From "Seeing Julia" by Katherine Owen

Julia is meeting with Dr. Bradley Stevenson, revealing what she witnessed at her husband Evan's tragic accident...

“The thing was, I knew, even then, I was saying goodbye to happiness. I felt it seeping away from me. Gone forever. Just this feeling of suspended disbelief. Suspended disbelief. You know; the feeling you get, after you’ve cut yourself, a silly accident where the carving knife goes astray. You’re cutting tomatoes and then, you’ve cut yourself. It’s stupid, really. And, you stare down at your finger and before the pain starts, you watch the hint of blood ooze from sliced skin. Then, in the next instant, it’s everywhere. The horror…spurting blood that can’t be stopped… the horror takes hold. And then, the pain comes.” I pause, take another deep breath, and glance over at the good doctor. He just regards me with those grey eyes of his, too much like Evan’s, takes notes, and watches me.

“I said to the officer. “It won’t be stopped. Will it? The happiness is really gone forever. This pain is never going to go away. Is it?”

“You should sit down,” he’d said back to me and asked me my name.”

From "Not to Us" by Katherine Owen

Ellie has recently discovered the betrayal of her best friend Carrie (Michael's wife) with her husband Robert. Now, she's learning from Michael that she has breast cancer...

“This is a joke; right? You just didn’t tell me I have cancer, because, frankly, if we’re being honest, Michael.” My voice wavers. I try to smile again, but can’t quite make it work. “I’ve got enough shit going on right now.”

“No.”

I can’t find any solace in his tone. I shift in my chair and just look at him. We’ve known each other for almost twenty years, since the days at the University of Washington when all four of us had been sophomores in college. I’ve seen him naked a half dozen times, in those innocent moments, when we had all gone camping together, drank too much, and let strip poker go a little too far. He is my best friend Carrie’s husband. He is best friends with my husband, Robert. My friend even.

And, yet, in this moment, all I can think of is that there is worse news than this—worse news that I will eventually have to tell him. My resolve gives way. My eyes betray me first and fill with tears, not for myself, but for Michael.