Austin Morris

“Once Aunt Evie is out of the way, you can call Pastor Caleb ‘Daddy’ in front of everyone.” The words were an ice-cold nail, driven straight into my ear only minutes after my husband had publicly prayed over my “infertility.” The woman speaking was Grace, the young widow my husband, Caleb, had been “shepherding.” She was once my friend. The one listening was her three-year-old son. And the silver tag hanging around his neck was a baptismal keepsake from my husband’s family. It should have been my child’s. On Mother’s Day, in a church of four thousand people, I became the cruelest joke in the room. I didn’t lose my mind. Instead, my blood turned to ice in my veins, and my mind sharpened with an unnatural clarity. I, the perfect, gentle, unfailingly dignified pastor’s wife, was done. After I got home, I deleted every affectionate photo of us from the church website. When Caleb came home late that night, no warm light or hot soup waited for him. Only......