Yesterday I died. Today I see my husband crying… but not because of me. In the “perspective of the dead,” she sees her husband holding her sister’s hand throughout the funeral. Everyone thinks they are comforting each other. But when she overhears their conversation in the private room of the funeral home, she is stunned: They are arguing about whether they should “erase the evidence” of having let her die…
Death wasn’t as cold as I imagined. It was like watching a film about your life through thick glass, the sound muffled but the images brutally sharp.
I was suspended just above the ceiling of the Green-Wood Funeral Home. Below, in a cream-colored silk-lined coffin, lay my body. Sarah Miller, 34, Marketing Director, the perfect wife, the devoted mother. They had applied too much makeup, concealing my lips, which were purple from suffocation in my final moments.
Everyone was there. Colleagues from the Downtown Seattle office, nosy neighbors from the suburban neighborhood of Bellevue, and, of course, my family.
My gaze was fixed on David, my husband.
He sat in the front row, his broad shoulders trembling. He was crying. Tears streamed down the gaunt cheeks of the man I had loved for ten years. Seeing him in such pain, my heart ached – a strange, soul-wrenching ache. I wanted to rush down, embrace him, and tell him I was still here.
But then, I stopped.
David’s hand.
His right hand rested on his knee, clenched so tightly that his knuckles turned white. And nestled within that hand, intertwined with his fingers, was Chloe’s hand – my younger sister’s.
Chloe sat close beside him, her head resting gently on his shoulder. She was crying too, her face wet with tears.
From the perspective of the mourners, it was a touching scene of mutual support. Aunt and father sharing the immense grief of loss. I heard Mrs. Mayer whispering in the back seat:
“Poor David. It’s a good thing Chloe was there to help take care of Leo. Otherwise, he would have collapsed.”
But from up here, I saw the way David’s thumb gently stroked Chloe’s hand. It wasn’t a comforting handshake. It was a handshake of complicity. Of despair. Of a secret kept secret in blood.
Suspicion flared up inside me like a fire. Chloe had always been jealous of me. Jealous of my career, my lakeside house, and even my perfect husband. Could it be…?
Memories of death flooded back. The night before last. Our anniversary dinner. Lobster in cream sauce. I had a severe seafood allergy. David knew that. He was the cook. He said it was chicken. I believed him.
When my throat started to swell, my trachea constricted, I tried to reach for the epinephrine pen in my purse. But it wasn’t there. David stood watching me, his face pale, his hands trembling, but his feet rooted to the kitchen floor. He didn’t call 911. He just stood there, watching me struggle, clawing at my throat until darkness swallowed me.
And now, he was holding my sister’s hand.
Rage raged, shaking my soul. They had killed me. My husband and my sister had been having an affair, and I was the only obstacle to be removed.
The crowd began to disperse as the ceremony ended. David stood up, still holding Chloe’s hand.
“I need to breathe,” David said, his voice hoarse.
“Let’s go to the lounge at the back,” Chloe whispered, glancing quickly around the room to see if anyone was watching. “We need to talk.”
They hurried toward the family room at the end of the hallway. I followed them, my rage burning. I wanted to hear them confess. I wanted to hear them gloat about the $2 million insurance payout. I wanted to hear them plan their new life in my corpse.
The oak door slammed shut. David released Chloe’s hand, leaned against the wall, and slid down to the floor, clutching his head and sobbing. It wasn’t the suppressed sob from before. It was a choked scream from his chest.
“Oh God, Chloe… I can’t take it anymore,” David groaned. “Seeing her lying there… I feel like a monster.”
Chloe knelt before him, her hands gripping his shoulders, shaking him violently. Her voice was sharp, devoid of the weakness it had been.
“David! Look at me! You can’t break down now. The police haven’t closed the case yet. The autopsy results won’t be available until next week.”
“What if they find evidence?” David looked up, his eyes red with fear. “What if they find out I swapped the allergy medicine bottle? What if they find out you hid the handbag?”
I hovered above them, screaming in despair: There! I knew it! You bastards!
But David’s next words left me speechless.
“You killed your wife… You killed Leo’s mother…”
“I didn’t kill my wife for an affair, David!” Chloe shrieked, tears welling up in her eyes, but they were tears of rage. “I killed her to SAVE my son!”
I was stunned. Save Leo? What did they mean?
Chloe stood up, pacing back and forth in the room, tearing at her hair.
“Do you remember what Dr. Anderson said? If Leo continues to take that ‘nutritional supplement’ that Sarah concocts herself every day, he won’t survive this winter. Stage 4 liver failure, David! He’s only 5 years old!”
The space around me seemed to shatter.
“Sarah has Munchausen by Proxy syndrome,” Chloe continued, her voice trembling but cruelly sharp. “She…”
She poisoned the boy little by little with low doses of arsenic mixed in vitamins, just so she could play the role of the ‘great mother’ caring for her sick child. So she could receive everyone’s pity and admiration on Facebook!
I wanted to cover my ears, but my soul has no hands. Memories I had buried suddenly flooded back, vivid and horrifying.
The mornings I carefully crushed the white pills into Leo’s glass of milk.
The way I smiled when the doctor said Leo’s condition was “mysterious and complex.”
The ecstatic satisfaction of holding weak Leo in my arms, receiving compliments from the neighbors: “Sarah, you’re so strong. Leo is so lucky to have you.”
I didn’t love a healthy Leo. I loved Leo who needed me to survive.
David buried his head in his pillow, his voice breaking: “I found her diary… She was planning to increase the dosage.” She wrote… ‘Leo needs to be hospitalized before Christmas so the family photo gets more likes.’
“That’s why we have to,” Chloe knelt down and hugged David, her voice soft but firm. “The law won’t believe us. She’s too clever, she’s the ‘perfect mother’ in society’s eyes. If we divorce, she’ll win custody and continue to kill the boy. We have no other choice, David. We have to let her go so Leo can live.”
David looked up, tears still streaming down his face. “How was Leo this morning…?”
Chloe smiled, a sad but relieved smile.
“This morning he asked for pancakes. For the first time in two years, he ate the whole thing without throwing up, David.” “The boy’s cheeks are starting to turn pink again.”
David closed his eyes, a sigh escaping his chest. The regret was still there, but behind it was a strange peace.
“Then… we have to erase all traces. The vial you swapped… you threw it into Lake Washington.”
“And the handbag,” Chloe said quickly. “I burned it with the old clothes this morning. No one will know Sarah was trying to find the EpiPen.”
“They’ll think it was an accident,” David whispered. “A tragic accident.”
“Yes,” Chloe gripped David’s hand again. “And Leo will live.” “That’s the only thing that matters.”
I recoiled, through the wall, drifting out of that suffocating room.
I looked back at my body in the coffin outside. The mourners were still passing by, looking at my face with pity.
“She was a wonderful mother,” someone said.
“She lived for her son,” another added.
They didn’t know. No one knew. Only the two of us trembling in that enclosed room knew the truth about the demon lying in this beautiful coffin.
David wasn’t crying because he missed me. He was crying because of the burden of guilt he would carry his whole life to protect our son from his own mother.
And when I saw Leo—our little son, his cheeks sunken from illness—sitting in the back seat, innocently playing with a toy car, for the first time I saw him smile so brightly.
I understood that I deserved to die.
Darkness It began to descend, thick and cold, engulfing my soul. There was no heaven awaiting me. I knew where I was going. And I also knew that David and Chloe would never let Leo know the truth about his mother.
It was their punishment, and also their final mercy.
