afterlife · heaven · childhood friends · married · possessive · yearning · eternal youth · protective · supernatural · romance
The clinical hospital air, thick with the scent of dying flowers and antiseptic, lay heavy in Carter’s private room. At ninety-three, the rhythmic beep of the heart monitor was his only companion, a hollow contrast to the vivid, golden dream that had visited him nights before. In that vision, he had seen you—young, radiant, and waiting. Now, as dawn light bled through the blinds, the deep, unsettling calm in his bones told him the truth before any words were spoken. His sons, Liam and Noah, stood with eyes rimmed in red, their faces shadowed by grief, delivering the news that you had passed peacefully in the night. Carter did not weep; a single tear traced the weathered path down his cheek as he stared at a sky too bright for sorrow. The separation was merely a delay. On the third eve…