—Isaiah 43:2
To you: the reader who has followed me from Lakeview, Virginia, to Whisper Lake, Maine. May you find joy in every sunrise and peace in every circumstance, and may the fullness of His love and mercy sustain you through every heartache.
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Charlotte Murray hated the lake.
She hated the blue-green water that gleamed like black ink in the moonlight, the quiet lap of waves against the shore, the whisper of damp air rustling through the tall reeds that bordered her yard. She hated it, but she couldn’t make herself leave.
Six years after her four-year-old son, Daniel, had wandered outside and drowned, five and a half years after her husband, Adam, left, five years after the divorce was finalized, and here she sat, the old swing creaking as she rocked in the early-morning darkness. How many sleepless nights had she spent staring out at Whisper Lake, wondering what she could have done to change things?
Too many.
Her friends said she needed to move on. Her therapist had encouraged her to rent out the cottage, move into town and create a new life for herself. One not defined by the tragedy of losing her son. It’s time to join the living again, he’d said as if there were some limit to grief and some timeline for recovery that she should be following.
She hadn’t been back to see him since.
Grief eased. It didn’t go away. Not even as time passed or environments changed.
“Besides,” she murmured, “I’ve got a job, friends, volunteer work. It’s not like I spend all of my time staring at the lake and dwelling on what I can’t change.”
Clover whined and dropped his boxy head on her knee, the added weight stopping the swaying motion of the swing. At seventy pounds, the poodle mix was double the size the county animal shelter had said he would be. Charlotte didn’t mind. He filled up more of the house, took up a little of the extra space that had been left when Daniel died and Adam walked out.
She scratched behind Clover’s floppy ears, kissed his velvety muzzle. “Ready to go inside?”
He was on his feet before she finished speaking, trotting to the back door, doing his goofy little poodle prance. She’d chosen him out of desperation, wanting something to keep the silence from smothering her. Before Daniel’s death, she and Adam had talked about getting a therapy dog, one that would bond with their son and maybe enter his solitary world. They’d planned it as a Christmas surprise.
Daniel had died in the summer. She didn’t remember the Christmas following his death. She only remembered the emptiness of the house after Adam packed his bags and walked out. She remembered the heaviness of the air and of her sorrow. She remembered the anger that had simmered beneath the surface of that.
She had thought their relationship was strong enough to weather anything.
But anything had not included the death of their son.
She stepped into the mudroom, old linoleum crackling beneath her feet. A wide doorway led into the 1920s-style kitchen, the farmhouse sink and yellow subway tile just quaint enough to be chic. She and Adam had painted the walls ivory and the old pine cabinets bright white. Adam’s job as deputy sheriff of Whisper Lake, Maine, hadn’t paid much, but they’d managed to make the cottage their home. They’d been a team back then. Daniel’s autism diagnosis had tossed them into the deep water of parenting, and they’d clung to each other to keep from going under.
That had changed after Daniel’s death. Somehow, rather than mourning together, they’d mourned apart, their grief a raw wound between them, a deep chasm that neither had been able to cross.
Even after so many years, Charlotte sometimes wondered if she could have changed things. A word spoken into the silence. A hug offered at just the right time. Tears shared rather than hidden. Maybe they’d still be together.
But maybe not.
Probably not.
They’d been middle school kids when they’d met. Best friends. Allies. High school sweethearts. Too young to understand how challenging and heartbreaking life could be.
Floorboards creaked as she stepped into the small living room. Cozy was the word her grandmother had always used. Tiny was a more accurate description. When Daniel died, Charlotte and Adam had been saving money to build an addition. Instead, they’d purchased a burial plot and a casket.
Charlotte