As we left the grave, my son screamed, “Mom is cold! I felt her hand!” My sister hissed, “Stop this embarrassment, she’s gone,” trying to drag him away. I ignored her and grabbed a shovel. I dug until my hands bled. When the lid finally popped open, the crowd froze in horror. My wife’s eyes were wide open, and the desperate scratches on the inside of the lid revealed a truth that made the police arrest my sister instantly

The crowd gasped. Someone behind me began to weep loudly.

“Thomas, please,” Karen begged. “Think about what you’re seeing. You want Noah to see… to see her like that again? It will traumatize him forever.”

I hesitated. That was the fear. What if I was wrong? What if we opened the lid and she was… gone? Just a shell? The image of her dead face, gray and waxy, would be burned into Noah’s mind forever. It could destroy him.

But then Noah looked up. His eyes were red-rimmed, but clear.

“She’s waiting, Daddy,” he whispered.

That broke something in me. It snapped the tether of social convention and fear.

I pulled a multitool from my pocket—a small, silly thing I carried for fixing loose screws around the office. I pushed past Mr. Halloway.