It’s a particularly hot summer, and it’s not uncommon for the elderly to overheat when they underestimate the weather. Maybe he’s right and this is all a lot of fuss for nothing. He just needs a slap on the hand to follow the doctor’s and Nana’s orders a bit better, and everything will be fine.

Even as I tell myself that, I know it’s wishful thinking and childish hopes. A girlish desire to deny the mortality of a man who has always seemed larger than life to me. Deep inside, I know he’s no more immortal than the rest of us, but even so, I need to know this isn’t going to happen again. I love him too much to lose him. Especially not now, and if I had my say, not ever.

After being reassured several times by Papa that he’s fine, I excuse myself from the room to let him and Nana bicker themselves out.

In the hall, I run into a man wearing a long white coat and carrying a binder with Papa’s name on the spine. His name tag says Dr. Lee, and he has an aura of calm control that seems to relax me immediately.

“Are you Violet?” he asks before I can say anything, giving me a warm smile.

I nod. “I am. How’d you know?”

He grins. “Your grandfather wasn’t concerned in the least about his health and has been talking about you since the moment he came in, telling anyone who’ll listen about his granddaughter. If you didn’t know, he’s quite fond of you.”

I smile. “That definitely sounds like him. Can you tell me what happened? I’m not sure I trust his version of events.”

Dr. Lee’s expression turns solemn and the energy around him shifts, making me instantly nervous. “It appears that, due to the heat and overworking himself, your grandfather’s blood pressure dropped and he lost consciousness.”

“That’s what Nana said. So, if we can keep him from overdoing it, he’s going to be okay.” I say it definitively, like I’m adding tying him to his recliner in the air-conditioned living room to my to-do list.

Dr. Lee tilts his head, his lips pressed together. “Well, as I explained to Angela and Stefano, we’re waiting for tests to come back for a more complete picture, but I don’t need the tests to tell me that his heart isn’t in good shape. It hasn’t been in quite some time.”

Oh, no.

“But he’s stable now . . .” I say, like I’m refuting his medical knowledge with only the power of my hope.

“I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, Violet, but . . .”

The growing look of sorrow and despair in Dr. Lee’s eyes says everything, and I’m forced to grab ahold of a wall rail to keep from falling.

No.

It can’t be.

It just can’t.

My worst nightmare come to life.

“How long does he have?” I ask through the lump in my throat. The words sound surreal, like someone else is saying them.

“At his age, it’s hard to say,” Dr. Lee muses, shrugging his shoulders. “Anything I say is at best an educated guess. Six months? A year, maybe? But he’s a stubborn mule who refuses to follow orders, which complicates things. To be honest, he could go at almost any time if we can’t get his heart to function properly and him to be compliant.”

His words, an awful confirmation of what I feared most, hit me like a sucker punch to the gut, the air leaving my lungs in one forceful gust.

Six months to a year? Or less?

How can Papa, the only father figure I’ve ever known, the man who practically raised me from a pigtailed toddler to adulthood, the man who could take on anything the world threw at him and live to tell about it . . . have such little time to live?

In that moment, all the should’ve, could’ve, and would’ves flash in front of my eyes. It’s as if everything I expected to experience with Papa has turned into a puddle that’s evaporating quicker than I’d ever considered.

But the worst part is, the one thing he’s wanted to see the most is likely to never happen, and that looms like a dark umbrella over my breaking heart.

When’s my beautiful little flower getting married so I can walk her down the aisle?

To say marriage is a huge tradition in my family is like saying a tsunami is a little wet. An understatement of such magnitude, it’s laughable, especially for my grandparents, who look forward to the next generation of weddings with teary smiles and proclamations of the continuation of their legacy with another branch on the family tree.

Hell, most of the women in my family are married off before they’re old enough to drink alcohol. In fact, I’m probably the only woman in my family, at age twenty-six, who isn’t married with a wagonload of kids.

Due to my busy career, I’ve been single for as long as I can remember, although I’ve always dreamed about having this big fairytale wedding. I used to use Nana’s curtains as a makeshift veil and Papa would pretend to walk me down the aisle. I want him to do that for real, hold my hand as I greet my husband-to-be, bless us with a marriage as long and happy as his and Nana’s has been, and see that I’ve finally grown into the woman he always told me I could be. Successful, loved, happy.

Now it’s never going to happen.

As if sensing my tormented thoughts, Dr. Lee adds, “If there’s anything you need to say or anything important left for you to do with your grandfather, I’d do it very soon. Now if you’ll excuse me . . .”