“You made cinnamon pancakes. Rebecca helped with the eggs, which meant I spent half the morning fishing shells out of the bowl.”
Carol smiled. “She was so proud of herself.”
“She still makes them for the boys. Your recipe.”
Her eyes filled, and I looked down at our hands to give her a moment.
“People always said she looked like me,” she said.
“They did.”
“Except for her eyes.”
Rebecca’s eyes were green, clear and striking. Carol had warm brown eyes, and mine were gray.
“She always did have beautiful eyes,” I said.
Carol turned toward the window. When she spoke again, her voice had changed.
“Walt, have I been a good wife?”
I leaned closer. “How can you even ask me that?”
“Please. I need to hear it.”
“You’ve given me a wonderful life.”
Her face crumpled. I thought she was afraid of leaving it.
“Promise me you’ll do something,” she said. “Before I tell you what it is.”
“Anything.”
“Find Anna.”
My hand stopped moving.
Carol swallowed. “You’ll understand when you find her. And please… forgive me in advance.”
I stared at her. “What does Anna have to do with us?”
She shut her eyes.
“Carol, what am I supposed to forgive?”
A nurse came in to check on her. By then Carol was exhausted, struggling to stay awake, and I was asked to let her rest.
I thought we would talk again when she felt stronger.
She never did.
PART 2: The Woman Who Left
After the funeral, I kept finding things Carol had set down with every intention of picking them up again.
Her glasses on the recliner. A grocery list under a magnet. A crossword with three answers missing.
I left all of it where it was.
Rebecca called every evening from Columbus. Sometimes she talked about the boys. Sometimes we listened to each other breathe until one of us could manage a sentence.
I didn’t tell her about Anna. I could hardly explain it to myself.
Forty years earlier, I had asked Anna to marry me. We were young, and I was about to leave Millfield for a job. I had very little money, but I had already started imagining an apartment with her books on the shelves.
Her answer arrived in a letter.
She said she couldn’t leave with me. That we wanted different lives. That I shouldn’t come looking for her.
I had read it so many times that the paper softened at the folds.
My mother, Ruth, told me to respect Anna’s decision.
“You can’t make someone choose you, Walter.”
I believed her. Eventually, I believed I had recovered.
But sitting alone after Carol’s funeral, I could remember exactly how it had felt to hold that letter.
For two weeks, I blamed Carol’s request on medication and exhaustion. Then I would hear how carefully she had said Anna’s name, and that explanation would fall apart.
I began contacting people from college.
Most remembered Anna but had lost touch. Finally, someone gave me a number for her old friend Diane.
The moment I introduced myself, her tone hardened.
“I don’t have anything to tell you.”
She ended the call before I could explain.
A week later, she called back.
“I spoke to Anna,” she said. “She said I could give you her number.”
I gripped the phone. “Where is she?”
“Pittsburgh. She moved there years ago to be near her sister.”
Diane paused.
“Whatever you have to say, Walter, be honest with her.”
I didn’t understand the warning until later.
When Anna answered, I recognized her voice beneath the years.
“It’s Walt.”
There was a long silence.
“Yes,” she said at last. “Diane told me you might call.”
I explained about Carol. The illness, the funeral, the request I couldn’t make sense of.
“Could I come see you?” I asked.
