My dead husband.

“Happy birthday, Maggie.”

The call disconnected.

And in that instant, every truth I thought I had uncovered became meaningless.

Because either someone had found a cruel way to imitate the dead

PART 3 — THE VOICE OF THE MAN I HAD BURIED

For six years, I had trained myself not to listen for Michael’s voice.

That was what grief did to you.

At first, every sound resembled the person you had lost.

A stranger coughing in a grocery store.

A laugh from another room.

Footsteps behind you.

Then, slowly, painfully, the mind accepted what the heart refused to accept.

Michael was d/e/@/d.

I had stood beside his hospital bed.

I had held his hand.

I had attended his funeral.

I had watched a sealed casket disappear beneath white roses.

So when his voice came through Daniel’s phone and said, “Happy birthday, Maggie,” every certainty I possessed collapsed.