Sacrifice

She was introduced to me as the woman who would one day save the land via her sacrifice. I courted her, knowing it was futile given her future, but she wasn’t opposed to my advances.

Every day with her was a gift, until finally, forty years after we were married, the day came for her sacrifice.

She handed me a note, then did her duty.

“I got forty years of joy from you, at the cost of one moment of pain.

And yet, forty years of pain for one moment with you would be a price I’d pay equally quickly.”