Caroline

Caroline is the main character and first-person narrator of the short story. In the narrative present, Caroline has been in love with her husband, M, for "five years, six months and fifteen days" (2). She met him through her new job at an architectural firm. Though he was nine years her senior, Caroline was immediately taken by M. They began a romance and were eventually married. Roughly three years later, they had a son. Two years later, M got into an accident which put him in a coma, and fractured his old manner of being.

Over the course of the story, Caroline attempts to reconcile her shock, anger, confusion, terror, and sorrow.

While M was in his coma, Caroline began to realize how much she relied upon her husband for a sense of stability and selfhood. She worried that if he never recovered or died, she would not survive...