“He must’ve had hundreds of them!”
They both shook with laughter, hanging onto each other, imagining Father, oblivious, as batting-eyed maids circled around him.
Finnian wiped the tears at the corners of his eyes, releasing a long, sated exhale.
They both grew quiet as the weight sank in. That those amusing moments were ones of the past. Memories were all they had left of him, and they overflowed.
The back of Finnian’s nose stung. He straightened his shoulders and held onto Naia’s arm, reminding his trembling limbs that he had support.
Fixing his gaze out among the dense thicket of tropical ferns and palms, he let out a shaky breath. “He would want to be one with the sand.”
Naia looked up at him, her round eyes pooling. “Sand travels the waters,” she recited with a sad smile, “it crests in the waves and delivers onto the shore with the tide. It remains for as long as it needs, and then it is pulled back and continues the cycle over again.”
“It is the way of nature; the way of life,” Finnian’s voice coated thick with tears, the words embedded in the deepest waters of his mind from all the times Father explained it to them.
Naia removed the lid to the jar and grabbed a fistful of Father’s ashes.
She drew in a breath. “I suppose there are a million sentiments I could express to you, but I believe you already know just how much you meant to me. Therefore, I will leave you with this: your love is everything to me. Words would never be enough for me to express how grateful I am to be your daughter. Thank you for teaching me how to be vulnerable, to observe and show kindness to others, for always being my light in the darkness.” As the words left her mouth, she sprinkled the remains in the sand around her feet.
She handed off the jar to Finnian, and it felt as if it held basalt.
His stomach knotted and his limbs locked up, despite his brain's orders todo as she did.
The comforting touch of Cassian’s hands settled on top of his shoulders as he moved up behind him, providing an instant release to the ache drilling in his chest. It gave Finnian enough courage to dip his hand into the jar.
He expected the ashes to feel different, divine somehow, but they didn’t. They were light—lighter than the granules of sand beneath him. They squished in between his closed fingers. Proof of his father’s existence; of the long life he lived. It seemed unfair, somehow.
“There is impact,” Cassian whispered in his ear. “Impact on those who touch our lives. You came into mine and I haven’t been the same since. The time we were apart, you remained etched deep in my soul, Finny. That is what it means to live, to love. There is purpose in that. Vale touched the lives of more souls than you could ever imagine.”
He was right. From a young age, Finnian recognized that about his father. It was impossible not to smile when he came into a room. When he spoke to a person, he granted them his full attention. He was considerate and always going out of his way to help others—the kitchen maids and their bouquets, sneaking stationed guards sweet treats from the feast, calling the staff of the palace by name and inquiring about their children.
Finnian lifted his fist from the jar and held it out. A memory of his boyhood lit behind his eyes, as a child, gazing up at Father, the stream of morning light feathering around him in rays of cornflower through the layers of the sea; Father looking down at him, smiling softly.
His ashes were the last tangible thing Finnian had left of him.
“I don’t want to let go.”
I am scared to let go.
Ash squealed, the sound of his feet squeaked in the sand. “He’s here!”
Finnian, Naia, and Cassian both turned to look.
Ash hopped around, and his footprints in the sand quickly filled with an assortment of blossoms—dahlias, peonies, moonflowers, baby’s breath,poppies, hibiscus.
I am always with you.
A sob caught in Finnian’s throat.
Naia threw her hand over her mouth as a cry sprang loose.
“Grandpa Vale must not be that far away if he can grow us flowers!” Ash trailed around Ronin, his footprints becoming beautiful floral arrangements. “Do you see? Mama, look!” He beamed, pointing down at them. “Uncle Finny!”
“Yeah,” Ronin said, his voice tottering with tears of his own as he glanced up at Naia. “He’s not far away.”
Cassian smiled broadly at Finnian, all-knowing.
The only truly eternal thing in life was not the life of a god or a goddess, but the love that gathered in one’s soul, transcending flesh and scouring the edge of the dawn to reunite us in small moments. Perhaps that was the entire meaning of life, to always find each other again.
