I Heard My Dead Husband Laughing in His Casket

§01

The sounds from within the viewing room continued, a grotesque symphony of whispers and rustling fabric against the backdrop of funereal lilies whose sweet scent now seemed cloying, sickly.

Each soft moan was a hammer blow to the life I thought I had.

I flattened myself against the cool plaster of the hallway wall, my hand instinctively covering the slight curve of my belly.

My breath came in shallow, ragged bursts, a traitor in my own chest.

Inside were two people.

Brielle Langley, the girl my in-laws had raised but never formally adopted, her presence in the family a constant, ambiguous shadow.

And the man she called Drew, her boyfriend.

A man I’d only seen in passing—a stranger’s face, handsome in a generic way, always clinging to Brielle’s side.

I never imagined the “Spence” she whispered was a secret nickname.

I never imagined it was *my* Spence.

My perfect husband.

The man whose eulogy I was supposed to write.

The man who, at this very moment, was defiling his own memorial with the girl he called his sister.

To orchestrate such a monstrous lie… a faked car crash, plastic surgery, a new identity… all to be with her.

White-hot rage, pure and clean, sliced through the fog of my shock.

I wanted to throw the door open, to expose the writhing, contemptible truth to the portraits of Parrish ancestors lining the walls.

But their voices, smug and conspiratorial, held me in place.

“It was their fault, you know,” Brielle’s voice hardened, losing its breathy quality. “Your parents. Those sanctimonious old fools, so obsessed with what people would think. ‘It wouldn’t look right,’ they said. ‘A brother and his ward.’ We don’t share a drop of blood.”

A bitter, familiar laugh. Spencer’s laugh. “And their obsession with reputation is our greatest advantage now.”

“And you still married *her*,” Brielle accused, her tone turning petulant. “You’re a liar, Spence.”

“Rosalind was a means to an end, Brie. A tool,” he said, and the casual cruelty of it stole the air from my lungs. “She was the perfect incubator. Good family, good reputation. The Kellers and the Parrishes, a match made in university-town heaven. It was a role she played beautifully, you have to admit.”

My heart didn’t just break.

It stopped.

It turned to a block of ice in my chest.

“Once she produced an heir for the Parrish dynasty, their precious reputation would be secure,” he continued, his voice a low murmur against what I could only imagine was her skin.

“My duty would be done. No one would ever question my life choices again.”

“This whole plan was in motion for months. I went under the knife the moment we confirmed the pregnancy.”

“If I didn’t love you, why would I go through all this?”

“Look at us now. I’m not Spencer Parrish anymore. I’m just your Drew. We’re finally free.”

So that was it.

My role.

The incubator.

The two years of marriage, the shared meals, the feigned affection… all a performance.

My body, my baby… they were just props in his disgusting little play.

I stumbled back, my hand slipping from my belly.

The nausea wasn't from the pregnancy.

It was from him.

The man I had slept beside for two years.

A monster wearing my husband's skin.

And now, a monster wearing a stranger’s.

§02

I don't remember how I made it back to the master bedroom, the one Spencer and I had shared. Each step was a negotiation with gravity.

The cold night air seeped through a window left ajar, raising goosebumps on my arms. It felt like the house itself was exhaling a chill.

A dull ache started in my lower abdomen, a familiar twinge of protest.

Was it the baby, sensing my despair?

Or was it my body, finally rejecting the last piece of this poisonous charade?

I looked at my reflection in the vanity mirror.

The face of a grieving widow stared back, pale and hollow-eyed. A stranger wearing my skin.

A bitter laugh escaped my lips, a sound that was half sob, half snarl. It echoed in the silent, perfectly appointed room.

I had to kill her.

I had to kill the woman in the mirror.

The woman who was foolish enough to marry Spencer Parrish.

So a new one could be born from the ashes.

My hand rested on my belly.

Four months.

Just a cluster of cells, a nascent life.

A life conceived in a lie, for the sole purpose of chaining me to a family of ghouls.

This child, I decided with a terrifying clarity that cut through the pain, would not be born.

And Spencer Parrish?

He wanted to be dead.

I would grant him his wish.

I would make sure he became a ghost in the system, a man with no name, no past, and no future.

I would make him legally, officially, and irrevocably deceased.

The next morning, I found it in the polished mahogany desk in his study.

The folder.

Inside, the hospital’s medical certificate of death, the funeral home’s cremation authorization… everything but the one document that truly mattered.

The official, state-issued death certificate.

A cold smile touched my lips.

They were sloppy.

In their haste to stage Spencer’s death and protect their reputation, Jonathan and Beatrice had made a critical error.

They hadn't made his death official with the government.

Probably because they planned to resurrect him later under a new name, once the dust had settled.

My father was David Keller.

A detective.

I practically grew up in the Oak Creek Police Department.

I knew the system. I knew the paperwork.

And I knew exactly what to do.

I dressed carefully, choosing a simple black dress, letting the dark circles under my eyes complete the picture of a shattered widow.

Then I took Spencer’s wallet, his social security card, the household documents, and I walked out of that house of lies.

§03

The breakfast table was a tableau of nauseating hypocrisy.

Brielle sat pouting, pushing a piece of melon around her plate, while Spencer—disguised as Drew—was in the kitchen, humming as he made her a perfect, golden-brown pancake.

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