My husband and I built a quiet, steady life together. A life of trust, of small joys, of ordinary stability. But there was one thing in our house I was never allowed to touch—a closet at the end of the hall, always locked. Thomas insisted it was nothing but old paperwork. I believed him. Until he died. After the funeral, I couldn’t stop thinking about that closet. What was behind that locked door? My curiosity, buried for decades out of love and trust, finally got the better of me. I

My son had only been back at kindergarten for one week when he climbed into the car, buckled halfway into his seat, and said something that made my whole world tilt. “Mom,” he said brightly, like he was telling me about snack time, “Ethan came to see me.” Ethan had been dead for six months. For a second, I couldn’t breathe. The parking lot around us was loud—parents chatting, car doors slamming, teachers calling goodbye—but inside the car, everything went silent. I forced my face to stay calm. “Oh, honey,”