They Held My Funeral While I Was Still Breathing. Then My Seven-Year-Old Nephew Looked Into the Coffin and Said, “Mommy, Aunt Madelyn Is Looking at Me”

He’d lost weight in the orange jumpsuit, but he still had the smooth, reasonable calm that had convinced me for seven years that he was the sanest man in any room.

“You look well, Madelyn,” he said into the phone.

“For a woman who was supposed to be dead and buried,” I said, “I suppose I do.”

His face hardened.

“I never wanted it to go like this.”

“How did you want it to go?” I asked.

“You were waiting for me to stop breathing.”

“You were asleep,” he said, without a flicker.