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.

Neither woman answered, and their complete stillness sent a sudden chill down my back.

“Will someone please tell me where my husband is right now?”

The air felt heavy and stifling, as though everyone in that bustling corridor was guarding a secret I had somehow shown up too late to prevent.

Just then Paul, Brian’s closest surgical partner, came around the corner with a stack of medical folders tucked under his arm.

Paul had spent countless summer afternoons at cookouts in our backyard, and he was normally the calmest doctor in the whole building.

That afternoon, though, his hands were visibly shaking, and his face was as white as a fresh bandage.