The library book sat on her nightstand for three weeks after the funeral — a heavy historical biography she'd been working through that autumn, spine still cracked open to wherever she'd left it. When I finally made myself pick it up to return it, I noticed how strange the pages looked, bristling with small paper scraps sticking out at odd angles all through the book.
My wife never used real bookmarks. She'd grab whatever was closest the second her eyes got tired — didn't matter what it was. I sat on the edge of the bed and pulled them out one at a time: a grocery receipt, a torn corner of an old photograph, a train ticket stub, a crumpled candy wrapper, a museum pass, and more, scattered through the chapters. Seventeen in total, by the time I'd gone through the whole book.
I returned the book to the library the next day, clean and intact. But I kept every one of those scraps in my coat pocket. I couldn't throw them away.
I took them to a framing shop downtown and had them mounted, all seventeen, arranged carefully against a plain mat board inside a black shadow box. I hung it on the wall above the reading chair where she used to spend her afternoons.
Now when people visit and notice it — and they always notice it, it's an odd thing to have framed on a wall — they ask what it is. I've got the same answer every time now. I tell them it's not really an art piece.
I tell them: those are the last seventeen moments she chose to pause.