I hadn't thought much of it at the viewing, the pale band of untanned skin where the ring should have been. They'd removed it for the autopsy, I assumed, or maybe it had gone missing in the crash. Now the idea of having it back felt strange. Wrong, almost. Like he should have taken it with him.
"I can come now," I said.
"That's fine. Just bring your ID and we'll get you sorted."
Sorted. Like I was picking up dry cleaning.
I hung up and stared at the half-clean casserole dish in the sink, soap bubbles dissolving into nothing.
The state police barracks was on the access road behind the county courthouse, the kind of place you'd drive past a hundred times without noticing. Inside, the fluorescent lights hummed over scuffed linoleum. The air smelled of floor wax and stale coffee, a bureaucratic scent that stuck to the back of my throat. A woman behind plexiglass barely looked up when I approached.
"I'm here to pick up personal effects," I said. "My husband’s, Ryan Hartley."
She nodded, already turning to her computer. "ID?"
I slid my driver's license through the gap in the plexiglass. She glanced at it, typed something, then disappeared through a door behind her desk.
I stood there, hands in my coat pockets, staring at a bulletin board covered in outdated safety posters. I knew how to move through bureaucracy, at least. Eight years processing death certificates and land transfers at the town hall had taught me that much. You sign where they tell you, you take what they give you, you walk out.
The woman returned with a manila envelope, a clipboard, and a thinner folder she set to one side. "Personal effects and the vehicle recovery report," she said. "Sign for both."
I signed without reading, my handwriting shaky. She took the clipboard back, checked the forms with the efficiency ofsomeone who did this every day, then slid the envelope toward me.
"That's everything," she said. "Sorry for your loss."
The phrase was automatic. She was already looking past me to see if anyone else was waiting.
I picked up the envelope. It was heavier than I expected. I turned and walked out, clutching it against my chest like something fragile.
The cold air hit me as soon as I stepped outside. I made it to my car and slid behind the steering wheel. The lot was nearly empty, just a few cruisers lined up near the building.
I sat there with the envelope on my lap. The vehicle recovery report sat on the seat beside me. I didn't open it. Whatever was left of the car wasn't what I was here for.
I peeled back the metal clasp and tilted the contents onto the passenger seat.
His wallet, brown leather worn soft at the edges. I held it to my nose, hoping for the scent of his cologne or the cedar of his dresser drawer, but it just smelled like cold plastic and the inside of an evidence bag. His watch, the one I'd given him for our fifth anniversary, the face cracked. A set of keys. And his phone, the screen spiderwebbed from impact but still intact.
The wedding ring came last, rolling out into my palm. Gold, simple, engraved on the inside with our wedding date.
I stared at it, felt its weight on my hand. It had been on his finger when he died and now it was here, in a parking lot, in my palm, and he was gone.
I held the ring, waiting for the wave of grief to hit. For the memory of our wedding day, the way he'd slipped it on my finger and kissed me in front of everyone. But all I could think about was someone collecting these things. A deputy crouched on the shoulder of the road, picking through the wreckage. The reservoir behind him, Route 9 stretching out into darkness.
I set the ring on the dash and picked up the phone.
The screen was dark, the battery dead. I turned it over in my hands, feeling the crack spiderweb across the glass. There was a smudge of something dark along the edge. Dirt, maybe, or dried blood. My thumb moved to wipe it away, a reflex, before I snatched my hand back. I didn't want to know what it was. I didn't want to clean it.
I had a charger in the car. I always kept one in the console for emergencies.
I plugged the phone in and waited.
Chapter 3
Olivia
Three minutes later, the screen came to life.
The Apple logo appeared, white against black, glowing in the dimly lit car like a ghost. Then it dissolved into his lock screen.
