Chapter 11 - What We Finally Buried
Before the new treatment began, Sophie asked to leave the hospital for one afternoon.
Dr. Brooks allowed it.
Two hours.
No crowds.
No restaurants.
No unnecessary exposure.
I drove.
Sophie didn't tell me where we were going until we were halfway there.
“The cemetery.”
I glanced at her.
“What cemetery?”
“The one by St. Matthew's.”
I understood.
We had never buried our babies.
There had been no funerals.
No graves.
No names on stones.
Our grief existed without a physical place.
Sophie held a small paper bag on her lap.
“What is that?”
“You'll see.”
The cemetery was almost empty.
We walked toward an old oak tree near the edge of the property.
Sophie stopped beneath it.
“Why here?”
“I came here after the second miscarriage.”
“You did?”
“Sometimes.”
I had never known.
She opened the bag.
Inside were three small white stones.
Each had a date written on it.
The dates we lost our pregnancies.
My chest tightened.
She handed me the first.
“I never named them.”
“Neither did I.”
“I thought maybe that was why I couldn't let go.”
I stared at the stone.
“We don't have to name them.”
“I know.”
She knelt carefully.
I joined her.
We placed the stones beneath the tree.
No ceremony.
No priest.
No prepared words.
Just us.
Sophie touched the first stone.
“I loved you before I knew you.”
Her voice shook.
Then the second.
“I loved you even when I was afraid to.”
Then the third.
She stopped.
Her shoulders trembled.
I placed my hand over hers.
“I didn't know about you.”
My voice failed.
I tried again.
“But I wish I had.”
Sophie leaned into me.
That was the first time she had done it since before the divorce.
I wrapped my arm around her.
And there, beneath an oak tree with no names carved into marble, we finally mourned our children together.
Not as a colonel and his ex-wife.
Not as two people trying to decide who was responsible.
As their parents.
When we stood to leave, Sophie wiped her face.
“I spent years thinking you didn't care.”
“I spent years pretending I didn't hurt.”
“That's not the same thing.”
“No.”
I looked at the stones.
“But I think they came from the same fear.”
She nodded slowly.
On the drive back, she fell asleep against the window.
At a red light, I looked at her.
For the first time since the divorce, I didn't wish I could go backward.
Going backward would only make me the same man again.
May you like
I wanted something harder.
I wanted to become someone worthy of whatever came next.
