I cannot lose you again

Prologue

The Army chaplain knocked at 6:14 in the morning.

Aria knew what it meant before she opened the door.

No one in uniform brings good news before sunrise.

She had been awake already. She'd worked the night shift and come home smelling like antiseptic and burnt coffee. She was still in her scrubs. Her hair was pulled back in a loose knot that had started to fall. She remembered thinking she should shower before crawling into bed.

There were two men on her porch. One chaplain. One officer. Both were too stern in their demenor.

"Mrs. Callahan?"

Her throat felt dry. She nodded.

The words were careful. Polished. Official.

Regret to inform you.

Ambush.

Convoy.

Missing, presumed killed in action.

Presumed.

She held onto that word like it was a railing in the dark.

Presumed meant they didn't know.

Presumed meant he could still be breathing somewhere.

Presumed meant this wasn't final.

She thanked them.

She actually thanked them.

Later, she would hate herself for that.

When they left, she stood in the doorway for a long time. The early light was thin and gray. Across the street, Mrs. Delaney's sprinklers clicked on, mist rising into the quiet. A dog barked. Somewhere, a screen door slammed.

The world did not pause.

It should have paused.

Inside, the house still held him.

His boots were still by the door.

His flannel was thrown over the back of a chair.

The dent in the couch cushion where he used to sit and stretch his bad shoulder.

She walked to the kitchen and picked up his coffee mug. It still had a faint ring at the bottom from the last morning he'd been home. He'd kissed her temple on his way out, promised to call when they reached base.

"I'll be back before you know it," he'd said.

She pressed the rim of the mug to her forehead and tried to remember the exact sound of his voice. Already it felt slippery, like something she could lose if she weren't careful.

They had met in their senior year of high school.

He was the quarterback everyone watched on Friday nights. She was the girl who worked double shifts at the diner because her mother couldn't keep a job longer than a month. He'd come in one night with a broken rib and a split lip, claiming he'd taken a bad hit during practice.

She'd known he was lying.

She'd handed him ice and told him to sit down.

That was the first time they had met, but it would become the catalyst for their journey together.

Three years of marriage. One deployment. A hundred small promises about the life they'd build when he came home for good.

They had picked out baby names once to see how they sounded.

Now there were two men in a government sedan driving away from her house, and she was alone with a word that wasn't quite a confirmation and wasn't quite hope.

Missing.

By noon, the town would know.

By evening, casseroles would line her counter.

By next month, someone would gently suggest she was young enough to start over someday.

They didn't understand.

Chase wasn't a chapter.

He was the whole book.

Aria set the coffee mug back in the sink. Her hands were steady. That would surprise her later. She thought she might scream. Or collapse. Or tear something apart.

Instead, she walked into their bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed.

On his pillow, there was still a small stain where his head had rested the last night before deployment.

He had been up in the attic repairing a leak when he caught his head on an exposed nail.

She lay down on that pillow, rubbing the dried bloody spot.

"I'll wait," she whispered into the fabric.

She didn't know then that waiting can turn into its own kind of life.