I couldn’t tell you, my love, because I knew you’d worry about the rules, the fairness, whether it was allowed — and it is, it’s all documented and legal and done. But mostly I couldn’t tell you because it would have meant saying out loud, while I still had you in front of me, that I’d found the child who was going to get my heart. And I couldn’t bear to make my death that concrete for you while I was still alive to hold your hand.
But here’s what I need you to understand, Grace. I’m not going to be here to watch our daughter grow up. That’s the one thing I can’t change, and it’s broken my heart more than the illness ever did. But because of what I arranged, a four-year-old named Lily is going to live. Her mother and father are going to get the thing I don’t — years. Birthdays. A daughter who grows up. I can’t stay for ours. So I made sure I could stay for someone’s.
