Chapter 7: Debrief

The market in Pine Landing was the only store within ten miles, and it had a corkboard by the register.

I was holding a pack of newborn diapers when I saw the flyer.

It was a white sheet with a black border, pinned between a lost cat and a kayak for sale.

STATION 9 FAMILY MEMORIAL.

Saturday at two o'clock, in the firehouse hall.

In loving memory of two babies who never got to come home.

Below it, in smaller type, was a line from my husband.

"My son's name was never spoken, because I never got the chance to say it."

I read it twice.

Then I tore the flyer off the board, and the woman at the register looked up.

"Is that yours?" she said.

"It is now."

I paid for the diapers and walked out to Ansel's truck with the flyer folded in my fist.

He was waiting on the porch when I got home.

Bree had taken her own baby upstairs.

I put the flyer on the porch rail in front of him and smoothed it flat.

He read it standing up.

"Saturday," he said. "That's nine days."

"They're burying my son with a speech."

"They're burying a paper."

"Don't be clever."

"I'm not." His voice was low. "Two men are going to stand in front of the whole department and cry over children who are alive."

"They stood in a day room and held someone's hand while I burned."

"I know what they did."

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Day Two Sisters Burned for Husbands Who Never Came from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.