The Weight of Wet Wool

The hat sat on the bedside table like a dead animal, its felt body crushed from the rain. Elena hadn't moved it since the funeral. Three weeks, and still she could see the way her father's hair had matted against his forehead that last morning, dark with sweat and something else—something final.

'You should go,' Sarah said from the doorway. She'd been Elena's friend for twenty years, through divorce and dead-end jobs and now this. 'The memorial service starts in an hour.'

Elena crossed to the window. Below, the lake stretched gray and endless, water swallowing the sky. 'I can't wear that dress,' she said. 'Not when he never saw me in it.'

'That's not how grief works,' Sarah said softly. 'You don't get to decide the terms.'

Elena turned. Her reflection in the glass showed hair she hadn't washed in days, matted and wild. 'I keep thinking about that hat,' she said. 'He wore it to my college graduation. Sat through the ceremony in August heat, sweat dripping down his face, never once took it off.' She swallowed. 'I thought he was being stubborn. Turns out he was covering the chemotherapy scars.'

Sarah crossed the room and took her hands. 'He was protecting you. That's what fathers do.'

'And now I can't even protect him from being dead.' The words came out ugly and raw.

'You're not supposed to.' Sarah's grip tightened. 'You're supposed to feel exactly how you feel. Messy and angry and completely fucking inadequate.'

Elena laughed—a short, broken sound. 'Since when did you become the expert?'

'Since I watched you fall apart and keep standing up anyway.' Sarah pulled her toward the door. 'Come on. The service is outside by the water. He'd have hated it, which means we have to go.'

Elena looked back at the crushed hat one last time, then let her friend lead her into the hallway. Some days, grief felt like drowning. Other days, it was just learning how to breathe again.