Fallon
The sun tracks across the sky as the afternoon wears on. The twins exhaust one game and invent another, their creativity seemingly boundless. Rebecca remains engaged, suggesting new activities when interest wanes, mediating the tiny conflicts that arise between siblings.
And I sit. Silent. Watching. A ghost at the edge of a life I never had, witnessing the mother Rebecca could have been and should have been for Emma and me.
Igor shifts in his chair, checking his phone periodically. His presence never fades from my awareness, a constant reminder that this peaceful scene is just another face of our captivity. The pretty yard, the playing children, the attentive mother all of it existing inside the borders he controls.
I wonder if Rebecca ever forgets he’s there, if she’s learned t
