We laughed.

We said goodnight.

That was Thursday.

We flew Friday morning.

Dad called before we boarded.

He wished us a safe trip.

My father died on Saturday.

But I didn’t know that yet.

And the order matters.

On Friday, I knew nothing.

I sat beside Sophie on the plane while she talked endlessly about mermaids.

Could they live in rivers?

Did they have different powers?

Were ocean mermaids stronger than lake mermaids?

Her curiosity was still completely alive.

Cancer hadn’t touched that part of her.

When we arrived, the hotel looked almost exactly like the pictures.

White exterior.

Blue shutters.

A block from the beach.

The moment I opened our room window, salt air rushed inside.

Sophie’s eyes widened.

“Can we go now?”

“After we unpack.”

“But Mom—”

“Five minutes.”

She unpacked faster than I had ever seen her do anything.

Then she stood by the door practically vibrating.

We crossed the street.

And then she saw it.

The ocean.

She stopped completely.

It stretched from one edge of the world to the other.

For a moment, Sophie simply stood there.

Then she ran.

Straight toward it.

Shoes and all.

She splashed into the shallow water and laughed.

That laugh.

I stood on the sand and covered my mouth.

This time I didn’t try to stop myself from crying.

Her joy was big enough to hold my grief.

We stayed until she was exhausted.

She collected shells with the seriousness of a museum curator.

Four were acceptable.

Six were rejected.

Each rejection came with an explanation.

We let waves wash around our ankles.

She stared toward the horizon.

“Do you think the mermaids live way out there where we can’t see them?”

“I think they live exactly as far away as you imagine.”

She considered this.

“Then they live very far away.”

“Then they live very far away.”

Eventually, we returned to the hotel.

We were changing for dinner when someone knocked.

The hotel manager stood outside.

His name was Mr. Caruso.

He was around fifty, very formal, and he was holding a box with extraordinary care.

“I’m sorry to disturb you,” he said. “But there’s something about this trip you don’t know.”

He held the box toward me.

“I was asked to personally give you this on your first day.”

Sophie stood beside me.

Mr. Caruso continued.

“I received very specific written instructions.”

I took the package.

It was about the size of a shoebox.

Brown paper.

Heavier than expected.

My name was written across the top.

I knew the handwriting immediately.

Dad’s.

For several seconds, my brain refused to make sense of it.

Dad was at home.

Dad had called me the night before our flight.

Dad had told me to wear shoes that could get wet.

“There’s a letter inside,” Mr. Caruso said. “I was told you should read that first.”

I put the box on the table.

Sophie watched silently.

I opened it.

An envelope with my name sat on top.

I unfolded the letter.

Dear Elena,

If you’re reading this, everything went the way I hoped, and you and Sophie made it to the ocean.

I stopped.

Then read the line again.

The next paragraph made my body go cold.

Dad explained that his heart had been much worse than he had told me.

Doctors had warned him that time was limited.

He hadn’t told me because Sophie’s illness was already more than enough for me to carry.

He apologized.

Then he explained that he had arranged the trip weeks earlier.

The hotel.

The flights.

The delivery.

Mr. Caruso.

Everything.

Sophie climbed onto the bed beside me.

I kept reading.

Dad had packed things for both of us.

But the sentence that broke me came near the end.

He wrote that he knew hearing about his death would hurt.

He couldn’t change that.

But he wanted Sophie to see the ocean first.

He wanted me to watch her joy before grief reached us.

He wanted me to have that memory to hold.

Then:

I love you more than I have ever known how to say.

I love Sophie more than the Little Mermaid loves the ocean, and she will understand what that means.

Open the box together.

Love, Dad.

I don’t know how long I sat there.

Eventually, Sophie touched my arm.

“Mommy?”

I folded the letter and put it in my pocket.

She studied my face.

“Did something happen to Grandpa?”

She had always been able to read me.

“Yes, sweetheart.”

She looked at the letter.

“Is he…”

I nodded.

“Yes.”

She became completely still.

Then I opened my arms.

She climbed into them.

We stayed like that for a while.

Eventually, Sophie looked toward the box.

“He sent that before.”

“Yes.”

“He knew.”

“Yes.”

“He said we should open it together.”

“Yes.”

She climbed down from the bed and walked to the table.

She placed both hands against the box.

“Okay.”

So we opened it.

The first things inside were two notebooks.

Mine was navy blue.

Sophie’s was covered with seashells.

Dad had written in both.

Mine contained words meant only for me.

Sophie’s contained things he wanted her to remember.

And one more thing.

A fairy tale.

One Dad had written himself.

It was about a little girl who traveled to the ocean looking for the mermaid she had always dreamed of meeting.

And she found her.

Sophie read slowly.

When she finished, she pressed the notebook against her chest.

“He wrote this for me.”

“Yes.”

“He knew he wouldn’t be here to read it.”

“Yes.”

She held it tighter.

“But this is still him reading to me.”

My throat closed.

“Yes.”

Underneath the notebooks were two photographs.

One showed Sophie and Grandpa at the treatment center.

He was holding the storybook.

She was smiling.

He was too.

The second photograph was of me as a little girl.

Maybe seven years old.

Standing at the edge of a lake.

Shoes in my hand.

Laughing.

My mother was visible behind me.

Dad must have taken it.

I hadn’t seen that photograph in years.

I didn’t even know he still had it.

Beneath the photographs was a map.

Hand-drawn.

Careful.

Precise.

The kind of map only a man who had spent decades in construction would make.

It showed the beach around our hotel.

Dad had marked several places.

A good shell-collecting area at low tide.

A café with supposedly excellent coffee.

A bench facing west where we could watch the sunset.

And a pier.

Beside the pier, he had written:

The pelicans gather here in the afternoon. They are enormous and will make Sophie laugh.

Sophie traced the map with one finger.

“He planned where we should go.”

“Yes.”

“He didn’t know if he would still be here.”

“No.”

“But he made the map anyway.”

“Yes.”

She pointed at the pier.

“Can we see the pelicans tomorrow?”

“We absolutely can.”

At the bottom of the box was something wrapped in tissue paper.

I opened it.

A snow globe.

Inside was a tiny ocean scene.

A beach.

A wave.

And a little girl standing at the edge of the water.

Painted across the base were four words:

Sophie at the ocean.

Dad had somehow had it made specifically for her.