Doctors and nurses rushed in, shouldering me aside. They began emergency resuscitation. The defibrillator fired once, twice, again, jolting Grandma's frail body. But nothing brought her back.

Half an hour later.

The doctor set down the paddles. Slowly, he pulled the white sheet up over Grandma's face.

"The patient shows no vital signs."

"I'm sorry for your loss."

I stared at him.

Sorry for my loss? How was I supposed to bear this loss?

She was the only family I had left.

I walked to her bedside, one step at a time, and sank to my knees.

The grief was so total, so absolute, that I couldn't cry. Not a single tear would come.

I knelt there for three hours.

Only when my legs had gone completely numb did I grip the edge of the bed and pull myself up.

I called the funeral home and arranged the cremation that same night.

The moment the furnace door closed, I thought I saw Grandma smiling at me. She was telling me to live well, to stop wasting tears on people who didn't deserve them.

It was four in the morning when I walked out of the funeral home, cradling the urn in my arms.

I pulled out my phone. The screen was clean. Empty.

No missed calls from Phil. No messages. Nothing.

He was probably at Clarissa's bedside right now, hovering over her, protecting their baby with every ounce of care he'd never given my grandmother.

I put the phone away and took a cab back to the place that used to be called home.

The door swung open to a house full of us. Every surface held some trace of the life Phil and I had built together. The wedding portrait on the wall. The matching slippers by the entryway. The pair of custom mugs sitting side by side on the coffee table.

How ironic.

I packed a few things quickly, then set my grandmother's death certificate on the table.

Before I left, I took one last look around. Then I shut the door without mercy.

The airport terminal hummed with the steady flow of travelers.

I watched planes lift off through the window, and felt something I hadn't expected: calm. A strange, hollow calm, settled deep in my chest.

The boarding announcement crackled over the speakers.

I stood, tightened my arms around the urn, and walked toward the gate without looking back.

Goodbye, city that took everything from me.

Goodbye, Phil.