I placed salt in the south-east corners of the house.
On the window sills.
Outside the main door.
I circled it around the bodies of those I love — seven times each — some asleep, some awake. Ancient gestures, borrowed hope. The small human instinct to bargain with forces we do not understand when life begins to slip through our fingers.
But love does not always win by force.
My baby boy continued to deteriorate. The mannitol that was meant to help only added new indignities — pressure on his bladder, blood where there should have been none. Blood in his urine. Blood in his stools. The body, brave for so long, began to quietly surrender.
The doctor told me it was time.
You can prepare for that sentence all you want. You can see it coming days, weeks, even months in advance. But when it finally arrives, it still lands like a blow to the chest. It is always difficult to hear. Always harder to witness — the slow, visible unravelling of someone you love.
I have stood at this threshold many times now. One would think death would feel familiar, even friendly. But death never comes alone. He brings grief with him — vast, consuming — and the promised relief feels like something that belongs to a future too far away to touch.
Before the end, I took Zach to Old Raj Mahal Lane — the place where he was happiest. He walked off the leash, free, unburdened, until his legs could no longer carry him. We went home after that. I fed him pizza, his favourite tuna slices from Joey’s. He ate every morsel with quiet devotion, as if marking the moment, as if saying thank you.
Now I wait.
I wait for the doctor to come home, carrying the injection of relief. Relief for him — and perhaps, someday, for me too. When my own body can no longer go on. When I am tired beyond repair. When I am surrounded by those who love me enough to let me rest.
That is what my baby boy is being given today.
And I wish — with every fibre of my being — that it did not have to be my decision. But love, when it is real, does not cling. It listens. It watches suffering honestly. And if ending pain is the last act of care left to us, then we take that burden onto ourselves so they don’t have to carry it any longer.
This is not cruelty.
This is mercy.
This is love that chooses to hurt so another does not have to.
Hearts Still Care 
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