I often imagined my life as a string of missed opportunities weaved together in a misconstrued narrative.

Because those were what defined us—the chances we regretted not taking.

"He moved." I gasped.

Edmond dragged down the last of the blanket onto the body but didn't look at me. Instead, he watched the dormant corpse below.

"He had a broken neck, ma'am." When his eyes met mine, he nodded toward the body. "You can touch it to see that it's not breathing. It's by luck alone no animal found him."

My teeth chattered despite the summer night. I struggled to move.

"We can put him back," Edmond insisted. "Won't take long for me to get him back up there. Then we call the constable—"

"Help me," I ordered, reaching into the wagon. "I'll get his feet."

It took the two of us to put him in, though I doubted Edmond needed the help. Edmond was a hulking two meters; or there's about.

Still. This was my doing, and my decision.

Our grim task broke through the sweet chatter of the bugs awakening for the early morn. Dried brush scraped us and twigs snapped below our feet. Each disturbance sounded like a million cannons firing, alerting the world to our awful intent. The wet dew below our feet drew my focus rather than the horse blanket in my grip, reeking less so of the animals of its original purpose and more for our dirty deed.

When we reached the riverbank, Edmond was the one stopping. "Wait," he said.

My heart pounded against my ribs so hard my chest ached. Every moment we stood there doing nothing, I told myself this wasn't happening. That I wasn't doing this.

"We can bring him into town," Edmond said. "Present him there. They'll see the broken neck and if you perhaps sell another horse, that would not only cover the cost but feed the house for another year."

But as he spoke, I flung Gareth's legs over the edge. Then I wrestled his upper body from Edmond's arms, so poorly that I nearly slipped down into the water when I tossed him in.

Edmond had to catch me less I got swept away as well.

"Ma'am," he reminded me, "the rocks."

We hadn't put them in Gareth's pockets as I'd thought to. We hadn't done anything. We...I, I hadn't.

A shiver ran through me as I gripped the horse blanket. I'd burn it when we got home, I decided. Not only as a precaution against the illness my now late husband bore, but of any reminder.

The rigid body bobbed for a while then sank. When it surfaced yet again, it was nearly out of view.

Shame pulsed through me.

I'd thrown him away. The only man I'd ever planned to be with. The first person to glance in my direction with such affection I could barely contain my joy. My child's father.

Like so much rubbish, I'd thrown him away.

My breath hitched when I tried to say something, to assure Edmond of my decision. It was only when I looked at him that it occurred to me just how tightly I gripped the man's shirt sleeve. I held on for dear life.

And when the last of Gareth faded, I took the shaky steps needed to turn and make my way out of the brush.

Upon reaching the wagon, I held it with both hands, head hung.

I trembled.

Edmond held my waist, and I awoke from my numbness and allowed him to guide me up into the front seat of the wagon. After Edmond joined me and flicked the reigns, the twin beasts trotted on.

The sun was rising when we arrived back.

Each breath I took brought Gareth's sour stench back to me. I couldn't afford it. Afford to get him a lot, or a headstone. I couldn't afford to let others know that I was once again alone with no man to run my home. I couldn't afford to allow him to drag us any farther down.

Timing. It was luck and nothing short of it that he'd met his end now. Oh, but if it had come sooner. And the more I thought of this awful wish, the worse I felt. That was a person. A man. A man I once coveted. A man I'd once made a child with, I'd thrown away my future for. Drifting down the river like washed up debris.

Yet another bout of my panic came when I looked up at Cinderella's bedroom window to see the opened curtain drag closed.

What more could go wrong?

Timing and choices.

"What's done is done," Edmond said, slipping from his seat to round the wagon to meet me. "Say the word and—"

"Stop speaking," I begged him. In both hands, I still gripped the blanket. "Burn this." After shoving the offensive fabric into his grip, I lumbered to the house. I needed to change out of these clothes, praying to never see them again.

Had I done this wrong? Was I wrong? By law, Gareth had limited access to my inheritance. We couldn't gain wealth with his carelessness but eventually my daughters would have something. Should I have held on? Should I have explained the situation and why we couldn't have consummated this? Should I have been direct, as Edmond had suggested? Then he would have stayed that night.

Now he was gone. And I didn't even bury him. I didn't even tell his daughter.

How could I look her in the eye again?

Patience was never my strong suit, but I knew strategy.

Life was about timing.

Cinderella. Oh, how I've wronged her.

As I entered the house, I dreaded the thought of hearing that sweet voice call, "Stepmother."

Instead of being pleased that we were all here together as a family, now thoughts of her dragged a flood of fear and panic up inside me. Most of all, I feared her trusting smile.

I thought of her pleasant expression now, similar to the same light in her eyes that was there when she knew I'd transform from Governess to matriarch. In the back of my mind, a countdown began. A countdown to the very moment when all that contentment would vanish, and she'd no longer gaze upon me fondly.

A countdown to the moment she'd learn her father was dead.

My weary feet took me to the foyer before a gut-wrenching scream tore me from my worries. My stomach dropped. With all the crimes of the morning, I couldn't take much more.

Poppy and Piglet hurried into the hall and we three met up, confused.

We found the source of the cries moments later, in Cinderella's room. In her hand, the mouse lay dead.

That very night, Edmond sat in the study, examining Arabella's medicine.

"Arsenic," he said, his expression grim.

Our eyes met and he needed not form the question. I answered, "It was Arabella's medicine."

He sat back.

I, situated across from him, told him what I wrestled with all day. "It was her handwriting so I'm certain he didn't kill her."

Edmond stared at the desk in quiet contemplation.

I covered my face. "Had she killed herself to avoid the doctor's costs?"

When Edmond spoke to me, it was with a quiver in his voice. "Your sister was in a lot of pain. I don't know if we are allowed to judge how she decided to end that suffering."

But I could judge it, and I judged it with everything in me. "She let Cinderella mix it into her food for her. Who does such a thing!"

Edmond made no echoing of my outrage. That was unexpected.

Finally, he repeated, "I don't know if we're allowed to judge."

In the last few months, being here again, being back in this house again, the good memories outweighed the bad. A part of me started to miss her, miss what we once were. But now...now I hated her all over again.

"Cinderella—" he began but I wouldn't allow him to finish that thought.

"She made a mistake." I sighed and told him, "I've confiscated all the medicine."

The gaze he bore into me said he didn't agree completely with my actions, or inaction.

Finally, he gave a nod. "Who will explain it to Cinderella?"

I shot him a look of shock. "What? Explain what exactly? That she unknowingly mixed poison for her mother who she'd tried desperately to save?"

He didn't answer.

My eyes gravitated to the desk and I said, "I will think of something to tell her.

Disappointed wasn't a word to describe how I'd felt about Edmond's stance. How could he possibly have defended Arabella's actions? To put...to put such a grim responsibility on the shoulders of a child? What sort of monster was my sister? And how hadn't I known all this time?

Edmond exited and I found Cinderella in her bedroom, staring down at the dead mouse in the box. I wanted to throw it out—feed it to the cats—something. But each attempt I made to utter such a suggestion, she'd peer up at me with those big pleading eyes, and I'd crumble.

I sat down on her bed beside her. My throat was harsh and aching but I said, "Cinderella—"

"It was still young. I've had two mice pets before." She peered up at me. "And cats eat what they've killed. Correct?"

This would not do. Thinking was the last thing I needed from her. Should she dig deep enough, she'd discover the truth. She sensed foul play, so I offered up her culprit.

"I must ask your forgiveness. I've...I've poisoned him by mistake, I think."

Cinderella recoiled. "Poisoned?"

My lie must be precise, so I based it in some truth. "I hadn't known it was poison at the time, darling."

"Poison? But what did it look like? When did you give him something? I'm with you so often—"

"I've already thrown it out. And I'm very sorry. But I'm to blame."

The box in her hands took up her attention and she offered me not a peep for a long while.

"But you're so smart. I don't think you could ever make a mistake, even in this."

Her voice cracked so I tried to rub her back. She leaned away from the touch.

As understandable as her reaction was, it still stung. I'd taken a dear friend from her.

"Everybody dies. Everyone leaves," she said, shedding a tear. Finally, she sucked in a deep breath. "I should get used to it."

Gareth's unmoving face flashed before me and I could hardly formulate any words of comfort.

Finally, I told her, "It's all right to be sad—"

"I don't want to be sad! I'm always sad. When Mother was alive, I was sad. When she died, I was sad. I'm still sad." She stood and threw the box onto the floor. "I'm tired of sadness. When will something finally go right for a change? The cook is right. Nothing good ever comes when I'm around. Everyone around me is dying."

She stormed out and I stood to give chase. My feet took me as far as the door.

After picking up the box to find the mouse still inside, I held it close to me and went in search of Cinderella.

I found her at the gate, staring off into the fields.

Gareth had no funeral and no one to weep for him, but my Cinderella cried for this mouse.

We buried it in the garden. All came to the ceremony. Poppy and Piglet stood confused, but Edmond seemed the most compassionate.

He even bowed his head in respect and muttered a few kind words on behalf of the creature. "All friendships, in all forms, are gifts from beyond."

A time or two, Poppy readied a comment but the look I shot her shut her up.

This was important. Yes, it was a mere mouse, but it didn't matter what it had meant to us, only what it had meant to Cinderella.

She cried for her rat, but I imagined she might have felt something on a deeper level. Therefore, I convinced myself that she cried for her parents as well.