Dani arrived for the evening shift, bringing decent food from town and updates from the inn.
“Two new bookings for October,” she reported. “And the Hartwell-Chens want to book their anniversary party next year.”
Normal news. Life continuing. It felt wrong, but what was the alternative? Stop everything until Pop finally let go?
That evening, Dr. Hartley had what she called good news. “He's responding well to treatment. We'll probably be able to send him back to Coastside tomorrow or the next day.”
Back to Coastside, where he'd sit in a chair not recognizing anything until the next infection, the next crisis, the next step in the long goodbye.
“Is there...” Kate started, then stopped. “How do we know when enough is enough?”
Dr. Hartley sat down, her young face suddenly serious. “That's the hardest question in medicine. The DNR helps. When his heart stops, we won't restart it. But until then, treating infections, providing nutrition, that's considered basic care. Some families choose comfort care only. No antibiotics, just pain management, letting nature take its course. But that's a decision only you can make.”
After she left, the siblings sat with that weight. The power to let their father go or keep him tethered to a life he no longer recognized.
“What would Pop want?” Dani asked.
“Not this,” Tom said immediately. “He'd hate being helpless.”
“But he can't tell us,” James pointed out. “We're guessing.”
“No,” Kate said quietly. “We know. Remember what he said when Mom was dying? 'When it's my turn, don't let me linger. Let me go with the tide.'”
They all remembered. Pop standing by their mother’s hospice bed, making them promise not to keep him alive when his time came. But that was before the dementia, before he lost the ability to make his wishes clear, before the long gray area between living and dying.
Kate's phone rang, jarring in the quiet room. The inn's number.
“Kate?” Marcy's voice was strained. “I hate to bother you, but we have a situation. The Brennan wedding on Saturday, they just called. They want to add 25 more guests. I told them it was impossible, but they're insisting.”
“I'll handle it,” Kate said, then realized she couldn't. She was here, Pop was dying, and she couldn't be in two places at once.
“Actually,” she said, “talk to Dani.”
She handed the phone to her sister. Watched Dani shift into event planner mode, handling the crisis with calm efficiency. “Tell them we can accommodate twenty additional guests, but the tent rental and catering additions will be rush charges. If they agree to the amended contract I'm emailing now, we can make it work.”
It was seamless, professional. The inn didn't need Kate specifically. It needed someone competent. Her siblings were that now.
Thursday morning, Pop was stable enough that Dr. Hartley started discussing discharge. “Tomorrow probably. The infection is under control.”
Under control. Not cured. Not fixed. Just controlled, until next time.
Tom pulled Kate aside. “We need to talk about what happens next time.”
“I know.”
“Do we treat it again? Keep doing this over and over?”
Kate looked at their father, breathing easier now but still lost to them. “No. Next time, we let him go. Like he wanted.”
Tom nodded, eyes wet. “Okay.”
That afternoon, something miraculous happened. Pop opened his eyes, and for just a moment, they seemed to focus on Kate.
“Pop?” she said, heart racing. “It's Katie.”
His lips moved, no sound, but she could read them. “Katie-girl.”
Then his eyes drifted shut again, and he was gone back to wherever his mind lived now. But he'd seen her. For one second, he'd known her.
