I stood beside the urn and the photo of Michael squinting under the sun, a streak of grease on his cheek. That picture had sat on his bedside table for years. Now it felt like a substitute for the man who had taught me practical things—how to fix a tire, how to sign my name confidently.
“You left me alone,” I murmured to the photo.
Michael met my mom, Carina, when I was two years old. They married quietly. I don’t remember life before him. My earliest memory is riding on his shoulders at a county fair, one hand holding a sticky balloon string while my fingers tangled in his hair.
My mom died when I was four. That fact has shaped my life ever since.
Last year, when Michael became ill, I moved back into the house without hesitation. I cooked for him, drove him to appointments, and stayed by his bedside when the pain left him silent. None of it felt like duty. He was my father in every way that mattered.
After the funeral, the house filled with low conversations and the clatter of dishes. I stood near the hallway table holding a glass of lemonade I hadn’t touched. The house still smelled like him—wood polish, aftershave, and the faint lavender soap he always insisted wasn’t his.