Grief and gladness fused so tightly together that even a trauma nurse couldn’t have separated them.

I will love her fiercely for that hug until the day I die.

My father set the carving knife down, gripped the table’s edge with both hands, his eyes shining, and looked at me.

He nodded at his wife first, which, in the context of our house, was practically a declaration of war.

And my mother rose from her chair like a storm system pulling up off a frozen lake.

The Ghost on the Porch