Douglas collapsed a second time on a rain-soaked Tuesday morning, this time in the garden he loved most, found by one of the groundskeepers face-down among the roses he'd planted himself decades earlier, according to Freda, back when his wife was still alive to help him choose which varieties.
The hospital gave us a different answer this time, gentler in tone but harder in substance. His heart, already weakened, had suffered damage the medication could manage but not reverse. Weeks, the cardiologist said carefully, avoiding Nathaniel's eyes as she said it. Perhaps a few months, with careful care. Not longer than that.
Nathaniel took the news the way I'd learned he took every wound too large to immediately process, quietly, his face arranging itself into something composed while his hands
