text: Like Emeralds There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that Asher loved his wife, Evelyn. The way he looked at her made it abundantly clear to any passerby that this was surely a match made in Heaven. Asher had been his small town’s prime bachelor for a long time, thanks to his gentlemanly qualities, sharp looks, and ample fortune left to him by some relative (of whom nobody was entirely sure). He was known for his seemingly random acts of philanthropy, and constant willingness to be of service. Asher always had a smile on his face, and carried an air of optimism everywhere he went. When Asher had reached thirty years of age the townsfolk started to suspect that perhaps their favorite bachelor may have succumbed to a life of singleness. After all, it was not uncommon for people who live on their own for too long to decide that marriage may not be everything it’s chalked up to be. It was to the town’s both dismay and delight when Asher married a woman from a few towns over. “Rumor has it they met at one of those spring dances,” the townsfolk would say, “I hear after their eyes locked they already decided to marry one another.” “What was wrong with the bachelorettes here?” others would say, “Ought to give them a fighting chance hasn’t he?” argued the mothers of said bachelorettes. Regardless of how they met or how the townsfolk felt, no one could argue that the couple’s life appeared idyllic. Asher had both the undying respect and envy of his town. He had wealth, status, and a beautiful wife. Evelyn had also garnered a fair deal of envy for herself, having acquired the security of a rich, warm, and loving husband. It was typically at this stage in a man's life when he started to relax and bask in the blissful years to come. Men who appeared to possess all the treasures one could attain in this life often slowed down and did nothing more than enjoy themselves. Unfortunately, the same could not have been said for Asher. As the months continued to trek forward, he began to appear increasingly more disheveled. Dark circles imprinted themselves on Asher’s eyes, and that air of optimism soon began to disappear as though it had been blown away by some malevolent force. No one was entirely sure what the root of this seemingly spontaneous depression was, and in such a small community it was common to make somebody else's personal business your own. People would stop him on the street every chance they got to ask him how everything was going, in a futile attempt to gain any semblance of an answer to their mystery. “I’m right as rain!” he would say with a smile, “and why wouldn’t I be?” Asher did indeed love his wife dearly, and treated her as though she was entitled to every good thing on Earth. Despite this, there was just one, singular, minute problem that Asher could never seem to get over no matter how hard he tried. It was her eyes. If you were to ask any outsider, they would describe Evelyn’s eyes as nothing more than a beautiful shade of green, like that of an emerald. While this was indeed true, there was something missing that any keen observer would notice. Even Asher, with his acute observation skills, was blinded by everything else about Evelyn to notice her eyes during their hasty engagement. Evelyn’s face was fully capable of displaying anger, fear, joy, but no matter her facial expression her eyes remained akin to that of a corpse. Asher loved her, but he felt that at times they were too much to bear. Her cold, loveless, stale eyes penetrated his every thought and action, and caused him to lose sleep at night. There was something deep in Evelyn that appeared to be missing, some essential inexplicable something that made someone human. While everything else from her actions to her voice appeared human, her eyes were the critical tell that this was nothing more than an act. Asher did everything he could to overlook this. He began to pour himself into project after project, looking for work in every place he could find in an effort to avoid being home. Even though Asher had enough money to live the rest of his life comfortably, he still found himself working nine hours a day in the fields or in town. Evelyn seemed ignorant to this change in behavior and continued to live her life as though Asher had not come under some sickness in the head. Asher dreaded when the workday came to an end and had to head home. Unlike most working men, Asher counted down the hours until he was able to go to be in the fields again. Every second that he did not have to look into his wife’s soulless eyes was a relief to him. Life fell into dreary equilibrium for the couple, where Asher would go out and work in some neighbor’s field, while Evelyn would go into town to visit friends and run errands. Asher was by no means happy, but he felt that he was able to make do with the situation. Then something changed. When Asher arrived home one evening there was a very subtle change in Evelyn. So subtle that not even the most scrupulous of individuals would have been able to notice it. Her eyes would appear to blink just ever so slightly less frequently, and her stare seemed to penetrate just a little bit more. This was more than Asher could take, and that ever-so-fragile equilibrium was now beyond repair. After having endured months of paranoia and insomnia, Asher snapped, and he began to scream incomprehensible accusations at Evelyn. Something along the lines of her “being the devil” and that she was “inhuman”. Evelyn’s emotionless face and eyes remained on Asher until he lost all semblance of reason. He started to claw at the walls, topple furniture, and destroy any poor innocent décor that happened to be in the madman’s path. “Asher” Evelyn said with a tone of one trying to replicate sympathy, “Is something the matter?“ Asher turned to look at his wife and what he saw was not his wife. It was as though an unholy creature was wearing the skin of the woman he thought he loved. Not being able to contain the growing fear and apprehension, Asher evacuated the hell he called home. The destitute Asher remained missing for forty-eight hours, and the following morning Evelyn decided to take action. She notified the local sheriff, and search parties were arranged to help find her missing husband. The sheriff couldn’t help but remark on how calm she appeared, given that she was reporting on the seemingly random disappearance of her husband. Regardless, they found him unconscious in a field and had a doctor examine him for any physical ailments. Appearing perfectly healthy, the doctor dismissed it as nothing more than some stress-induced panic that caused him to act irrationally. Asher was sent home, and when the townsfolk were told to recount their side of the subsequent events, seeing him leave the hospital was the last time anyone could remember seeing Asher again. It had been a little over a month before anyone had seen Asher leave the hospital. No one had seen anyone leave or enter his residence in a suspiciously long time, so a neighbor of Asher’s took it upon himself to be a good Samaritan and check up on the couple. He knocked, waited, knocked again, waited a little longer, and knocked harder. When he realized this was a fruitless endeavor he decided to go to the sheriff. The neighbor asked him to go and make sure everything was okay, and with an air of tired reluctance at the affairs of the nosy townsfolk, the sheriff fulfilled his request. The sheriff knocked and waited. He continued to knock for the better half of ten minutes, and when he realized this wouldn’t work he resorted to busting down the door. With only a couple strong kicks the door surrendered and collapsed to the floor, and lying before him in the center of the home was Asher’s lifeless body. The sheriff pulled out his gun and entered the premises cautiously. He inspected Asher’s corpse, and saw a kitchen knife residing in his abdomen. The blood surrounding the wound was a dark crimson, indicating that this wound was not fresh. The sheriff looked around the home and saw no indication of domestic unrest, or any sign of Evelyn either. The sheriff had no idea what to make of the situation. Occasionally, maybe every couple of years, reports would float around of a newly married young man found dead in his home, with no sign of his newly widowed wife.