PART 1: The Woman Behind the Curtains

The first thing Nathaniel Brooks noticed when he returned home after ninety-three days was that every mirror in his house had been covered.

The second was that his wife wouldn’t look at him.

Not even when he whispered her name.

“Evelyn?”

She stood beside the kitchen stove, her back turned toward him, wearing a high-necked dress and a faded blue shawl pulled strangely close around her face.

For three months, Nathaniel had dreamed of this moment. Through thunderstorms on the Kansas plains, freezing nights beneath the stars, and endless miles behind stubborn cattle, he had pictured Evelyn running into his arms.

Instead, she stood perfectly still.

“You’re home early,” she said.

Her voice trembled.

Nathaniel removed his hat. “By four days. Thought I’d surprise my beautiful wife.”

She flinched at the word beautiful.

He noticed.

After eleven years of marriage, Nathaniel knew every expression on Evelyn’s face. He knew the little wrinkle between her eyebrows when she worried, the way she tilted her head when she was teasing him, and how her whole face softened whenever he entered a room.

But now she wouldn’t even turn around.

“Is something wrong?” he asked.

“No. You must be hungry. There’s stew.”

He glanced toward the parlor.

The large mirror above the mantel was draped in white cotton. The little looking glass beside the washstand wore a brown towel. Even the oval mirror in their bedroom, visible through the half-open door, had been covered with a bedsheet.

“Evelyn, why are all the mirrors covered?”

Her hand tightened around the wooden spoon.

“I got tired of looking at them.”

“All of them?”

“Please, Nathaniel. Just wash up for supper.”

He wanted to press her. But something in her voice stopped him.

It wasn’t anger.

It was fear.

And Nathaniel Brooks had never heard his wife sound afraid of him before.

At supper, she sat across from him with the oil lamp turned unusually low. Her shawl remained wrapped around her head and shoulders despite the warmth of the kitchen.

She barely touched her food.

Nathaniel told her about the cattle drive, about a stubborn steer that had nearly sent their cook into a river, and about young Billy Turner accidentally pouring coffee into his boots.

Usually, Evelyn would have laughed until tears gathered in her eyes.

Tonight, she only smiled faintly and kept her face turned toward the shadows.

“Did someone come by while I was gone?” he finally asked.

“A few neighbors.”

“Did something happen on the ranch?”

“No.”

“Then why does it feel like I’m sitting across from a stranger?”

Her spoon stopped moving.

For a moment, the only sound came from the wind brushing against the windows.

“Maybe,” she whispered, “you are.”

Nathaniel stared at her.

Before he could answer, she rose quickly, gathered the dishes, and turned away.

That night, Evelyn told him she would sleep in the small guest room because she’d been coughing and didn’t want him catching anything.

He knew she wasn’t coughing.

He also knew that pushing a frightened horse only made it run farther.

So he kissed the top of her covered head and said goodnight.

But sleep never came.

Near midnight, Nathaniel heard a quiet sound from the other side of the hallway.

Crying.

He stood outside the guest room with his hand raised to knock.

Then he heard Evelyn whisper something that made his chest tighten.

“Please don’t make him look at me.”

He remained there until the crying stopped.

The following morning, Nathaniel rode into town to collect supplies.

At the general store, Mrs. Abigail Foster greeted him with a smile that vanished almost immediately.

“Nathaniel Brooks. I didn’t know you’d returned.”

“Just yesterday.”

“And Evelyn? How is she doing?”

“That’s what I’d like to know.”

Mrs. Foster looked away.

Nathaniel leaned against the counter.

“Abigail, what happened while I was gone?”

“You ought to speak with your wife.”

“I’ve tried.”

The older woman pressed her lips together, visibly struggling.

Finally, she whispered, “She’s a brave woman, Nathaniel. Braver than most people in this town.”

“Brave for what?”

But Mrs. Foster wouldn’t answer.

Outside the store, Nathaniel noticed a little girl standing beside a wagon.

He recognized her immediately.

Six-year-old Lucy Miller, the blacksmith’s daughter, used to visit their ranch for Evelyn’s famous apple biscuits.

Lucy ran toward him.

“Mr. Brooks!”

He smiled and crouched. “Well, if it isn’t Miss Lucy. Have you been keeping my wife company?”

The child’s smile faded.

“Mama says I shouldn’t talk about that day.”

Nathaniel felt a coldness settle in his stomach.

“What day, sweetheart?”

Lucy glanced toward her mother, who was loading packages into the wagon.

Then she whispered, “The day Mrs. Brooks came into the fire for me.”

Nathaniel stopped breathing for a moment.

“What fire?”

Lucy’s eyes filled with tears.

“I knocked over the lamp at our house. Everything caught. I couldn’t get out because the kitchen door was stuck.”

Nathaniel slowly stood.

“And Evelyn?”

“She came through the smoke. She picked me up and wrapped me in her apron.”

The child touched her own cheek.

“The flames got her here. And here.” She pointed toward her neck.

Nathaniel suddenly remembered his wife’s shawl, the dark kitchen, and the white sheets covering every mirror.

He remembered how she had flinched when he called her beautiful.

“When did this happen?” he asked.

“Six weeks ago.”

Six weeks.

His wife had been suffering for six weeks while he rode beneath distant skies, believing everything at home was peaceful.

Lucy’s mother hurried over, her face pale.

“Nathaniel, I’m so sorry. Evelyn made us promise not to send word. She said you couldn’t leave the cattle drive, and she didn’t want you worrying.”

“How badly was she hurt?”

The woman lowered her eyes.

“The doctor treated her burns. She’s healing, but… some of the scars may never completely fade.”

Nathaniel turned toward his horse.

He could barely remember mounting.

By the time he reached the ranch, his hands were trembling.

He found Evelyn in their bedroom, standing before the covered oval mirror.

She held a small silver comb in one hand.

“Evelyn.”

She startled and quickly pulled her shawl over her cheek.

“You’re back already?”

He stepped inside.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Her face went white.

“Tell you what?”

“About the fire.”

The comb slipped from her fingers and struck the floor.

For several seconds, she said nothing.

Then her shoulders began to shake.

“I was going to tell you,” she whispered. “I wrote a letter almost every night. But I kept tearing them up.”

Nathaniel moved closer.

“Why?”

She backed away.

“Because I knew what would happen when you came home.”

“What would happen?”

Her voice broke.

“You’d look at me. And you’d remember the woman you married. And then you’d see what’s left.”

Nathaniel felt something inside him fracture.

“Evelyn…”

“Don’t.” She lifted one trembling hand. “Please don’t tell me it doesn’t matter until you’ve seen me.”

He stopped.

She slowly loosened the shawl.

Along the left side of her face, from her temple down toward her jaw, stretched the uneven pink and pale skin of healing burns. A scar continued beneath the collar of her dress.

She kept her eyes lowered, bracing herself for the silence she feared most.

Nathaniel didn’t speak.

He couldn’t.

Not because the woman before him was difficult to look at.

But because he was imagining her alone in a burning house, carrying a frightened child through the smoke, then enduring weeks of pain without the husband who had promised to stand beside her.

At last, he reached for her hand.

She pulled away.

“Don’t pity me, Nathaniel.”

“I’m not pitying you.”

“Then why are you crying?”

He hadn’t realized tears were running down his cheeks.

“Because you went through all of that alone.”

Evelyn stared at him.

“I thought you wouldn’t love me anymore.”

Nathaniel sank to his knees before her.

“Evelyn Brooks, I didn’t spend eleven years loving a reflection in a looking glass.”

Her lips trembled.

He gently took her hand again.

“I loved the woman who stayed awake nursing me through fever. The woman who rebuilt this ranch with me when we had nothing. The woman who walked into a fire because a little girl needed her.”

He pressed her fingers against his chest.

“And I love the woman standing before me now.”

Evelyn covered her mouth as she began to sob.

For the first time since his return, she allowed him to hold her.

They remained together on the bedroom floor until sunlight shifted across the boards.

Eventually, Nathaniel stood and approached the covered mirror.

“May I?” he asked.

Evelyn hesitated, then nodded.

He carefully removed the sheet.

For a long moment, she couldn’t bring herself to look.

Then Nathaniel stood beside her, their hands intertwined.

“There’s my wife,” he whispered.

And Evelyn, seeing his eyes filled with love rather than horror, began to cry again.

But just as Nathaniel leaned down to kiss her forehead, three urgent knocks shook the front door.

A man’s voice called from outside.

“Mr. Brooks! It’s Sheriff Dalton!”

Nathaniel frowned.

“What is it, Sheriff?”

The answer made Evelyn’s face drain of color.

“It’s about the fire at the Miller house. We’ve discovered something your wife needs to know.”

Then the sheriff added, in a voice suddenly grim:

“That lamp didn’t fall by accident.”