“I am,” I whispered. “I love you… and I’m so angry.”
I grabbed my phone and called the hospital.
“Did he ask everyone to lie to me?” I asked Becca.
“No,” she said. “Only the attending doctor and the lawyer knew. He signed legal papers.”
I let out a hollow laugh.
“Did he think I couldn’t handle it?”
“I think he believed you’d carry too much,” she said gently.
She hesitated, then added, “A week ago, he planned to tell you. He said, ‘Today’s the day.’”
My heart stopped. “What happened?”
“You came in laughing, telling him a story. He watched you… then said, ‘Not today. I want one more normal day with her.’”
Silence filled the space between us.
“He didn’t get to make that choice for me,” I whispered.
“I would have stayed. I would have carried it with him.”
“I know,” she said softly.
“But he chose for me anyway.”
I looked at the final documents inside the pillow.
There were trust papers. A business account. A lease agreement.
And proof he had sold his father’s 1968 Mustang to fund it—the car he had loved since he was seventeen.
Notes were scribbled in the margins:
Good foot traffic.
Change paint to sage green—Ember will hate the original.
At the top of the page, in bold letters:
“Ember Bakes.”
I covered my mouth, overwhelmed.
Twenty years ago, I had dreamed of opening a bakery.
At the bottom was one last note:
“My Ember,
Thank you for making ordinary days feel like magic.
If I could do it all again, I’d still choose you—every time, in every life.”
The first day I opened the bakery, I panicked for a moment—not about baking, but because Anthony wasn’t there to say, “See? I told you people would come.”
A customer pointed at the framed pink pillow on the wall.
“That looks important,” she said. “Family?”
I smiled softly.
“Yes. That’s where my husband kept the most important parts of our life.”
I glanced around the bakery, full of warmth, life, and possibility.
“This part,” I added quietly, “I chose.”
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