Jiya
The ground outside was a white blanket with the first snowfall in November.
I walked downstairs to the kitchen and saw my children.
Watching them play in the living room, their laughter drifting through the house like music, I silently thanked God for the strength he had given me to survive these past months.
The pain of losing Cole had taken root in my chest. Some days it felt like a dull ache.
Other days, it surged through me. Realizing how he must have felt when he had lost his wife and daughter years ago made my heart twist with a new kind of understanding.
Back then, when we were still strangers, I had only seen his grief from the outside.
I hadn’t truly known the silent battles he fought every day inside him, just to keep moving forward.
I wished I had known and understood sooner.
Had I urged Cole to go to the doctor earlier, maybe he would be here with us today.
I should have forced him. I should have given him an ultimatum.
Occasional guilt roosted over me when I sat at the docks—my favourite place, the place where so many of our memories lived.
I had watched countless sunsets and sunrises with him there, the sky painted in shades of gold and crimson as we stood side by side, our hands laced together.
The children and Geeta had joined us on many of those evenings.
Lucas would run along the wooden planks, chasing seagulls, while Emma clung to my leg, giggling at the sound of the waves.
Those moments had felt ordinary at the time, yet now they glowed in my memory like treasured photographs—irreplaceable pieces of a life that had slipped through my fingers too quickly.
I had noticed his symptoms.
So had his brother.
I had told him to visit the doctor, sometimes demanding an explanation for his reluctance, my voice firm, my worry barely hidden beneath the surface.
But he would always win the argument somehow, disarming me with that stubborn smile and convincing me that everything was fine when it clearly was not.
The ache and grief never truly faded, even after we learned the end was inevitable.
The moment the doctors confirmed his cancer, the future I had carefully imagined with him shattered.
The life I had planned, the house we were supposed to move into as a family, the laughter that would have filled those rooms, the quiet evenings we would have shared… everything vanished overnight.
He had proposed to me with hope, promising a future filled with love, stability, and belonging. I had believed in that future with my whole heart.
Then the diagnosis came, and everything changed.
The house we had chosen together was cancelled, the deposit returned as though our dreams could be refunded just as easily.
The wedding, which was supposed to take place in October, was preponed to April, a fragile attempt to hold onto hope while fear crept silently into every corner of our lives.
In the end, the life I had dreamed of with him slipped away, leaving me standing alone with the children once again.
Did I not deserve happiness?
Did I not deserve love?
Did I not deserve a partner—someone to love, someone to cherish, someone to grow old with?
Over the past couple of months, I’d kept myself busy with work and the children, filling my days with responsibilities so I wouldn’t have time to dwell on the silence Cole had left behind.
At first, the idea of working in Liam’s company had felt ridiculous.
I had made a promise to Cole, yet I wasn’t sure whether I would be able to keep it.
I knew nothing about construction. Nothing about permits, blueprints, inspections, or the endless technical details that seemed to define that world.
Doubt followed me everywhere during those first few weeks, whispering that I didn’t belong there, that I was stepping into territory far beyond my abilities.
I felt like a stranger trying to navigate a foreign language.
“No, this is wrong,” the twenty-year-old intern had said during one of my early visits to the office. “You need to first acquire permits and licenses before checking out the health and safety requirements of a project, but only after you’ve finalized a location.”
“But Matt,” I replied, scratching the back of my neck and shaking my head, “it doesn’t make sense to me. Isn’t health and safety supposed to come before everything else?”
I’d been ready to give up multiple times. I couldn’t understand how this business worked. I hadn’t studied for it. It wasn’t my major in university.
I loved food.
I loved people.
I loved creating spaces where families could gather, laugh, and share meals.
Cement and concrete had never been part of my world.
But I loved Cole, and this company carried his name, his effort, his dreams. It was part of the legacy his family—and himself—had worked so hard to build, and walking away from it felt like walking away from him.
Sitting down in Cole’s office for the first time had been one of the hardest moments of my life.
Touching the desk he had used, the chair he had sat in, even the pen he had once held in his hand, made tears slide down my cheeks before I could stop them.
Every surface in that room held traces of him.
He had left me his share of the company, but I didn’t want to simply inherit it.
I wanted to earn it.
Gaining a brother in Liam had changed my life. He welcomed me into his family. Being around him made me feel less alone. I didn’t want to disappoint him. I didn’t want to fail.
So I made a decision.
I wasn’t going to give up, no matter how difficult the journey became. I was going to do everything in my power to keep my promise to Cole.
Night after night, after the children had gone to bed, I sat at the dining table surrounded by papers, books, and notes, teaching myself everything I could about the business. My eyes burned from exhaustion, yet I kept going, driven by a determination that felt stronger than fear.
I visited construction sites the company had worked on, walking through unfinished buildings with a notebook clutched in my hand, writing down every detail I didn’t understand.
I asked questions, listened carefully, and absorbed as much information as possible, determined to prove—to myself more than anyone else—that I was capable of carrying forward the life he had built.
“Mr. Liberman,” Liam had said during one of the meetings I attended as he addressed the client.
“This project caters to the common man. The prices are affordable. The materials are eco-friendly. The homeowners will have choices they never imagined. Your real estate agents will be able to sell this project easily once they show customers these designs and amenities.”
As I sat there listening, watching Liam speak, I realized this wasn’t just about business for him either. He was honouring Cole too. He was protecting what his brother had created. He was building a future that would make Cole proud—from wherever he was watching.
And in that moment, I silently promised him again: I will not let your dream fade.
Confirming the deal with a handshake, I saw how passionate Liam was about his work. His energy filled the room, like a man who believed in every word he spoke.
After treating me to lunch that afternoon, he said, “Today, we will learn about construction materials,” he said, leaning forward slightly as he spread blueprints and sample sheets across the table.
“There are various materials used depending on the type of building that one constructs. It’s all about being economical and sustainable. ”
I nodded, absorbing every word.
Jotting down notes in my notebook, I slowly began to grasp the business I had become a part of.
The unfamiliar terms that once sounded like a foreign language were beginning to make sense.
Typing out proposals, standing in line for permits, preparing transmittals—each task became another brick laid in the foundation of my confidence.
Fewer and fewer mistakes appeared each week on the mock documents Liam prepared for me. Each correction felt like progress. Each lesson felt like a step forward.
I wasn’t just learning a business; I was learning a piece of Cole’s world.
And with every new concept I understood, my connection to him grew stronger, as though I were walking beside him again, tracing the path he had once built with his own hands.
Now, watching my children play in the snow outside, I wrapped both hands around a cup of hot chocolate, letting the heat seep into my palms.
Emma lay on her back in the snow, flapping her arms and legs excitedly as she made snow angels.
Her laughter rang out across the yard, untouched by the sorrow that had reshaped our lives.
She didn’t understand that Cole would never be coming back.
Her world continued as though nothing had changed, her days filled with toys, giggles, and bedtime stories.
Occasionally, she would stop what she was doing, turn toward me with wide, searching eyes. “Dada?”
The word landed like a stone dropped into still water, sending ripples through my chest.
“Dada is no more,” I would say, my throat constricting. “Dada is here,” I whispered, placing my hand gently over her chest. “He’s watching over us now.”
Lucas, however, felt his absence in a way that only someone older could understand.
He had witnessed Cole’s struggle during those final months, watching the man he admired grow weaker day by day.
He had helped me carry food to his bedside, his small hands steady despite the fear in his eyes.
Every morning, he’d bring Emma to see him when they woke up.
Every night, before going to bed, he had said goodnight to Cole.
He was so mature for his age that it both filled me with pride and broke my heart at the same time.
I was proud of my son—of the boy he was becoming, of the man he would one day grow into.
After dinner that evening, I sat on the couch and watched television. My eyes moved to Cole’s picture resting on the mantle.
A flashback of his funeral surfaced in my mind, and a cold shiver ran down my spine.
I had seen it before it happened… in my vision—the one I experienced in the hospital when I was fighting for my life two and a half years ago.
I shuddered with the realization.
So many pieces now fit together.
The house with the blue door… Cole… Emma’s face… the funeral.
Each image had appeared in that vision long before reality unfolded, and now the memories returned. But one question stayed in my mind.
The wedding.
I remembered seeing a wedding after the funeral in that same vision, yet it was not the wedding I had shared with Cole in our backyard. That ceremony had been simple, intimate, filled with love—but the wedding in my vision had felt different.
Was it someone else’s? Maybe Lucas’s or Emma’s when they grow up? Or Elle’s children?
The thought hovered in my mind, and I reached for the magazine lying in front of me while the children switched off the TV and began playing with their toys on the floor.
Milo padded across the living room and lowered himself beside me, pressing himself close against my leg as he always did.
He had grown attached to me from the time Cole passed away, rarely leaving my side at night and curling up beside me on the bed, while Oreo usually wandered between Lucas and Emma, shuffling from one child to the other before finally choosing a spot to sleep.
Suddenly, Emma screamed at her brother.
“Lucas,” I said, turning toward them. “What’s going on with you guys?”
“Nothing, Mama,” Lucas replied quickly. “I took the toy to fix it for Emma, and she’s now yelling.”
“Emma,” I said, looking directly at my daughter. She stared back at me, her small face scrunched up. “Your brother is trying to help you. Stop screaming. It is not nice. Apologize, please.”
Whimpering softly, Emma stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Lucas in a clumsy hug.
Watching them reconcile made my chest ache. They had each other, and they always would have each other.
Flipping through the pages of the magazine absentmindedly, my attention drifted across advertisements and photographs—until one picture caught my eye.
A heaviness expanded in my core, and my muscles went weak.
I squeezed my eyes shut, convinced I was imagining things.
This can’t be real.
Slowly, I opened them again.
And there it was.
Caleb Evans and Tatiana Myers' Summer Engagement Celebration!
The headline seemed to pulse on the page, the letters expanding and shrinking.
A selfie of the two of them filled the centre—Tatiana smiling brightly beside him, her hand resting proudly on his chest, a diamond ring sparkling under the camera’s flash. The next page displayed photographs from an engagement shoot—perfect poses, elegant clothing, polished smiles.
A life moving forward and a future being built.
I sat motionless, staring at the images, my mind struggling to catch up with what my eyes were seeing.
Caleb.
Emma’s father.
Caleb.
The name echoed inside my head, stirring emotions I had buried so carefully beneath layers of responsibility and survival.
He had moved on with his life, just like I had. I couldn’t blame him for that. I couldn’t question him. I couldn’t be angry. He was not mine anymore. And I was not his.
Still, something inside my chest hardened at the sight of it.
Tatiana was a beautiful woman—elegant, confident, everything a man like Caleb would naturally be drawn to. His type of woman.
A mix of feelings churned inside me. Sadness brushed against grief. Acceptance collided with lingering attachment. Memories stirred like dust rising from the past. I didn’t want to feel any of it. I didn’t want to examine those emotions.
Closing the magazine slowly, I placed it on the table and walked over to my children, forcing myself to focus on their laughter, their warmth, and their presence.
But my thoughts drifted back to Caleb as I looked at our daughter.
His daughter.
The child he knew nothing about, and the child who would grow up without ever knowing the man whose blood ran through her veins.
That thought pierced my heart.
With the holidays inching closer, I knew Christmas and New Year were going to feel different this year. Filled with memories etched into my mind—memories that time would never erase.