Tom opened the bottle of ibuprofen, his hands clammy and trembling. The pills scattered across his palm before he threw a handful back and washed it down with a glass of water. His head was pounding. It felt as if a hammer was coming down just above his brow, cold metal against his skull. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. Any harder and his head would split right open. He could picture it, blood streaming down his face and bits of brain matter hanging out like cooked spaghetti. At least the pain would end, he thought.

Tom lay in bed, the setting sun casting shadows across the room. Even the fading light was already too bright for Tom's headache. He shut his eyes to stop the pain from radiating across his skull. It felt like there was an elastic band wrapped tightly around his optic nerve. His eyes felt weighted and any movement made the pain worse.

Tom caught something the night before—the night they found the man. After the ship came down in flames, Tom rushed below deck. The ocean was in a state of fury, chunks of debris scattered across the rolling surface. They almost missed the body until they saw an arm, a leg. The body would briefly appear before being swallowed back into the ocean.

Two of the crew put on life vests and lowered themselves to the water. The body trailed alongside the ship and the two crew members were able to pull him on the lifeboat. The crew hoisted the boat back up as water crashed beneath. Tom's heart stopped when he saw the body. The wind rushed through him and seemed to steal what warmth was left in his blood.

What they found was not a pilot or a civilian. They found an astronaut. The situation seemed so farfetched, so implausible that Tom almost laughed. He wasn't supposed to be here. He should have landed at the space center, walking off with a smile on his face, family waiting on the other side. But something went wrong, something unaccounted for. All the scientists and engineers ran their calculations and this man still fell within the margin of error. Something unexpected happened and now he was dead.

Tom grabbed the man by the collar of his white suit and pulled him on board. The back of his helmet hit the deck with a thud and Tom staggered back at the sight. The impact in the ocean blew his head off. His fleshy neck came to an abrupt stop. Tom's mind tried to fill in where the head should have been but all he saw was the deep red that soaked the back of the helmet. The blood pooled inside like a bowl of tomato soup. That was when he saw Sandy and Marilyn.

The last thing Tom remembered was bringing the body to the morgue. When they laid the man down, Tom thought he saw the body move. And then he couldn't remember anything else. Tom didn't exactly blackout. It was more of a gap in his memory, like trying to recall what he did seven years ago. No matter how hard Tom tried, he couldn't access the thought. The moments following bringing the body to the morgue had been erased. Tom later awoke walking back to his room. He felt ill, adrenaline no longer coursing through his veins.

"How are you feeling?" Marilyn asked. She sat on the bed next to Tom and placed a hand on his thigh.

"Not great," Tom said. "How's Sandy?"

"She's fine and fast asleep." Marilyn peered out to the other room where Sandy slept. "I tried to keep her busy today. She is exhausted, to say the least."

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"But how has she been with..."

"I'm not sure she processed what she saw," Marilyn said. "I'm not sure she fully understood what happened."

"They're tougher than we think." Tom let out a smile, but it quickly faded.

Marilyn stretched out on the bed and lay behind Tom. Her head sunk into the pillow and her long legs wrapped around his, moving like silk sheets against his own. She ran her hand up and down his arm, feeling the ridges of his muscles and the brush of hair, like a wheat field along a mountain line.

"You're tense," Marilyn said.

"It's my head," Tom said. He felt her breath on his neck.

"Did you take any painkillers?"

"A handful."

"Tom..."

"I can't stop picturing him, Marilyn. His head was gone. I could see his spine protruding from his flesh like a piece of raw meat."

"I can't get it out of my head either," Marilyn said. "I've never seen a dead body before. Not like that."

"How did that happen?"

"I'm not sure but we are lucky it didn't hit us. Did you know they're turning the ship around?"

Marilyn slipped her hand under Tom's shirt, her fingers running along his ribs. The smoothness of his skin was interrupted by a lesion several inches long.

"Careful," Tom hissed.

Marilyn lifted his shirt to find a wound along his lower ribs. His skin was torn open.

"What the hell, Tom. You need stitches. When did this happen?"

"I don't remember."

"What do you mean you don't remember? It's huge."

"When I was walking back last night, I felt a pain in my side. I looked down and saw my shirt had torn and was bloody." Tom sat up and positioned his back against the bed frame. "I thought the blood was from the body, but I must have cut myself open on something. I was so panicked I didn't even notice."

"We need to take you to the doctor."

"I'm fine, Marilyn. It's the headache that is killing me."

"You could have an infection." Marilyn moved to her luggage and unzipped it. She revealed a travel-sized first aid kit. Tom watched in fear as she opened a pack of disinfectant wipes and lifted his shirt.

"This may hurt," Marilyn warned.

"That's putting it lightly," Tom replied.

The disinfectant came down like a searing knife, a sharp pain that would blow the dial off any scale. Tom's whole body seized, the muscles in his neck bulging like electric cords.

Tom screamed.

"Just a bit more," Marilyn said.

Suddenly the headache was not so bad. It felt like all the nerves in his abdomen caught fire. A thousand lines of pain all leading from his lesion and taking hold of the rest of his body. The fire simmered.

"All done," Marilyn said.

"Thank God," Tom said.

"Don't thank God, thank me. I'm the one that cleaned your wound." Marilyn smiled.

Marilyn placed some gauze over the wound and held it together with medical tape. Tom flinched but the pain was nowhere near before. Tom could feel the steady drum of pain rising in his head again.

"Tomorrow we will pass by the doctor before heading to the pool."

"Fine."

"Mommy?" Sandy called. She stood before the doorframe, rubbing her sleepy eyes with her hands. "What's wrong with Daddy?"

"Nothing, honey. Daddy just has a little booboo. Head back to sleep."

"Okay," Sandy said.

Marilyn placed the first aid in the luggage and crawled back into bed with Tom.

"I love you, Tom," Marilyn said.

"I love you too."

"And I don't ever want to lose you. I can't help thinking this way during times like these, but I am thankful I have the two of you and nothing terrible happened yesterday. I mean someone did die but I am grateful for us." Marilyn nestled her head on Tom's chest.

"You two are everything to me. You know that." Tom planted a kiss on her forehead.

"I know."

They lay in silence until the sun disappeared beneath the horizon. Marilyn's head rose and sank with Tom's breathing. She could tell his breath was short. Marilyn ran her fingers over his chest, drawing circles with the tips of her nails. The circles made their way to his waist.

"Maybe I could make you feel better."

Tom was still. It seemed his breathing almost stopped. Marilyn got up to shut the door.

And she did make him feel better.