The Librarian of Burned Books

The telegram regretfully informing Vivian Childs that her husband had died in battle arrived before his last letter. When Viv saw the familiar scrawl on an envelope two weeks after that baby-faced sergeant had knocked on the door, her knees gave out.
She hit the marble floor of the entryway with a sharp crack that she distantly knew should hurt but didn’t. Edward.
For one desperate second, Viv thought that terrible telegram must have been a mistake.
But no, that couldn’t be. This was a ghost, the words of a dead man who didn’t yet realize his fate. Viv’s heart beat painfully against her wrists, her throat, and time passed, the ticking of the grandfather clock matching the throbbing at her temples. The comforting numbness that had protected her for the past two weeks had lifted and the pain she’d been holding at bay rushed in to every hollow space in her body.