Hummingbird, Resting on Honeysuckles
Novelette 8,510 words Recommended by 2 award/anthology sources
"Red for temperature. Blue for ignition. Green for airflow. It takes four hours and forty-two minutes for you to finish your transformation into a pile of white ashes. I keep a patient vigil over those three primary colors on the cremator’s monitor, making sure that nothing is left behind. Nothing that can be linked to life..."
Content warnings 3
deathdeath-of-a-loved-oneillness-and-pandemic
Quasar links out; the story lives on Clarkesworld, where the author gets the click.