Mercy Train by Rae Meadows

hunters stranded on river islands, a family buried in a stalled car, a young farmer who went to get wood from the barn and got lost, ending up frozen in a field. It could have so easily included Samuel Olsen, lost half a mile out in his wheat field, who’d picked a direction and started walking, hoping his internal compass was right, and came upon his fearless and dogged wife, a tether around her waist, who’d come to bring him home.
    â€œThat was so brave, what you did,” she had said to her mother the next morning.
    â€œYou do what you can for those close to you,” her mother had said. “There’s nothing brave about it.”
    Even now, Iris didn’t know what to make of her parents’ marriage. As a girl she had begrudged them for not holding hands or kissing or dancing to the radio. Later, she believed that neither had expected a lot from life, so they had been satisfied with mere companionship. But now it seemed their devotion was something far greater, quiet and abiding: faith that one was always looking out for the other.
    Iris swung her feet off the couch and sat up wincing, her head swimming in stars, a deafening pulse in her ears. When her eyes cleared she looked around the room at the things she could clear out now so her children wouldn’t have to deal with them: a bowl of conch shells she’d found on morning beach strolls, Scrabble—Henry’s—and Yahtzee, a glossy book of photos of Sanibel’s “Ding” Darling Wildlife Refuge, even the TV. But maybe Samantha will want to watch something while she’s here, she thought.
    Although it was never stated as such, Samantha was coming to care for Iris until she died. After the double mastectomy and the radiation had failed and the cancer was everywhere, Iris had asked her oncologist how much time he’d wager she had left. She had thought he’d say a year. He raised his shoulders and palms in a defeated shrug and said, “Maybe six months if you’re lucky.” Lucky. That wasn’t how she would have put it, but here she was six months later, still ticking. But the ticking was stalling, skipping, slowing a bit more each day.
    Samantha would arrive tomorrow. Iris sometimes thought of her daughter as a twittering bird, anxious and restless. Marriage and art—Samantha was an accomplished potter—had been grounding for her, but now that she was pregnant, Iris saw the nervousness come flooding back. Her son-in-law Jack was not all he could be. He was fine, Iris supposed, though she had hoped for someone with a little more oomph. Maybe she’d never gotten over his weak handshake. She knew she was being unfair, surely she was afraid that her daughter was repeating her own mistakes, her willingness to settle for just okay. And Samantha was not like Iris, it was true. Samantha ached to be a mother. She was exhilarated by each passing week of pregnancy—“Mom, she’s the size of a baseball!”—and didn’t see motherhood as a duty to fulfill. Iris worried about what would happen after the euphoria wore off and the grind set in, those long hours tending to a baby insatiable for food, attention, comfort. Those long hours trying to figure out if it was worth it after all.
    Oh, Samantha, Iris thought. I wish I could be there for you then.
    A succession of quick knocks hammered the door, startling Iris. Samantha? No, no, she was still in Wisconsin. I am here on the couch in Sanibel, Iris said to herself, trying to settle her mind. The knocks began again.
    â€œComing,” she said weakly, wiping the drool from the corner of her mouth. She rose and teetered to the door, at the last minute realizing she was still in her robe. “Who is it?”
    â€œHoney, it’s me, Stephen. From next door.”
    She opened the door, the day clear now, the muggy warmth soft and heavy. Stephen was shirtless, his chest muscled and hairless and bronzed an orangish hue, and he