The Cabin - Jasinda Wilder Page 0,39

be so loose around my wrist. It’s still massive on me, which reminds me of him.

210 days

Fuck, I miss him.

I finally looked through my photos on my phone. I’d started to forget what he looked like.

I watched a few videos of us: in the park, running together. Laughing at the old man in the grass behind us, hand shoved in a plastic grocery bag, trying to catch poop as it fell out of his dog’s butt.

Christmas, two years ago. We gave each other fleece onesies and nothing else. Or at least, that was the agreement. We both broke it, though. I bought him the watch I now wear all the time, and he bought me a Pandora bracelet and a pair of earrings.

I made it through maybe fifty photos and two videos, and then I was crying so hard I couldn’t see and my heart felt like it was going to crack into pieces. Or maybe I just felt the cracks more acutely.

I’ve worked eighty hours a week minimum since I went back to work. I haven’t cooked myself food once in that time—I live on coffee, takeout, fast food, and protein bars.

Tess moved out a few weeks ago, to her sleek top-floor condo downtown. She quit her job—she’s now doing something technical involving computers from home; she’s freelancing, doing her own thing instead of working remotely for some Silicon Valley megacorporation. She’s happy. Sowing her wild oats, she says. And still worrying about me.

Don’t, I tell her. I’m fine, I tell her.

But I’m a shitty liar, which she’s well aware of. I’m not fine. Not at all.

But hell, my husband died. I’ll never be fine again.

Part III

Redemption’s Song

Letters From The Dead, Part One

DING….DONGGGGGG…

The doorbell rings, surprising me, and I nick my thumb with the whittling knife.

“Shit,” I hiss. “Ouch—motherfucker!”

I stick my bleeding thumb in my mouth and taste pennies as I head for the front door. It’s 8 p.m., and I can’t even begin to fathom who the fuck could be at my door, let alone at 8 p.m. on a Saturday night.

Whoever the hell this is, he’s even taller than me, which is saying something, and he’s hunched at the shoulders, with droopy but intelligent eyes, and I’m reminded of a vampire from an old black-and-white movie.

“Nathan Fischer?” he asks, in a slow, deep, syrupy Southern voice.

“Yeah, that’s me. Who are you and you what d’you want?”

“May I come in? I shall be brief.”

“Not until I know who you are, and what you want.”

“Understandable. First, let me apologize for the late hour on a weekend.” He withdraws a business card; it’s thick, expensive card stock, ivory in color and printed in navy blue ink trimmed with gold leaf. This is the business card of a serious attorney.

Tomas Anton, Esq., specializing in estate law. Levine, Levine, & Anton, attorneys at law.

“What do I want with an estate lawyer?”

“It’s more what I want with you. I represent the estate of the late Adrian Bell.”

“Adrian…” I swallow. “Okay. Still not following what you want with me.”

He nods. “I understand your confusion, Mr. Fischer. Please, may I come in? What I have to say is private, and sensitive.”

I nod, open the door and admit him. My kitchen table is my makeshift workbench, so it’s littered with curled bits of shavings, and the piece I’m working on sits in the midst of the largest pile of shavings. It’s a bird, a life-size rendering of a raven caught mid-caw, wings ruffling.

Mr. Tomas Anton, estate attorney, ambles to the table, bends at the waist and peers at the nearly finished carving. “That is remarkable, Mr. Fischer. You are a true artisan.”

“Thanks. It’s a hobby.”

He has a briefcase, a slim leather thing that’s probably more accurately called an attaché. He pulls a chair away from the table, sweeps the pine shavings off with a long, elegant hand, and sits down. Props the case on his knees and pops the latches. Lifts the lid. Removes a manila folder, marked with my last name in calligraphic handwriting on the tab. Closes the lid and sets the folder on top of the case. Each movement is precise, considered.

His eyes lift to mine. I’m standing, arms crossed, hands tucked under my armpits. “Perhaps you would like to sit down.”

“You’re recommending?”

He nods. “Indeed.”

I sling a chair around, perch on it backward, arms folded over the back. “I’m listening, Mr. Anton.”

“I will get right to the point. Mr. Bell, with whom you were friends, made rather extensive arrangements prior to his tragic