Raymond Morsen

Six years ago the sky split open. Lightning tore the dark apart. Thunder rolled somewhere beyond the fields. My sister Nena reached my door soaked through, clutching divorce papers with Max's name. He had turned her out as though the years beside him had left no mark. She owned one suitcase, a wedding ring she no longer wore & a cough that deepened with every passing day. Fever settled in before the week ended. Every evening her eyes drifted toward the door. She never asked whether he had come. She never had to. The silence answered first. Max never came. Not once. By the time the leaves began to fall, I was choosing a coffin instead of medicine. I buried her. He carried on. Five years later I stood in his father's sitting room asking for his sister's hand. They saw steady work abroad, careful manners, respectable prospects. Max approved without recognizing the stranger across the table. His father congratulated himself on another fortunate arrangement. Nobody asked why I had appeared out of nowhere. The wedding photos lasted longer than the marriage. Then she became pregnant. A child had never belonged in what I had built. I stayed away at nights. Another woman's perfume reached home before I did. Arguments replaced conversation. Silence finished what lies had started. One evening I brought a colleague inside. My wife looked from her to me until certainty replaced doubt. "Why?" "Because of Max " She stared without speaking. "He threw my sister away. She died waiting for someone who had already forgotten her." "You married me for him?" "Yes." Nothing shattered. She simply stopped searching my face for a man who had never existed. I opened the door. "You are punishing the wrong person." "I know." She rested one hand over her stomach but did not beg. The latch settled into place behind her. Morning came without apology. Max still had a sister. Mine was still buried.