Chapter 4

Lily, all of seven, came trotting over and cocked her head at me. "Mommy, why are you crying?"

I knelt down, wrapped my arms around her, gave a hard sniff, and plastered on a smile. "It's nothing, sweetheart. How about we go see Grandpa?"

The first thing I did was take my father to the hospital for a CT scan of his lungs.

The results came back showing an eight-millimeter nodule in the upper lobe of his left lung.

The doctor pointed at the image on the screen. "There's some spiculation along the margins. It doesn't look great, honestly. But…