They'd woken at the same time, all wrapped in one another's arms. They'd woken at the same time, and Cora smiled briefly and nestled her face back into his chest, Robert holding her to him.

They talked some more, a little more about Isidore. A little more about what Robert could expect now that Shiva was over...the things they were permitted to do. The things they were not.

And then, another hour later, they'd risen from the bed and gone downstairs to meet everyone else. They'd gone downstairs to partake in the meal that would end Shiva and move into the next phase of mourning for her family.

Cora held his hand as he led her down the stairs.

"We, the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem, give thanks to You, O Lord, our God." Tobias' voiced boomed around the coral-colored dining room, the steam from their breakfast plates - salmon, eggs, fruits, toast - rising into the morning sunlight that filtered in.

"You, the Omnipresent, our Comforter," he continued; Cora brought her eyes up to him briefly, to where he stood at the head of the table. He looked like Father. "Blessed are You, Lord, our God, King of the universe, the True Judge. Blessed are You, who in Your infinite wisdom, so decided to take our son, our father, our brother, Isidore."

At his name, everyone around the table fell into a deeper quiet, an introspective quiet, a quiet that incited a sudden image of Father to appear in Cora's mind, and she sighed.

"Thanks and praise be unto You, our God."

Cora allowed her gaze to move back to her uncle, and she watched him, in silence, as he pressed his praying palms harder.

"Am-"

"-We pray for our Isi, Lord."

Everyone seated at the elaborately long table looked at GranMary as she interrupted. Some of Cora's family sat straighter, surprised, but Cora only sighed again. She knew her grandmother. Unlike the sweet, elderly, timid Savta that sat across from her, GranMary, who sat at the far end closest to Harold, would have the last word. GranMary always seemed to find the last word.

"We pray he finds his rest. We pray that those of us left behind...," here she brought her dark eyes to Martha, and then briefly to Harold; Cora tucked her chin, resting her gaze on the fingers she held entwined in her lap."...may those of us who loved him find comfort and healing."

There was a soft silence around the table, Cora noting that Uncle Tobias had sat, his hands folded at his chest reverently. It almost made her warm to think, warm to think that both sides of her family, both faiths were here at this table. Everyone was here at this table, and they were all here for her father. Uncle Tobias, Aunt Annele, and young Hanna. Aunt Ruth and Uncle Frank. Darling Savta. Harold...and her mother.

Her father, the man whose charisma and humor could always bring such different people together, still could do just that. Even in death.

After another few moments of quiet, GranMary's voice permeated the warmth that now filled their grieving hearts.

"In Jesus's name we..."

Then, as if everyone thought the same thing at one time, all eyes went to her, some gazes narrowed and judging.

"...well – some of us – pray."

Again, another silence, but this time it was a bit harder, Martha breaking it with an exasperated sigh. "Ma."

"I said some of us," Mary shook her head. "For goodness sake. Amen. Just say Amen."

An unsure chorus of "Amen" sounded around the table and Cora could hear the faint snickering sigh of her husband beside her. She glanced quickly to her right, and grinned up at him. He was smiling.

Strange, it was strange, what had happened. What had transpired here, what had developed.

Life. A new life. A new life had been born of death.

In looking at her husband, she felt as if they'd started anew. Even in the shadow of death, a death that Cora was sure she'd never quite get over, a death she was sure she'd think of at unexpected moments for the rest of her days, she'd also begun her life anew. A life that would be different from her old one, a life in which she'd know that although things may be left unsaid, it didn't make them any less true. Robert did love her, he had loved her, he still loved her...and perhaps her father knew. After all, her father loved her, too.

Yes, Cora knew, a new life had grown out of the darkness, out of the despair, out of the shouts and the tears and the silences. A new life had grown out of Cora, a life that would strive now to hear the words unsaid.

Looking down into her lap, Cora looked at the hand that had reached to hold hers, the hand that gripped her own in comfort and in strength. She smiled down at it and pulled it closer, closer until his hand was pressed against her abdomen. Her abdomen, the place where, unbeknownst to them, something glimmered. The place where a new life stirred.

A new life they'd just begun.