The Invisible Weight

They lay on the cold concrete floor, shoulder to shoulder, a single candle burning down between them. The flicker of the flame danced across the low ceiling, casting long, tired shadows. The air was still—almost too still—and the silence pressed down heavy, broken only by the occasional creak of the shelter settling or the quiet rustle of fabric as one of them shifted, searching for a slightly more forgiving patch of floor.

“Are you asleep?” Lily whispered.

Hep let out a soft snort. “Do I look asleep?”

“No. You look like someone trying really hard to pretend he doesn’t feel like his spine’s being slowly compressed by cold concrete.”

“Mm. You’ve got me pegged,” he said, staring at the ceiling. A moment passed.

“I think I forgot how to sleep,” Lily murmured.

“Same. Feels like it’d be some kind of betrayal. Like if I doze off, I’m letting my guard down. Letting them win.”

She hummed softly in agreement. “Besides,” she added, “my brain won’t stop chewing on everything.”

“Mine either,” he said. “It’s like it wants to keep rehashing things I already survived.”

They were quiet for a while again, the candle guttering just slightly as if even the flame had grown tired of being awake.

“Marcus used to do that,” Lily said suddenly, not quite meeting his gaze. “Lie awake, I mean. Said his dreams were too loud. Said that when he did sleep, it wasn’t restful. Just… reruns. Bad ones.”

Hep turned his head toward her slightly, not saying anything yet.

“He was an artist. Not the moody, beret-wearing kind—he painted landscapes. Real ones. Mountains. Rivers. Places that don’t feel like they belong to this world anymore. He could find beauty in a mud puddle if the light hit it right.”

Lily remembered the way Marcus used to hum when he painted—not full songs, just little fragments of melody that drifted from his throat like smoke from a dying fire, absentminded and soft. He always smelled faintly of linseed oil and rain, and his fingers were perpetually stained with flecks of dried color, even after scrubbing them raw. She remembered how he’d tilt his head when studying a canvas, as if the painting might whisper secrets to him if he listened hard enough. He was gentle in a world that didn’t reward gentleness, always stopping to rescue spiders or trace the veins in leaves with a reverence she never understood until the world began to fall apart. He had a laugh that warmed rooms, and a way of saying her name like it meant something ancient and important. Even when the power went out and the world outside the window turned to static and smoke, Marcus kept painting, candlelight flickering across his focused face as if he could paint beauty back into existence. She remembered lying next to him on the floor of their tiny apartment, his hand tucked beneath hers, and believing for just a second that love might be enough to keep the chaos out.

“You loved him,” Hep said gently.

Lily gave a slow nod. “Yeah. Still do, probably. Even now.”

“You think he’s still out there?”

She hesitated. “No. I think I just need to keep looking anyway.”

They let that sit between them, unsaid but understood.

After a moment, Hep took a deep breath. “My wife’s name was Clara.”

Lily turned her head toward him, blinking slowly in the candlelight.

“She was… wonderful. The kind of woman who always had tissues in her purse and stickers in her pockets. First grade teacher. Loved kids. Worshipped them. Could make a cardboard box feel like Christmas morning.”

“She sounds lovely.”

“She was,” Hep said, voice catching a little on the word. “We were married eight years. Tried to have kids for most of them. No dice. Something medical—never really mattered which of us it was. The result was the same.”

“I’m sorry,” Lily said softly.

“She wanted to adopt,” Hep continued. “Badly. Had binders full of info, names of agencies, kids’ stories clipped from newsletters. I kept putting it off. Told myself it was too risky, or the world was too broken, or we weren’t ready yet. Truth was, I was scared. Scared I wouldn’t be enough for a kid who already had a broken start. Scared I’d mess it all up.”

Lily reached out and gently brushed her fingers across his sleeve.

“She left me,” Hep said. “Two days before the world fell. Said she couldn’t spend the rest of her life waiting for me to catch up. That she needed to be a mother more than she needed to be a wife.”

“Oh, Hep…”

“I thought maybe she made it out. Somewhere. She was smart, you know? Capable.” He looked away, jaw clenched. “Three weeks later, I found her. Couple of miles from our house. Car had flipped. Looked like she’d tried to come back.”

He went quiet for a moment, staring into nothing.

“There was a note in her pocket,” he finally said, voice rough. “Said she was sorry. That she should’ve waited. That she still loved me. That she hoped I’d forgive her for not making it.”

Lily swallowed against the lump in her throat. “That’s not something you ever really get over.”

“No,” he agreed. “But you carry it anyway.”

The candle had burned down to a stub now, the light dim and golden, softening the harsh lines of their faces.

Lily sat up and curled her arms around her knees. “I didn’t know it was possible to feel this alone while lying next to someone.”

Hep gave a bitter chuckle. “Yeah. It’s a special kind of quiet.”

She glanced at him, then looked down at her boots.

“Hep?”

“Yeah?”

“You think…” she hesitated, voice barely more than a breath. “You think it’s time to start seeking forgiveness from someone who can never give it to you?”

The silence that followed wasn’t heavy or cold. It was thoughtful. Like the world holding its breath.

“I don’t know,” Hep said at last. “But I think maybe it’s time to try.”

Part 12 of a series