Chapter 3 - Cinnamon ApplesI spent that whole night in the armchair beside his bed. Every so often he'd open his eyes just to check I was still there.
Around three in the morning, he looked over with a faint spark still left in him. "Maya... you know how to make cinnamon apples?"
I laughed through tears. "Roughly. Why?"
"My mother used to make them for me, back in Ohio, when I was a kid."
I went to the kitchen and found a can of sliced apples in the back of the pantry, some brown sugar, butter, a shake of cinnamon. Nothing fancy — I warmed it on the stove and brought a small bowl back to his room. He took two bites, chewed slowly, and smiled. The first real smile I'd seen on him since I got home.
"This is terrible," he whispered.
I laughed despite everything.
"But it tastes like home," he added, voice thick.
He reached up with a trembling hand and slid off the old sterling silver Marine Corps ring he'd worn on his left hand for forty years. He pressed it into my palm and folded my fingers over it.
"They share your blood, Maya," he whispered. "But you're my real daughter."
I couldn't hold it together anymore. I put my face against his arm and cried.
Ronan had never tried to replace my biological father, who died when I was small. He'd never once made me call him Dad. He'd simply shown up, every single time, for everything. He taught me to drive. He sat in the bleachers at every track meet I ever ran. He waited outside in the freezing cold for four hours the day I sat my Navy commissioning exam.
Whenever my mother said the military was "unbecoming for a young woman," Ronan would cut her off cold. "Leave her be, Wren. If she wants to fly, let her fly."
I squeezed his hand. "I love you, Dad."
First time I'd ever called him that.
It was also the last. He passed quietly just before dawn. Peacefully, his hand still resting in mine.
I sat with him a long while after. Then I smoothed his blanket, closed his eyes gently, and called Dr. Whitcombe. No hysterics left in me by then — just a deep, quiet grief. The man my family had treated like an inconvenient burden had held on just long enough for me to get home, so he wouldn't have to go through it alone.
Priya handled the legal notifications while I arranged a dignified cremation and a small military memorial. Six fellow veterans came. Two neighbors. Dr. Whitcombe. Priya. Me.
May you like
My mother wasn't there. Neither was Desmond or Poppy. They were still posting from the ship — one photo of my mother holding a champagne flute against a sunset, captioned "Last night in paradise!"
I didn't comment.
