How To Survive This Fairytale

Chapter 41

Forty-One

You don’t know if it’s fair to ask this.

And you don’t want to be unfair to him, not now, not after how far you’ve come together.

You don’t want to be the fisherman’s wife, asking for too much.

But you have to ask. You have to ask, so that you never look out at a lake or up at the sky and wonder.

You have to ask so you don’t spend every day at the window or on the front porch.

You have to ask so you don’t leave the door open.

“Will you visit me? Even just once.”

He takes your face in his hands, soft palms against your beard.

“Do you think, by changing my shape,” he says, “I’m changing my heart?”