At first everyone came. Relatives, friends, acquaintances, people who wanted to do the right thing, people who wanted to feel they had done the right thing, people who said things like “it was God’s will” and deserved to be thrown out a window. Others said “be strong.” Others “time will help.” Nobody knew that every phrase sounded like a shoe on a bruise.

Then they began to thin out.

That isn’t cruelty. It’s a human mechanism. People can bear looking at an open wound for a while. Then they need it to turn into a story, to acquire a summary, to stop staining the room.