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

No one outside our home knew the extent of it. Not my parents. Not Karen. Not the doctors.

Only Noah and I knew.

I looked at the coffin. The lid was sealed. It was a box of absolute, suffocating darkness.

A terrifying, irrational thought clawed its way into my mind. I tried to push it away with the heavy blanket of logic—doctors don’t make mistakes like that, machines don’t lie, death is a biological fact—but Noah’s scream echoed in my ears.

She is cold.

“Daddy, please!” Noah sobbed, collapsing into my arms. “Don’t leave her in the dark!”

I stood up slowly. The noise of the crowd—the whispers, the pity, the judgment—faded into a dull roar, like static on a radio. I looked at Mr. Halloway, who was signaling the gravediggers to proceed.