PROLOGUE

May 12, 2020.
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9:59 PM.
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We were in the middle of quarantine.

The world already felt strange.
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Empty streets.
Everyone stuck inside.
Silence everywhere.

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Then a message came through that would split my life into two versions:
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before that night…
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and everything after.

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I remember seeing the text come in from my sister-in-law.
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She never texted me.

And it wasn’t short.

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Right away, something felt wrong.

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I just froze.

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I had never dealt with something like this before.
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I remember sitting there staring at my phone,
trying to process what I was reading…

hoping maybe I misunderstood it somehow.
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But deep down…

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I knew.


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A few moments later,
I walked upstairs to my mom and handed her the phone.

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I couldn’t even say the words out loud.

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I just sat there speechless while my sister-in-law broke the news to her over the phone.
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And I still remember the silence after.




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The kind of silence that changes a house forever.



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My mom just kept saying

:“How could this happen?”

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And honestly…none of us had an answer.




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The Drive

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The very next morning, we rented a car and drove across the country to Florida.
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I remember the roads feeling endless.

State after state.

Exit after exit.
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Just silence.

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46 Hours later,
we finally arrived in Florida…

Everything felt heavy.

Like the air itself had changed.
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Nobody really knew what to say.

It didn’t even feel real yet.
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But the moment it truly became real for me…

was the funeral.


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I remember looking over at my mom and seeing her completely break down.

I had never seen her cry like that before.

She just kept crying.


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And in that moment…

something inside me shifted.
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Not just grief.






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but Responsibility.


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Because when I looked at my nephews…
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I realized they were going to need someone.
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And whether I felt ready or not…
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I knew I couldn’t run from that.

And without realizing it yet…

That was the beginning of everything that would change me.