Prologue

The epitome of loneliness rests in one man, Richard McCaleb. "Rests" isn’t quite the right word. The loneliness that resides inside Mr. McCaleb doesn’t rest. His loneliness is a depressing black abyss, there just to make him utterly miserable. It works tirelessly to ensure that he is as despondent as he can possibly be at any given moment. It claws constantly at his insides, tearing him apart piece by piece, vowing not to stop until he is unrecognizable from an unfinished jigsaw puzzle.

He’d been so depressed for so long that he’d forgotten how to smile, which used to be his favorite thing in the world to do.

Some people say it’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. Richard used to believe in this, but now he’s not so sure. While he wouldn’t trade his (too few) years with Sonia for anything, he sometimes wished he’d never known her, never loved her. He wished he’d turned left instead of right. He wished he had stopped at that second restaurant, instead of letting his growling stomach choose the first. He wished he had never taken the trip that had sealed his fate. He wished that he’d never met the woman that changed his entire being. He wished she’d never been diagnosed with that fatal disease. Above all, he wished that he had died instead of Sonia, who had so much to offer the world, while he, especially now that she was gone, had nothing.

He’d spent an entire month, give or take a couple of hours, in bed after she died. He hardly moved,

let alone got up. He didn’t eat, just slept. He didn’t even get up to go to the bathroom. His bed was soiled with a pool of his defecation and urine—and tears—but he barely noticed. He lay in the dark, feeling nothing but pain—no hunger, no cold, certainly no warmth.

For the first couple of weeks, the only human contact he had was with Lucia, the weekly housekeeper. She would bring him food and try to get him out of bed, to get his blood circulating, but she couldn’t stand to go in after long, considering the smell and depression in the room.

The 27^th day after his beloved wife’s death dawned just like the three weeks prior to it. The only difference was that shortly after sunrise, a new visitor came barging into Richard’s abyss. It was his sister, and she did not come quietly.

"Richard, get up. You’re my brother and I love you, and I know what you’re going through. I know. I know how much you loved Sonia, and I’m so, so sorry you have to deal with this pain and loss. But please, please get up and pretend to lead a resemblance of a life. Do it for me. Do it for you… Do it for Sonia. Do you really think that she would want you to spend your life stewing in your own filth? Literally?"

Her words stung Richard in a way no other words ever had. He was so shocked—not shocked that Fiona had come in, gung-ho, breaking through his depression; he was used to that, for his little sister had always been brazen. No, he was shocked that in all his thinking and pondering, he hadn’t ever considered what Sonia would want now that she was gone. She’d tried, before she passed, to get him to discuss the aftermath, but he always found a way to avoid the subject—he was still too much in denial. Her only stipulation that she actually got through to him was that he couldn’t spend his life lonely.

"Love again," she told him. "You have so much to offer. You’re the reason I’ve been alive as long as I have." She said it with a smile, but smiling was the last thing he wanted to do. When she’d fallen asleep a few moments later, he’d broken down crying, knowing, swearing, that he would never love another as much as he loved Sonia—or at all.