* * *
Mrs. Hazzard walks in the dim yellow light of the hallways in her heavy zipped boots. Though people die here every day, every hour, the nurses, rushing past her, do not seem to grasp the magnitude of what is happening to her. She is filled up, Mrs. Hazzard is brimming with the knowledge of Mr. Hazzard’s death. She is like a cup gently running over, yet there is no one to catch the precious overflow.
Now Mrs. Hazzard is down on the first floor looking for the cafeteria, with her stiff square purse over her arm. She will buy a muffin. She must keep up her strength for the vigil. The big front doors swing open letting in warm air that sweeps around Mrs. Hazzard like a healing river. Hospital staff are coming in from the outdoors, coatless. They have been walking in the warm sunny streets carrying their winter coats over their arms here in January in the centre of the city in an old neighbourhood of sturdy brick homes. They are astounded, grateful, lightened by the springlike temperatures. It is my husband, Mrs. Hazzard wants to tell them. It is my husband who has brought this weather. He is dying and his body is absorbing all the cold.
OBJECT OF YOUR LOVE: STORIES. Copyright © 1996 by Dorothy Speak. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
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ISBN 0-312-18638-x
First published by Somerville House Books Limited, Toronto, Canada.
First U.S. Edition: July 1998
eISBN 9781466891845
First eBook edition: February 2015
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