The living room blurs, lurching sideways. My head spins. I stagger, reaching for a wall, a table, a chair—anything to stop the fall. My hands find nothing. I crash to the floor, my face slamming against the oak planks of the house I’ve lived in for fifty years.
I lie on my side, heart pounding, blood thudding in my ears. What’s happening? A heart attack? A stroke?
I reach for my phone.
Where is it?
I can’t move. Sweat beads on my brow. I try to take a deep breath—but can’t.
A deep cold seeps into my bones, spreading through my limbs. A metallic taste floods my mouth. Blood?
Am I dying? This can’t be happening. Not now. I’m not ready.
Where is she? I need her.
Right. She’s been gone a long time. Because of me.
Late afternoon sunlight streams across the room. Is this how it ends?
I force myself to control my breathing. Whatever this is, it’s happening too fast.
I scan the room for something—anything—to anchor me. But all I find are shadows.
A sharp, familiar scent cuts through the air. I can’t place it.
Then I do.
My father’s cologne.
From the cracks in the floorboards, a luminous image rises.
“Where is my little one?” the voice asks, soft and unmistakable.
“Dad…” I manage, trying to slow my breath.
My father hovers above me like mist. His hazel eyes are translucent. I can see through them to the ceiling.
“There you are,” he whispers, drifting closer, as if he’s just found his lost child.
“Don’t worry, son,” he says, his voice like a long-forgotten prayer.
A numbness settles in my body. “Dad. Is it really you?”
He smiles. His ghostly face is young—so much younger than the old man I am now.
“I’ve missed you, Dad,” I whisper, and grief I thought buried rises like a wave.
The hours we spent in the kitchen, poring over geometry problems, debating politics, lamenting the state of the world. Him lecturing from behind the newspaper, me sometimes pushing back, pretending not to listen. Him teaching me baseball, coaching my Little League team, cheering me on. Him sneaking into the auditorium to watch me sing in the high school musical. Sometimes a nod of approval, sometimes a scolding. Always there when I needed him.
But the one time he needed me, I couldn’t help.
A shattered leg from football. Trapped in bed.
A thud from the next room.
He called out for Mom. I was the only one home.
I called out to him—no answer.
I dragged myself off the bed and onto the floor, then crawled to his room.
He lay still.
Then it was me pounding his chest, failing to save him.
Him—still a young man—gone forever.
Me, left to carry on without him.
“Help me, Dad. I think I’m dying,” I whisper. His gaze holds mine.
“Focus, son. Have faith,” he says, offering a gentle smile.
His form drifts upward. I reach for him. “Dad, please don’t go. Not yet.”
His translucent body stretches and thins—then, like a soap bubble, bursts.
He’s gone.
A raw moan escapes me. Tears stream down my face onto the cold floor.
Once again, I’m alone.
My body is numb now. My breath grows shallower.
Was that really him? Or just a hallucination?
The sunlight is gone, swallowed by shadows.
Time slips away.
I’ve lost so many—friends, family… and now, myself.
And I lost her…
I’m fading. I close my eyes.
I hear the ocean, the distant cry of seagulls.
I see her face.
We’re together on the boardwalk, holding hands for the first time.
Dancing in the sand.
I bury my face in her warm skin, the scent of lemon rising from her hair.
We kiss at the water’s edge as the sun slips below the horizon.
When I open my eyes, she is lying beside me—radiant. Her face rests on her hand, just as young and beautiful as the day I first saw her.
Before she left me—that night in the emergency room.
Our fifth wedding anniversary.
“You were the love of my life. Why did you leave me?” I ask.
I already know the answer.
My drinking.
Crashing the car.
I lived—she didn’t.
“Leaving you couldn’t be helped,” she says. “You knew that already. And you paid for it.”
Years in prison flash by.
Endless grief.
A debt I could never repay.
I stare at her now.
She hovers above me, hand outstretched.
“You’ll feel better soon. Come—it’s time.”
I begin to fade.
“Can you ever forgive me?” I ask.
Her smile falters, then returns.
She meets my eyes.
“I already have.”
My pain vanishes. The weight of lifelong regret lifts.
I take her hand.
Calm floods through me, as if I’m being lifted out of my body.
Drawn onward by the sweet scent of fresh lemons and the salty mist of an ocean breeze.
The End