The grief isn’t new. We’ve all been grieving on and off for four years as we rode this roller-coaster cancer buckled us into without our permission. But what I hear today is different. A resignation. A . . . lack of hope.

My throat clogs with a sob and my eyes burn, but I lift my chin, swallow back my tears, and pull back my shoulders. I can’t fix this, but I can be strong for them both. It’s the only thing I have to offer.

Death has a smell, the scent of decay and rot, and it’s shoved up my nose when I step into my parents’ bedroom. Dad’s hospital bed is raised so he’s sitting up, and his frail hands are wrapped around a cup of water.

“Hi, Daddy.”

His hands shake as he sets the water on the bedside table. “Shayleigh.” Even his voice is weak. This disease has stolen everything from him—his career, his strength, his pride. But not his family. Fuck cancer. Never us. “Come here.”

I’m not sure how my legs get me from the doorway to the chair beside the bed. With every step, I think they might collapse. But I make it, each step steadier than I feel, and lower myself into the chair, taking his hand. “Hard night?” I ask. It’s a space-filler question. There’s no point to it when every night for months has been terrible. And every day.

I ask it for myself. Because I need a few more breaths in a world where no one has confirmed what I’ve suspected for weeks now—that there’s no fighting this, that treatments will only make him sicker, and that it’s time to let go.

“Not terrible,” he says.

I laugh for his benefit. “You liar.”

He wraps his fingers around my hand. My dad used to be so strong. These hands picked me up hundreds of times. They gripped my knees when he carried me around on his shoulders, showed me how to hold a baseball bat, checked my forehead for fever, and turned the pages of my favorite bedtime stories. “We’ve talked to the doctors.”

I nod. Because I know. Because I’m hoping he won’t make me hear the words if I can just show him that I get it. I know what comes next, and my chest aches until it’s an effort to breathe through it.

“I want you to know that I would suffer for years if it meant I’d win this fight. I’d do it for you kids. If I had any chance of winning, I’d do it just so I could come to your wedding and walk you down the aisle. I’d do it just so I could watch you become a mom.”