Eleanor, you bartered Arthur’s remembrance for a gala; now you’ll barter this mansion for a mere room.

A suffocating sweetness hung heavy in the vast colonial home, an oppressive perfume of Casablanca lilies. These blooms filled substantial crystal vessels on the dark wood dining table, the culinary island, and the entrance console. Yet, their presence wasn’t for my father, Arthur, whose respiratory system was faltering in a stark hospice ward just ten miles distant. Instead, they graced the ‘Spring Soiree’ my spouse, Eleanor, was determined to host mere days after receiving his grim diagnosis.