They will insist it was dignified, a passing wrapped in ceremony and softened by familiar phrases, but the truth lived in the shadows of fluorescent-lit corridors. There, time stretched between beeping monitors and half-finished cups of tea. Queen Catherine’s fingers traced invisible circles on his wrist, as if willing his pulse to stay. The children spoke in fragments, bargaining with silence, memorizing the rise and fall of his breath like a fading hymn.
Outside, the world prepared its tributes, rehearsed its grief. Inside, he asked small questions: Did the shelter get its funding? Had the letters gone out to the families he’d promised to help? In those final hours, crowns and protocols dissolved, leaving only a man determined to leave nothing unfinished. When the bells finally rang, they did not just mark an ending, but the quiet beginning of all he’d set in motion.
