I'm sitting in the waiting room when Grace arrives. She is wearing pajamas with day old makeup smudged along her cheeks, and her hair is in a greasy knot on the top of her head. When she spots me, it's within a matter of moments that she is curling up against my chest, accompanied by a heavy inhale which I can't identify as a sob or chuckle of sigh or gasp.

"He's going to be okay," I tell her, not really sure where the words are coming from.

"No, he's not," she whispers, and doesn't move.

She tells me that his parents are here, but I never saw them arrive. Not because I wasn't paying attention, but because I didn't know them. Would probably never know them. He's dying after all, and when he did, I would remove any and all reminders of him from my existence. I didn't even know them, but I knew Dexter's parents would have to go as well.