“I’ll help your father get out early. I’ll pay off his debts,” he said, his voice even, almost indifferent. “Your family will never want for anything again. Just marry me and bear me a son. I’ll die in a year anyway.”
The milkmaid froze, staring at the man, trying to measure his words. Forty years old. Rich. Alone. He claimed his doctors had given him no more than a year to live. There was a kind of cold finality in the way he spoke, as if his mortality absolved him of any need for persuasion. For a moment, she felt a flicker of pity for him. He was a man of means, yet apparently trapped by his own illness. Her mind raced. Could this be true? Could a year’s life be all that remained? And if it were, what did that mean for her? She thought of her father behind bars, her mother growing weaker by the day, and the empty cupboards that made hunger a daily companion.
Finally, she nodded. Not out of greed, she told herself, but out of necessity. One year could save her family from ruin, provide her father with his freedom, and give her mother access to treatment she could never have afforded. What did she have to lose? The decision was made swiftly, almost mechanically. The wedding was quiet, with few witnesses, and took place with a sense of urgency that mirrored the unspoken pressure of her circumstances. There was no grand celebration, no elaborate ceremony, just a binding agreement that promised relief and security at a tremendous personal cost.
That night, however, the reality of her new life began to reveal itself in ways she could not have anticipated. As her husband slept, she found herself unable to fall asleep, the house strangely cold and unfamiliar. Every shadow seemed longer, every creak in the floorboards louder. She rose quietly from the bed, tiptoeing into the hallway, her mind restless with unease. It was then that a faint light caught her eye—coming from the slightly ajar door of the office. Papers lay scattered across the desk, illuminated by the soft glow of a desk lamp. She had no intention of prying, yet her curiosity, coupled with an inexplicable sense of foreboding, drew her closer.
Her gaze fell upon a medical report, dated several months prior. As she read, her heart sank. The words were clear, precise, and damning in their implications: the man’s health was satisfactory. He had a favorable prognosis. There was no mention of a terminal illness, no suggestion that his life expectancy was limited to a single year. Her mind raced as she pieced together what this meant. The story he had told her—the urgency, the impending death, the desperate plea—had been entirely fabricated.
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