I looked at the floor.
Neither of us said anything.
The next week became a blur.
Funeral home.
Flowers.
Phone calls.
Paperwork.
Relatives.
Obituaries.
People asking me if I was okay.
I kept saying yes.
I wasn’t.
I was planning my mother’s funeral with an engagement ring on my finger and a secret sitting like a stone inside my chest.
Everyone thought Ethan was being wonderful.
He answered phone calls.
He carried boxes.
He made coffee for my relatives.
He stood beside me during the funeral.
People told me,
“You’re lucky to have him.”
I almost laughed.
Because they didn’t know.
They didn’t know that three nights earlier, I had seen him in a hotel room with another woman.
They didn’t know I had watched those pictures alone in a hospital hallway.
They didn’t know that every time Ethan touched my shoulder, I remembered another woman’s hand on his chest.
During the funeral, I caught myself staring at my engagement ring.
Eight months earlier, Ethan had proposed to me on a beach.
He had gotten down on one knee.
He’d told me I was the person he wanted to grow old with.
I believed him.
Now the ring felt strangely heavy.
That night, after everyone went home, I sat alone in my mother’s bedroom.
Ethan knocked on the door.
“Can I come in?”
I didn’t answer.
He opened it anyway.
He sat across from me.
“I know you’re hurting.”
I looked at him.
“Do you?”
He lowered his eyes.
“I’m sorry.”
“You keep saying that.”
“I don’t know what else to say.”
“Then don’t say anything.”
He was silent.
I took off my engagement ring.
His eyes immediately went to my hand.
“I don’t want to make a decision right now,” I said.
He nodded.
“I understand.”
“No. You don’t.”
I put the ring on the table.
“My mother just died. I can’t spend the next week figuring out whether my fiancé has been sleeping with someone else.”
He swallowed.