A Death In Calgary

by Mary Daugherty

  Chapter Five: Death Attends a Funeral

  Emily passed away on a cold January night with Sam at her side. It was a quiet passing. No screams of mourning, no tearing of hair, just a soul ascending to Heaven in the last breath of a woman loved. Sam tried to lay down and die with her but God would not take him. He awoke with the morning with his head still lying on the pillow beside her. How could God be so cruel as to leave him in this world without his Emily.

  Emily was buried in the little cemetery of the town's church. All the townsfolk came and everyone must have brought food. Why do people want to feed a person that is mourning? Sam could not stand the thought of taking one bite. The smell of the food made him sick. He suffered patiently for hours until the last of the town had closed their car doors and headed toward home. Then he threw all the food into a garbage bag and tossed it outside in the can. He stuck the dishes in the dishwasher and tidied up the house. Emily would never go to bed with a dirty house. How she managed to get so much done in a day always amazed him and she did it with the grace of an angel.

  How Sam made it through each day is still a mystery to him. Days ran together as sleep took him and then the break of another day would bring him back to his loneliness. He had lost his best friend and his lover in one fatal swoop of cancer's great claw.

  As time passed, Sam learned to swallow the pain when necessary but it burned him up inside. It left him with bitterness than no amount of time would ever heal. When the day came for him to leave this earth he hoped, prayed, that Emily's love might be enough for them both but he did not believe it would.

  To maybe atone for his wicked ways or maybe just because he always had, he filled his time with being the town’s fixit man. Sam was willing to lend a hand wherever and whenever needed. All the well-meaning ladies encouraged him with promises of apple pies and even a kiss once to lure him back into the flock. No amount of cajoling was going to motivate him to attend church. Till he could find forgiveness in his heart for God, Sam just thought it was kind of hypocritical to hang out at His House. Emily had forgiveness down to a fine art but Emily always was the best part of the two. She made him whole, and without her, life was just missing something. Something just out of Sam's grasp.