Creative Nonfiction by Karen Zey

I study the form’s two check off options. Box 1: Married. Box 2: Single (includes both divorced and widowed). My chest tightens at the wrongness of this. I hate the word “widow.”  But it is a label that suggests loss, loss of the beloved routines of a shared life. Not the breakdown or betrayal of divorce. A 53-day nightmare in a hospital room, a harrowing final goodbye. The mountainous task of facing each morning without him. I brush my thumb over the back of my wedding ring. Choosing Single feels disloyal. I lift my pen and whisper: “Sorry, my love.”

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Karen Zey is a CNF writer, a part-time teacher and a full-time student of life from la belle ville de Pointe-Claire, Québec. She leads the Circle of Life Writers workshops at her community library and volunteers her time as an assistant CNF editor at Porcupine Literary.