One morning, Thomas asked me, as carefully as a man stepping onto thin ice, “Do you have family nearby, Nancy? Anyone looking in on you?”
“Just a distant cousin. Raymond. He’s been calling more lately.”
Thomas’s jaw tightened, just for a second. Then it relaxed, and he changed the subject to the weather.
I didn’t think much of it at the time.
“Do you have family nearby?”
***
Raymond’s calls got stranger that same week.
“Are you seeing anyone, Nancy? At your age, you shouldn’t be alone. Family should have each other’s backs.”
“I’m fine, Raymond.”
“Have you thought about a will? God forbid, but you know. Somebody responsible ought to be listed.”
“I said I’m fine.”
He asked about my bank and the apartment. He mentioned Aunt Margaret again and how he’d “helped her with everything” at the end. I remembered Margaret dying alone in a rented room, and I couldn’t figure out why that sat so wrong in my stomach.
“Are you seeing anyone?”
I brushed it off. I always brushed things off. That was my whole life in one sentence.
***
Then came the afternoon.
Thomas asked me to sit down.
His hand found mine on the blanket. It was cold and light as a bird.
“Sweetheart,” he said, “I feel terrible asking you this.”
By then, our conversations had become warmer with each passing day.
“Ask.”
Then came the afternoon.
“I’ve loved you my entire life. I know I’m going to die soon. But I’ve always dreamed of marrying you. Will you marry me? It’s my last wish.”
I could barely breathe. I couldn’t even blink.
Fifty-six years of “what if,” and here it was, thin and dying in a hospital bed, asking me the one question I’d never let myself imagine.
A voice in my head that sounded exactly like Raymond hissed, “Foolish old woman, don’t you dare!”
And another voice, the one I’d silenced at 17, said, “Say yes! For once in your life, say yes!”
“I’ve loved you my entire life.”
Thomas had stage 4 cancer. I decided I would grant his final wish.
“Yes,” I whispered. “Thomas, yes.”
His eyes filled with tears. So did mine.
“You won’t regret it,” he said. “I promise you that, Nancy. On my life, you won’t regret it.”
I didn’t understand then why he’d said it like that, like a vow that meant more than the wedding itself.
I only understood I’d just agreed to marry a dying man; my hands wouldn’t stop shaking, and somewhere across town, Raymond was probably already dialing my number.
I would grant his final wish.
***
The wedding took place three days later, right there in Thomas’s hospital room.
A nurse stood as our witness, and so did a quiet man in a gray suit who introduced himself as Walter, Thomas’s attorney.
I thought it was a little odd to have a lawyer at a bedside wedding. But my high school sweetheart squeezed my hand, and I let the thought go.
His eyes shone when he said his vows. Mine did too.
I thought it was a little odd.
***
After the small ceremony, Walter pulled a folder from his briefcase and set it on the rolling tray table.
“Just a few papers, Nancy,” he said kindly. “Standard things. Take your time.”
I didn’t take my time. I signed each one right where he pointed, trusting Thomas the way you trust the sun to come up.
***
That evening, my phone rang. Raymond again.
“Have you lost your mind?!” he snapped when I told him about the marriage. “Marrying a dying man you barely know?!”
“Take your time.”
“I’ve known him longer than I’ve known you,” I said quietly.
“Nancy, listen to me. You’re being manipulated. Some stranger sees an old nurse with a pension and dangles a sob story, and you fall for it? Annul it! Today!”
“No, I won’t.”
“You foolish woman! You don’t understand what you’re doing!”
I hung up.
“You’re being manipulated.”
***
A month later, Thomas was gone.
He passed in the early morning, peaceful, with my hand in his. The grief hit me harder than I expected, considering we’d only had a handful of weeks. But sometimes a handful of weeks can hold almost six decades within them.
The funeral was small. I stood by the grave and let myself cry.
Raymond showed up, of course.
He waited until the others had drifted toward their cars before he approached.
Thomas was gone.
“You know I’m your only living relative,” he said, adjusting his tie. “Family should handle family. Foolish old women shouldn’t sign papers they don’t understand, Nancy.”
“I understood every word Thomas said to me.”
He gave me a thin smile. “I helped Aunt Margaret with everything at the end. Everything. She was grateful.”
Something cold moved through me. I remembered how Thomas’s jaw had tightened whenever Raymond’s name came up.
“Family should handle family.”
“I need to go home, Raymond.”
“We’ll talk soon,” he said. “About your affairs.”
I walked to my car without answering.
***
The following morning, someone knocked on my door.
I opened it to find Walter holding a small wooden box under his arm. He gave me the same quiet smile he’d worn at the wedding.
“We’ll talk soon.”
“May I come in?”
I stepped aside. He set the box on my living room table and folded his hands.
“Thomas asked me to deliver this the day after his funeral. Not before. I’ve also sent Raymond a formal letter this morning, notifying him, as your next of kin, that your affairs are under a trust. He’ll have it by noon.”
“What?” I asked.
Walter smiled. “Thomas was right. You finally walked right into his trap.”
“May I come in?”
I sat. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking.
Walter drew a folded page from his jacket pocket. “Thomas left instructions I’m to read exactly as he wrote them.”
The lawyer smoothed the page and read gently, in a voice not quite his own.
“‘My darling Nancy, forgive me, but I set a trap, and you were never meant to be the one caught in it.'”
My breath caught. I gripped the edge of the table.
My hands wouldn’t stop shaking.
Walter looked up.
“Those papers you signed at the wedding did more than accept what Thomas left you. One was a new will naming a discretionary trust I administer, funded entirely by Thomas’s estate for your support. Another was a durable power of attorney. You named me, not Raymond, to speak for your affairs if you ever couldn’t.”
The lawyer cleared his throat before continuing.
“One was a new will.”
