My eyes traveled to marital status.
Divorced.
That word broke something the first line had not.
I traced it once with my finger.
“They put divorced.”
Wade looked away.
“Of course they did.”
My laugh sounded thin.
I had signed those papers in a room that smelled like copier toner while my daughter held my purse and pretended not to cry. Randall’s attorney had handled most things. Randall himself had not come.
I had told myself afterward that perhaps it was better.
Now his death certificate carried the result.
Divorced.
Not husband.
Not thirty-five years.
A box checked by someone who had never known us.
I placed the certificate beside the ring.
“What else?”
Wade said nothing.
I reached deeper into the shoe box.
There were medical records bound with a black clip. Not copies printed afterward. Original discharge sheets, oncology summaries, imaging reports, medication lists. Some were wrinkled. One had a brown stain near the corner.
