Disclaimer: i own Diddaly squat, since of course Will had a wife.. yea.. i own nothing.
Managing
I stood at the port watching all of the men come off the ship, I scanned it for Will, I didn't see him anywhere. He had to be there, I had no doubt in my mind, maybe he was below deck helping with something, surely I would have been sent word if anything had happened to him.
I walked a little bit closer to this ship, not much, men were running all about I didn't want to be ran into.
Women were crying with children obviously having lost someone. I didn't want to be one of them, what was I thinking I wasn't going to be one of them Will was fine.
I breathed deeply, I couldn't settle the knot in my stomach no matter how much I tried. Will was fine. Thoughts kept entering my mind about what might have happened to him and all I could do was force them away with the though "he's fine."
I never saw Will get off, even after I watched the Landsmen greet their wives and children and even Mothers and Fathers. Will was nowhere to be seen. I saw the man I suspected to be the captain and walked over to him.
"May I help you miss?" he asked me as I walked to him
"Sir, I am Will Warley's wife." His face fell, me stomach turned more knots, I told myself don't give up on it he may still be alive. "I was wondering why I did not see him come off of the ship."
"I'm sorry miss, but Will died in a storm. The mast he was on fell, we had to cut the ropes or it would have dragged the ship down. I'm sorry." I stopped breathing for a brief moment in shock. Will, dead there must have been some mistake, he would come off of the ship surprising us all, but he didn't come, he never came. Tears fell from my eyes.
"Thank you Captain." I managed to croak out as I turned and walked down a street back to my home. There was no part of me that believed he was actually dead for a while, I had received his sea trunk, and everything, but I still didn't believe it. I could only imagine the terror of losing someone in a storm. Part of me kept coming up with the crazy idea that 'maybe he didn't die, maybe he was picked up by another ship.' But that thought was silenced by the knowledge of the truth, he was dead, and there was nothing i could do to change it.
I knew that he shouldn't have gone on that ship, but at the time it seemed like a good idea, and so wanted to go. But he didn't come back; he didn't come back from where he wanted to go. It was almost like he was leaving me, only I knew he would never do that. All I could do was attempt to live on without him. It would be hard, but it's what he would want me to do, and with that thought, I managed.