Grief is supposed to bring families together, but in my case, it did the opposite. My mother was barely in the ground before my father started making changes—ones I never saw coming. But what my father didn’t know was that my mother had left behind one final surprise.
I was nineteen when my mother died. It happened fast—too fast. One moment, she was laughing at some dumb reality show, and the next, she was too weak to lift a spoon.
Cancer doesn’t wait for goodbyes. Neither did my father. Mom was everything warm and good in our house, and where she went, Peanut followed.
That little French Bulldog was glued to her side, her shadow in fur. When the sickness took hold, Peanut barely left her bed, curling up against her like she could keep her here just by being close. I tried to do the same, but unlike Peanut, I had to eat, sleep, and pretend my father wasn’t already erasing her before she was even gone.
He never loved her—not the way she deserved. I never saw him hold her hand, never saw him bring her flowers, or even look at her the way a husband should. And in those last days, he barely even pretended.
When the doctors told us it was only a matter of time, he just nodded. No tears. No breaking down.
Just a nod, like they told him the dishwasher needed fixing. “I don’t want to go,” I whispered, gripping the edge of the black dress I borrowed from my cousin. It smelled like lavender and someone else’s life.
“You have to,” my father muttered, fixing his tie in the hallway mirror. His voice was flat like we were heading to a business meeting, not my mother’s funeral. I swallowed hard.
“Peanut should come.”
He sighed, exasperated. “It’s a dog, not a person.”
“She was Mom’s dog.”
“And Mom’s gone.”
The words punched the air from my lungs. I felt Peanut’s little body press against my leg, warm and trembling.
I bent down, scratching behind her ears. “I won’t be long, okay?”
She licked my fingers. The funeral was a blur of murmured condolences and stiff hugs.
Strangers told me I was “so strong,” but I didn’t feel strong. I felt hollow. My father barely spoke, just nodded along like he was checking off a task list.
When we got home, he pulled off his tie and tossed it on the counter. “It’s done,” he said. “Done?” I snapped.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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