Martha Anderson parked the car in the driveway and walked to the front door of her house.
She didn't bother with the garage unless it was really bad weather, for a lot of William's things, like his power tools, were in there.
Reaching the front porch after getting the mail out of the curb side box, she saw a brown parcel sitting discretely against the front door.
Picking it up, Martha realized it was the birthday present she bought for Eric to give his girlfriend Cassie at her party this Saturday.
Securing the front door after entering, Martha checked, saw no messages on the answering machine and sorted the mail.
It was all bills, something Martha was staying ahead of right now thanks to insurance benefits and their savings, but with only her substitute teacher's pay coming in to support the family since William Anderson's death, she knew that wouldn't last forever.
Maybe I should swallow my pride and take in a border, but where would I put them? she asked herself.
Then she thought of her new friend and potential lover Coach Katherine "Kat" Johnson. Thoughts of the weretigress brought a smile to Martha's face, which were quickly erased when she asked herself how her sons Nate and Eric would react to having someone new in the house, let alone someone to take over their late father's place in her heart.
Shaking her head in hopes of clearing it, but failing miserably, Martha went upstairs.
She left the package in front of Eric's closed bedroom door, then went to the master bedroom.
Martha closed the door to the master bedroom behind her, kicked off her shoes, and looked around.
The first thing that struck her was the absence.
William's scent is just about totally gone, she realized, sniffing the air with her werecat senses.
There was still his things in his closet, which she kept closed since the funeral, but still...
Not knowing what else to do, Martha stripped off everything but her underwear and laid down on top of the bed.
Not here either, she realized, smelling his half of the king size bed they once shared.
It had only been almost three months, a fact confirmed because Martha was near the end of her first trimester carrying his last child, a daughter she had already decided to name Wilma, conceived the morning of the day he died at the paws of the rogue werevixen Yvette Smith.
And I hope that bitch rots in hell! she swore, thinking of the rogue locked away in a Moon Lake prison cell.
Martha stared at the ceiling, her mind full of everything and nothing.
She recalled all the advice she received over the past weeks since the funeral, especially from her closest friends and sister werecats, Samantha and Frances Twist. It didn't hurt that the Town Chancellor and her wife, a licensed therapist, also happened to live right next door too, and had been helping her out a lot, including that wild weekend together with the married lesbians before bi-Martha discovered she was pregnant.
Everyone keeps telling me to move on with my life. Them, even William's ghost, or whatever it was I talked to in that weird dream I had telling me I was pregnant before finding it out for real. But do I dare?
Then Martha thought of her unborn daughter, and the dream both she and Kat had of the future.
She continued staring at the ceiling for a while longer, until she finally reached a decision.
I'm tired of crying. I WILL get my teacher's recertification this coming spring, be a new mother over next summer, AND become Moon Lake's newest elementary school teacher by next fall! But there's something else I have to do first.
With that, Martha reached over and picked up the master bedroom's extension of the house landline.
Dialing the number from memory, Martha waited with baited breath until her call was answered.
Finding new strength in her resolve, she spoke.
"Kat? It's Martha. I know we have a date Saturday night, but are you free for dinner Friday night too? I'd like you to meet my sons."