I’m sitting by my father’s hospital bed, watching the slow rise and fall of his chest. The man who once claimed he caught a giant catfish with his wedding ring can barely speak now. Cancer has stolen his voice, but not his eyes—they still sparkle with that old mischief.

He turns to me, weakly lifts his hand, and croaks, “Tell me how I die.”

Joséphine looks at me, tears in her eyes. “He wants it to be a good story.”

I hesitate. All my life, I’ve resented his lies. But now, maybe the truth isn’t in the facts—it’s in the telling.

So I begin: “You didn’t die in a hospital. You escaped. We broke you out, drove to the river under a full moon. Everyone was there—Jenny, Karl, Amos, even the twins. You stepped into the water, and it shimmered… and then you became the catfish. Big as a boat. You looked back at me once, smiled with fish lips, and swam away.”

His breath steadies. His fingers twitch—not in pain, but in approval.

He’s not gone yet. But he’s already becoming legend.