Things We Set on Fire

by Deborah Reed

She couldn’t protect her sister, or any of them against what was to come, and she supposed what she felt was hopeless, helpless. Utterly alone. Then she remembered—as if her marriage had happened decades ago in some forgotten country—that somewhere in the world she had a husband. She’d married a man with the intention of spending her life with him, he for her and she for him, a kind and loving buffer against the harsh edges of the world, a man so different from herself, their life together so unlike any she had known, that she could not help but forget all about the person she used to be. But how strange that all sounded now. And yet how perfectly correct it rang out when they began, how right the promise declared itself, a win-win deal cut and shaken upon, and everything that followed, everything built up and out around them was evidence of their agreement. And now? So soon, the marriage was already feeling past. And looking back she had no way of knowing if Rudi had ever actually loved her, or if he loved her still. What had he seen when he looked at her all those years? Had she ever allowed herself to be seen?