through her.  It made Evelyn feel like she was already gone.

“Thank you.”

She sat down and sighed, running a hand through hair that had gone stringy and thin in her last phase of treatment.  It had been a long couple of years since the doctors told her she had just six months to live, but it was over.  Finally, Evelyn was ready.

Checking his watch the man began to gracefully circle the room, stopping to study the pictures Evelyn had hanging on a wall behind her couch:  a baby’s first step; a toddler in the pool; a brown-haired girl with no front teeth.  The pictures seemed to chronicle a young girl’s journey, but a large portrait was the centerpiece, Evelyn with a man who looked just like–

“You’re not my husband, are you?”

He looked over blankly.  Evelyn pointed to a photograph right in front of him.

“That’s Ann with my grandson.  My husband had been dead three years already when she had him.  My John would ask about a picture like that.”

He sat down beside her.  Evelyn shut her eyes.

“She’s so different now.  You wouldn’t believe how she’s changed.

“You were right about Cole.  Remember him?  Little prick.  He broke her heart right down the middle just like you said he would.”  She frowned.  “For a while it seemed like every guy she knew was going to do the exact same thing.”

The man listened, moving his empty gaze up and down her as she spoke.  He found it curious, the way Evelyn talked to him as if he really were her husband – as if she didn’t know what he really was.

“When Dr. Tyson said I was dying I told him he was wrong and I wasn’t going anywhere.”  She blurted it out, half laughing.  “You should have seen the look on his face.  I wasn’t trying to be a bitch, it’s just, Ann wasn’t ready.  You know what I mean?”

He didn’t.

Evelyn opened her eyes and found that he hadn’t stopped watching.  She stood up and walked across the room.

“She’s doing better, though.  She bought the cutest little house and is working in Tony Hill’s tax office,” Evelyn said.  “And … and she graduated last year!”

She wheeled around to see if that would spark any kind of reaction.  It didn’t.

“Having that little boy changed everything,” she said.  “It was like someone hit a switch.  One day she was running the bars, the next she was at the kitchen table every night, her head in a book, ready to do whatever it took.”

She turned to face him, looking him right in the eye even if she knew now that he wouldn’t return the favor.   “I wish my husband could have seen it.”  She hung her head.  “He was right about that too.”

Evelyn felt a tinge of sadness just as the screen door popped open and a twentysomething brunette came rushing in.  “Mom!” she called.  “Mom!” Evelyn found her in the kitchen.

“Hey, mom.”  Ann pulled a bag of chips from a cabinet, shoved it into a brown paper bag and moved for the fridge.  “I totally forgot I’m on snack duty for tonight’s game.  I hope it’s cool if I raid your kitchen.”

“Of course.”  Evelyn looked around like something was missing.  “Where’s Johnny?”

“He’s in the van, but we’re late as it is and by the time he’s finished telling you about day care and his new toys…”

“You’d never make it in time,” Evelyn finished for her.

“Why don’t you come?” Ann asked, taking a quick break from the scavenger hunt.  “It’s not too hot, and it’s been a while since you saw him play.”

Evelyn’s eyes moved into the living room.  Ann followed her gaze to the couch but couldn’t figure out what her mother was looking at.  She furrowed her brow.

“You feeling okay?”

“Yeah. I’m just … I’m tired, sweetheart.”

Ann gave her mother a gentle kiss on the cheek before grabbing her sack and moving for the door.  “Alright. I’ll be by tomorrow.”

“Ann?”  It slipped out, surprising even her.  Ann stopped in the doorway and turned.  “Nothing. Go ahead.”  Evelyn forced a smile and watched as her daughter hurried out the door, chasing after a promising life that made Evelyn proud.

“Thank you for that,” she said somberly, “but I guess my time’s up.”

Evelyn stepped back into the living room where the man was waiting, hands folded, eyes on the coffee table in front of him.

“Will it hurt?”

Finally, after sitting silent for so long, he spoke: “You’ll need a great deal of strength for what’s to come.”

She nodded, expecting the worst.  And then, of course, the worst came.

He looked up, his eyes going right to Evelyn’s.  In an instant she knew that the empty vessel was gone and saw that this really was her husband.

His eyes said everything that he couldn’t say before.

I love you, baby.

You’ve done so well without me.

I’m so sorry this is happening to you again.

The sounds came from outside.  Tires screeching.  A thud. Metal on concrete.

Evelyn’s eyes went wide.  Her knees nearly buckled.

She whipped around, looking through the screen to find Ann’s car upside down, a crumpled mess beside the pick-up truck that had hit her as she pulled out of the drive.

“Oh my God! No! No! NOOOO!”

Frantic, Evelyn pushed through the door and scrambled outside.  Still, even in her panic, the dying woman managed one last glance over her shoulder as she went.

But the man in black was gone.