One Child Left

"I have only one more child left to bury. What is it you want? Tell me!"

Veronica yelled out into the darkness, the same thing she'd done four times before now. And she knew the answer, and he knew that she knew it.

"Why must we dance like this every time?," he asked. "Haven't I been good to you?"

Through tears, the pain, the heaviness of it all, she cried out, "Good to me? Are you insane?"

"Yes," he said, adding some ice, "but that's beside the point. I have been good to you. I like you, Veronica, I really do. That's why I told you what I wanted right up front. Most people, I make them guess. And they never do, so they lose everything.

"You've still got something left, Veronica. But time is growing small."

She stood up, still in the black dress of mourning from the funeral of her son Jacob, fourth of her five children, and paced, the way she always did when a decision had to be made. Her eyes scanned the darkness, looking for a glimpse of her tormentor, but she'd never seen him, and never would. He wasn't there, but he was everywhere, nonetheless.

"Need a little help making a decision, Veronica?," came that damned hiss again. "Need a reminder?"

"No, I don't, I don't want to hear it again!"

"Oh, but I love thinking about it so. You're starting to annoy me, I'm almost enjoying hurting you. Almost. Let's see, first there was Renee..."

He laughed as she put her fisted hands on either side of her head over her ears, scrunched her eyes shut, tried not to listen, and continued, "She was the eldest, the smartest, the one all the dreams of a future seemed the best for. I enjoyed taking her. Have I ever told you she died happy?"

"A million times," Veronica replied, her voice a mixture of frustration and weariness, "she died skiing. She loved skiing."

"She was the apple of your eye, so I took it easy on her. Now Nathaniel, he was the bad seed, jealous of his sister."

Veronica stomped her foot, growled instead of making words to argue.

"He was, Veronica, he was. And I made him hurt. They still haven't found all of that boy."

"Stop it! Stop it NOW!"

"No, I'm showing my generosity, trying to make your decision easier. Your youngest is still in line. Want me to show him off the coil the way I did Cheryl?"

She knew closing her eyes wouldn't take the vision of Cheryl hanging from the balcony away, but she couldn't help it, and she saw that note burned like a brand into her sight: "The pain, now it ends for me. Still more to come for others."

"Oh, man, the pictures I showed little Cheryl. Now, Jacob, my masterpiece if I do say so myself. He didn't want to go to war, but, oh, how a little, uh, slip-up in the bedroom and an armed, angry dad can change things! Hey, don't worry about that, by the way. I took care of it."

"You did...never mind, I don't want to know. How long do I h--"

"I tire of this game, Veronica. The time is now, make your choice!"

Oh, the world for a way to go back in time, to never had asked for what she asked for. Better poor and unwanted than to have the world at your feet and tormented, she thought.

"OK, I'll do it! If I do, will you spare Joseph?"

"Have I ever lied to you?"

With one more laser-like stare around, she turned on her heel, reached the door and went out. Standing in the hallway was her husband Jason. He studied the floor, couldn't look at his wife, feared letting go of his pain when she'd had so much of her own to deal with.

She locked her arms around his waist, and hugged him tight, and that pressed out the last of his resolve, and he wept in front of her for the first time ever, for the countless time since the losses began.

He suffers, too, she thought.

Into the moonlight through the window, they moved, still holding on to each other. Taking her finger and lifting his chin to meet her eyes, she smiled. "It's over now," she said, taking a step back.

When Joseph found them seconds after the crashing of glass, they were still holding on to each other, his mother's tortured last gasps coming harsh and watery.

Over his shoulder, her eyes focused, and she finally saw him.

"Not the way I wanted it," he said coldly, "but a deal's a deal."