across the floor until I reached her side. “Would you like me to give you a ride home?”
“Please.” Amanda gave me a grateful smile. “Let me just go and grab my things.” As she strode off, I popped my head around Carter’s door. “I’m taking Amanda home. I should be back in half an hour.”
Exhaustion was layered into Carter’s face in fine lines. He simply held my gaze and nodded.
I concentrated hard on driving without grinding the gears, which I’ve been known to do whenever my mind’s preoccupied. Amanda sat staring numbly out the window with her forehead pressed against the glass, her shallow breaths forming a ring of condensation around her head.
“How could this could happen to my Ben? It just doesn’t make any sense to me.”
Gripping the steering wheel, I gave Amanda a sidelong glance. She seemed to be drifting in and out of a kind of semi-conscious state. When she spoke again she might have been in a trance. “Ben’s only thirty-five, you know.”
“I’m so sorry for your loss,” I said quietly. I hoped the simple phrase expressed the extent of what I felt. They were such easy words, offered with little or no thought, yet I meant every word of it.
Amanda’s face was an impassive mask. “Me too . . .” There was a pause until she added, “You know, our ten year anniversary is just next month. I had this whole trip planned. To Yellowstone. It’s where we had our honeymoon. We’d stayed at the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel . . . so beautiful, so peaceful. And we saw so many bison. But not many bears, though. Ben was all about the bears . . . always wanting to snap a hundred pictures of them.”
Amanda carried on talking about the time they had spent at Yellowstone, and it seemed to ground her for a bit. At some point, she slipped and lost her footing. “I had this amazing trip all planned. And now . . . now I’ll be planning a funeral. Oh God!” She buried her face in her hands and burst into gut-wrenching sobs. “This is so-so sudden. I just saw Ben this morning, getting ready for work. I-I haven’t had time to prepare for this. I didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye to him.” She began to cry even harder.
I swallowed hard, pushing against the lump that was blocking my throat. Then I pulled over to the side of the road, stalled the engine and put a comforting hand around Amanda’s shoulder, hoping she wouldn’t shrug it off, grateful when she didn’t.
Chapter Six
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted,” said the priest. After the first Episcopal prayer, Amanda rose from the pew and strode to the front of the church. For the first few seconds, “Hi,” was all she could manage. She stood there for a moment, composing herself. Then, “My Ben . . . I know he loved me. And I know he loved his family because he was never afraid to say it or show it.” Her voice did not crack and she looked strong and brave in front of a crowd of over three hundred.
She talked about her beloved husband, Ben, as if he were sitting in the front-row pew, gazing at her. She spoke about simple moments they had shared and I could sense the painful effort that it required from her.
Her husband was taken away so suddenly, without any warning, without preamble, that there was no gradual transition, no time at all for her to adjust. The way her world had been, with her husband alive, was gone. She now had to face a new reality . . . the way the world is , with him gone. My heart broke into a million pieces for her.
When her tribute came to an end, Amanda looked around at the sea of faces. “I’d like to leave you all with a poem by Canon Henry Scott-Holland. I know in my heart this is how Ben would have wanted to be remembered . . .” She unfolded a piece of paper, cleared her throat and began.
Death is nothing at all.
I have only slipped away to the next room.
I am I and you are you.
Whatever we were to each other,
That, we still
“Please.” Amanda gave me a grateful smile. “Let me just go and grab my things.” As she strode off, I popped my head around Carter’s door. “I’m taking Amanda home. I should be back in half an hour.”
Exhaustion was layered into Carter’s face in fine lines. He simply held my gaze and nodded.
I concentrated hard on driving without grinding the gears, which I’ve been known to do whenever my mind’s preoccupied. Amanda sat staring numbly out the window with her forehead pressed against the glass, her shallow breaths forming a ring of condensation around her head.
“How could this could happen to my Ben? It just doesn’t make any sense to me.”
Gripping the steering wheel, I gave Amanda a sidelong glance. She seemed to be drifting in and out of a kind of semi-conscious state. When she spoke again she might have been in a trance. “Ben’s only thirty-five, you know.”
“I’m so sorry for your loss,” I said quietly. I hoped the simple phrase expressed the extent of what I felt. They were such easy words, offered with little or no thought, yet I meant every word of it.
Amanda’s face was an impassive mask. “Me too . . .” There was a pause until she added, “You know, our ten year anniversary is just next month. I had this whole trip planned. To Yellowstone. It’s where we had our honeymoon. We’d stayed at the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel . . . so beautiful, so peaceful. And we saw so many bison. But not many bears, though. Ben was all about the bears . . . always wanting to snap a hundred pictures of them.”
Amanda carried on talking about the time they had spent at Yellowstone, and it seemed to ground her for a bit. At some point, she slipped and lost her footing. “I had this amazing trip all planned. And now . . . now I’ll be planning a funeral. Oh God!” She buried her face in her hands and burst into gut-wrenching sobs. “This is so-so sudden. I just saw Ben this morning, getting ready for work. I-I haven’t had time to prepare for this. I didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye to him.” She began to cry even harder.
I swallowed hard, pushing against the lump that was blocking my throat. Then I pulled over to the side of the road, stalled the engine and put a comforting hand around Amanda’s shoulder, hoping she wouldn’t shrug it off, grateful when she didn’t.
Chapter Six
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted,” said the priest. After the first Episcopal prayer, Amanda rose from the pew and strode to the front of the church. For the first few seconds, “Hi,” was all she could manage. She stood there for a moment, composing herself. Then, “My Ben . . . I know he loved me. And I know he loved his family because he was never afraid to say it or show it.” Her voice did not crack and she looked strong and brave in front of a crowd of over three hundred.
She talked about her beloved husband, Ben, as if he were sitting in the front-row pew, gazing at her. She spoke about simple moments they had shared and I could sense the painful effort that it required from her.
Her husband was taken away so suddenly, without any warning, without preamble, that there was no gradual transition, no time at all for her to adjust. The way her world had been, with her husband alive, was gone. She now had to face a new reality . . . the way the world is , with him gone. My heart broke into a million pieces for her.
When her tribute came to an end, Amanda looked around at the sea of faces. “I’d like to leave you all with a poem by Canon Henry Scott-Holland. I know in my heart this is how Ben would have wanted to be remembered . . .” She unfolded a piece of paper, cleared her throat and began.
Death is nothing at all.
I have only slipped away to the next room.
I am I and you are you.
Whatever we were to each other,
That, we still
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