I grunt, and with every ounce of strength I can muster, push the shovel into the ground. The pain is so intense, I scream. I lift it out of the pit like I’m lifting a truck.

“I’m not a little girl, you fucking prick,” I rage. “You’ll have to do better than that.”

Just like that, it stops. I can breathe again. I frantically complete two more cycles of digging before all my limbs tense.

There’s pressure in my throat. My airway is closing. I drop the shovel and pull at my neck. I fight, but it’s useless. I can’t stop him. I grab the shovel and keep going. The roar inside my head is back. The cold, penetrating pain has returned and now I can’t breathe.

My efforts slow and became less effective, but I keep digging.

My vision fills with spots. My eyes bulge in their sockets. I can feel the pressure in my face as my lungs claw for air.

My consciousness begins to surrender.

Suddenly, I see Caitlyn. Images of her. Horrible images that I know he is putting there. They’re the stuff of a parent’s worst nightmare. Caitlyn dead in the car. Caitlyn floating face down in the lake. Caitlyn’s broken body lying in a coffin. The images rush through me. I can’t block them out.

Then, everything goes black.

I’m looking into a void. I can still hear the sounds of my struggles and the digging, but it’s miles away. I don’t feel my screaming muscles, or my lungs clutching for air. The only physical sensation I feel is the light weight of Nicole’s ring against my chest.

Another image appears before me.

Nicole.

She’s standing before me in the void. She looks just as I remember her— beautiful, smiling. The most amazing woman I have ever known.

“Let go,” she whispers.

“No. You’re not her. You’re not Nicole,” I say, the sounds of my digging and gasping growing further and further away.

“We can be together, again,” the thing pretending to be Nicole says and adds with a grin, “Just like you wanted.” Her lips curl into a sinister, knowing smile. “Just like you planned.”

My heart collapses from grief. The grief of knowing that deep down, on those lonely, depressing nights, I had thought about it. I had thought about ending it all to be with her. That’s why I bought that gun—not for protection, but because I didn’t want to go on, not without Nicole. I bought it so that one day, I could use it to blow my brains out and be with Nicole.

“You’re not her! You’re him!” I scream.

Nicole’s face contorts in a flash of anger, but instantly returns to a caring expression.