I showed up at the hospital to surprise my husband during his shift. But the second one of his coworkers saw me, all the color left his face. Then his eyes filled with tears. “He hasn’t said a word to you, has he?” Ben and I had been married eleven years, and for every one of those years, I had shared him with the hospital. He was a remarkably gifted surgeon.

A slim woman stepped out onto the grass in a faded knit sweater, her dark hair pulled into a loose braid down her back.

She walked toward the headstone with the relaxed comfort of someone who had walked that same path a hundred times.

Brian got to his feet as she came near, wiping his wet face while she spoke quietly to him in the afternoon breeze.

Then she moved forward, put her arms firmly around his waist, and drew him into a long, familiar hug.

Brian held her in return with the silent desperation of a man hanging on to the one person who understood his grief.