The Third Part of Chapter 12: Out

Meanwhile, Eunice could not take the stress of knowing something important was going on, and not knowing what exactly it was; it was most disconcerting to her to be in the dark about one of her friends.

“I’m going over,” she said.

“What?” Mario was thinking of the preparations that he had to make for Steve, who would be sleeping on the pullout couch in the guest bedroom.

“I’m going to see James and Clarissa,” said Eunice, this time more emphatically.

“Something’s going on over there, and I simply must see what it is.”

Eunice stepped out the door just in time to see an ambulance zoom down the street and stop at Clarissa’s house. Now she knew something was afoot; one doesn’t dial 9-1-1 for just a scrape, and Clarissa and James did not strike her as obsessive-compulsive, hypochondriacs, or particularly weak. No, she thought; they are sturdy, sensible people, neither of whom would call an ambulance unless there was something seriously wrong. She then saw paramedics get out of the ambulance and run into Clarissa’s door. She could see the figure of Clarissa stepping out, and she could see even from fifty metres away that she was crying. The paramedics were carrying a body out of the house and examining it; it must be James! This thought was chilling, even though she had quite clearly heard Clarissa’s scream. She was now close enough to hear conversation:

“I’m sorry ma’am, there’s nothing we can do for him; your husband is dead.”

“Dead!” This came as a pitiful wail from Clarissa, and sent shock waves through Eunice’s body. This Clarissa looked nothing like the Clarissa who had moved in with James in May or the Clarissa she had known in university, because that Clarissa was always smiling widely, and lit up any room she entered when she smiled. James’s death was evidently taking its instant toll on her. The tear-streaks seemed to age her by ten years or more, and her hair, which was shiny and always carefully combed and styled, suddenly looked dishevelled, as if she had been running her hand through it very vigorously, as she was now doing.

“Do you need any other assistance, ma’am?”

Although this was a simple question, Eunice could see that Clarissa was having difficulty answering; she paused and stammered, which was unusual for the normally forthright and decisive Clarissa that she had known since university.

“…No…I do not think that I shall need any help.” This was a simple enough sentence, but still took Clarissa ten seconds to say.

“Well then, goodbye madam. We are very sorry about your husband’s death; it seems to have been a heart attack, which is very unusual for a thirty-three year old.” This provoked a fresh wave of sobbing from Clarissa; this matter-of-fact, yet almost cruel statement of what was a particularly acute case of bad luck was causing her anguish.

The news of James’s death came as a shock to Eunice and as the paramedics left in the
ambulance with James’s body, presumably to deliver it to a morgue, she approached Clarissa.

“Eunice” was the mechanical greeting that replaced the more cheerful “hi”.

“Clarissa, what happened?”

“He died.”

“Well, I could hear the paramedics, so I know that. What happened before that?”

Clarissa stammered before answering. “He had just arrived home, and I told him I was pregnant. I had decided to surprise him, you see. And then he…” at this point, she broke into tears.

Eunice finished her sentence: “…He had a heart attack. I heard the paramedics,”

Eunice, like Clarissa, was feeling devastated herself; she had known James since he had moved onto the street, after all, which was longer than Clarissa had known him, for she had heard Mario tell her that James told him that he and Clarissa had met at work in February. She was also much slower to tear up than Clarissa was, but they were already gathering in her eyes, and she blinked as a single tear fell down her cheek, in empathy with Clarissa as much as in mourning of the sudden and unexpected loss. Ever the practical woman––Mario had called her almost cruelly practical––she said, “I think we are going to have to make funeral arrangements,”

This was a mistake to say, thought Eunice, as she observed Clarissa dissolving into fresh tears. She nodded, though. There was a stiff breeze blowing, and Eunice, who was getting cold, bade Clarissa good-bye until the next day, and went home. Once home, she confronted her dinner, which had cooled off.

“Well?” said Mario.

“James died of a heart attack,” said Eunice.

Mario thought, what a concise, matter-of-fact statement, from somebody so taken with shallow gossip, to devote only six words to something so profoundly tragic. He was so shocked that he hardly knew what to think.

“A heart attack? At his age? Really?”

“I’m just as shocked as you are, dear,” said Eunice. She sat down on the couch in their living room, and cried over the loss of a close friend, and for Clarissa, for whom the loss could only be more painful. By now, she will have called her parents, and wondered how the parents––his and hers––were coping with the death. The death would unquestionably have repercussions with Patricia and Ryan; Eunice thought of them as sweet, aging people, who did not deserve such tragedy in their lives.

Mario had no idea how to deal with mourning; when his grandparents died, it wasn’t an issue, as they were old; there was the memorial, and then he went on with life, and they were of another generation; it was that generation’s duty to mourn, if at all. This on the other hand, was the death of a young person, apparently in good health, to all appearances. James was a friend, and now there was a void in his life. There was also the touchy issue of how to approach the subject with Clarissa; mourning needed to be a communal activity, for misery festers in solitude; for that reason, they decided to have Clarissa over for dinner that weekend.


The dinner on the Saturday passed in a subdued atmosphere, the loudest noise was the clinking of forks against plates, and it was not surprising that Steve excused himself from the table and went to watch television, such was the atmosphere of the house, and Eunice could only imagine how Clarissa was coping.


On Monday, Yvon, not normally a sensitive man, still noticed a dramatic change in Clarissa’s behaviour, which he first witnessed that morning, when he came to her cubicle to ask a question. Normally when he did this she would regard him imperiously, give him the eye if he said something along the lines of “How’s it goin’, blondie,” which he often did, even though she was a brunette, but when he entered on Monday, she registered hardly any reaction.

“Clarissa, I’m surprised; normally, you behave coldly to me, but now I’m hardly getting any reaction,”

“Yeah, what’s your question,” she acknowledged, without adding the usual “and make it quick.”

“The Minister has a question that he anticipates will come up; it’s about the self-employed fishermen’s subsidies,”

“I saw the email you sent me. I’ll get on it,” she said.

“I’m missing the barbed retorts,”

“I’m missing the spark in my life,”

Yvon thought that this was a rare slip for Clarissa.

“So, I take it something must have happened; I may be an economist, but I’m not completely emotionally dead inside,”

“I’m also an economist,”

“Well, what happened?”

“It’s my husband,”

“What happened? Surely he didn’t die?”

“Actually, that is what happened,” said Clarissa.

“Oh dear, I’m so sorry,” even for a sardonic person such as Yvon, there were sacred cows; the death of one’s beloved was one, and Yvon felt sorry for his co-worker, regardless of how often she ignored him, which she did adeptly; she would simply smile, or roll her eyes, or say, “good morning Yvon,” when he made one of his smart-ass jibes; there would be no such smart-ass behaviour today, or during that week, which was set aside for mourning, at least for Clarissa.

“But he looks so young in that photo on the desk; was it a car crash?”

“Sadly, no; if it were, I would have somebody to blame; it was a heart attack,”

“At his age? He looked like he was in his thirties!”

“He was; everyone’s shocked,”

Yvon thought, but didn’t say aloud in a rare moment of tact, that Clarissa could have done better than by marrying some dud.

“Well, me, I’m very sorry,”

“Thank you for your condolences,”

Yvon walked quickly away from her cubicle into his own, not wanting to deal further with a sad story; listening, as he had to, to his mother griping about her cottage friends at Lake Temiscamingue was bad enough, and still worse to hear her complain about himself, his brother and sister about how they never visit; Yvon said he would visit her more often, but her house smelled too strongly of cats.

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The Second Part of Chapter 12: Out

Eunice and Mario were sitting down to a particularly delicious dinner of seafood crepes with a salad on the side. Eunice had taken a bite when she heard a scream. “What was that?” she said, startled.

“You mean who was that,”

“It sounded like it came from the Millers’,” said Eunice.

“I had better see what’s up,” said Mario. With that, he rose and went to the window. Clarissa and James lived four houses down the street, and their front door was visible over the junipers that grew in the front. A glance revealed that the door was open, and he could see the figure of Clarissa, who was talking on her cell phone. He saw her put her phone away, and kneel down near a mass on their floor. That was all he could see. He then returned to the table.

“Something’s going on at the Millers,” said Mario.

“I’ll call them to see what’s going on,” said Eunice.

“Can’t that wait?” interjected Mario. He disapproved of Eunice’s gossipy streak; if Clarissa had something to tell them, she would surely call. They were about to enjoy a nice dinner anyways, and eating dinner while it was still hot was more important than something going on at the neighbours’. He took a line of passive resistance to gossip, usually nodding and saying “uh-huh” before he turned away or tried to steer the conversation elsewhere.

Thinking about Clarissa and James was making Eunice antsy; she viewed herself as one who needed to be up on the latest events and in the know. As a result, she played with her food more than she normally did, and enjoyed it less; she would have normally savoured every bite of her creation, from the texture and taste of the crepe right down to the creamy filling with crab, lobster and scallops. She finished her dinner in five minutes and strode over to the phone.

“I’m sure she’ll call us,” said Mario as Eunice dialled the Millers’ number.

She listened, and frowned when she got a busy signal.

“Fine, I can wait a few moments,”

“I told you, she will call us if there is anything going on; we’re quite close, after all.”

Eunice drummed her fingers on the kitchen counter, and then picked up the casserole dish. She removed the remaining crepes, put them in a Tupperware bin, which she then put in the fridge; Steve, who was from Sudbury, would be visiting for the weekend, and he liked crepes as much as they did. She then did the washing, with her mind always on Clarissa and James. It was interesting to hear Steve talk, especially about the nickel mine where he worked; on the other hand, she was not so much interested in hearing him gripe about his neighbour, a woman named Juliana, which was what he did the last time he visited, in January; gossip lost its appeal when the subject is one whom she did not know.


The phone rang at Ryan’s house, and he picked it up. Clarissa was again at the other end of the line. This time, however, she was in hysterics.

“He’s… dead!” the words came out in stutters.

“Who’s dead?

“James!”

“James…how? He’s perfectly healthy, he can’t be dead!”

“I called the ambulance two minutes ago; I didn’t think he was dead either.”

“What happened, though?”

“He arrived home, and I told him the good news. He then went into shock; it might be a heart condition, I don’t know.”

“Ryan, who is that you’re talking to?” inquired Patricia.

“It’s Clarissa. Jimmy’s dead.”

“My Jimmy… no! It can’t be. He must be alive, he must!”

Patricia went to kitchen and picked up the other phone. “What happened?” she asked sharply, in something of a panic.

“Oh, Patricia, I’m so sorry. He went into shock when I told him I was pregnant. I don’t know what to think right now. He was only thirty-three; I can hardly believe this is happening.”

They heard Clarissa choking back a sob. “It’s just such a horrible way to go. We were supposed to raise a kid together. Would you know of any conditions he might have had that could have led to this?”

“No, not at all. It’s such a tragedy, and we’re all in the dark.”

Was it murder? Surely not, he thought, in dismissal of the absurdity of such a notion; they loved each other deeply, which he could see from the way they would look into each other’s eyes. A woman who loves their husband that much doesn’t just kill him. Did someone else kill him? If that were the case, Clarissa would have told, and they would not be so much in the dark. Was it illness? No, then Clarissa would have had some sort of warning. Could it be a heart condition, as Clarissa said? Now, there’s a possibility; it is known that the first sign of chronic heart disease is death: “it doesn’t make you ill, it just kills you”. On the other hand, heart disease did not run in the family, at least not that he knew of.

Patricia was both in hysterics and grasping at straws; what could explain it? It could not have been anything fishy, and it did not sound like there was any violence involved; if that were not the case, Clarissa would not have called so quickly were she the killer, and she would have said so were it someone else. Little Jimmy, oh poor, dear little Jimmy must have been ill with something. What was it, though? She needed answers! The notion of her grief, powerlessness and ignorance of all circumstances was as much as she could bear.

“Clarissa, were there any warning signs?”

“No; he was fine yesterday. I told him that I was pregnant just as he got home. He was shocked, and then he collapsed.”

This was even more mysterious; there were definitely no prior signs.

“Well, it is very devastating to hear this, Clarissa dear, but thank you for telling us,” said Patricia.

“It just happened three minutes ago,” said Clarissa.

“Well, good-bye then, and we will have to look into funeral arrangements.”

“Wait a minute. You said you were pregnant?”

“I’m keeping the baby. The death of my husband does not change things,” responded Clarissa, sniffing.

“I have wanted a baby, and I will raise one without James, as I shall have to do now. Good-bye, Ryan and Pat,”

“Good-bye, Clarissa.”

Patricia hung up the phone in the kitchen and wept. It was even more devastating for her than for Clarissa, she thought; she had raised him, while Clarissa knew him for less than a year. Now he’s been felled by I-don’t-know-what, leaving a pregnant widow and grieving parents.
Ryan joined Patricia in the kitchen. His cheeks were tear-stained. “Why us, Ryan?”

“Questions like that sometimes don’t have answers, darling. It might be God’s plan,”

Ryan felt a mixture of grief and frustration. Patricia felt the same.

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The First Part of Chapter 12: Out

James arrived home at 6:35, hoping for a good dinner, or anything to get his mind off how to find a new job. There were no savings in the bank account; after the wedding, honeymoon, and mortgage, they were all out; at least there was no debt other than the mortgage. Clarissa, beaming, greeted him as he stepped through the doorway.

“Hi honey, guess what?”

“You roasted a duck for dinner?”

“No, I just made a casserole. I’m pregnant!”

The news hit James like a shock wave. How were they going to pay for this? He was fired! “What?” he gasped.

He then clutched at his chest and collapsed in the front hall. He saw lights flashing in his eyes, his vision was going blurry, he could no longer see the living room, and the outline of the chandelier was becoming fuzzier and then was a ball of light; he was also losing feeling at the extremities. It seemed like an eternity, although it was less than a second later, that he had a sudden flashback of himself chasing his sister around the backyard when they were living in Guelph, and then him again, skipping gym class while eating a chocolate bar, potato chips and fries, which he had liberally topped with salt, a common scene from his high school years. What had he read about salt in the past year? He simultaneously recalled Maurice’s voice congratulating him when he was hired at Valoix Consulting. Then he remembered the wedding, with the botched, though still tasty wedding cake; he loved the rich, buttery smell of that cake, and butter cream was his favourite cake for years, and then it hit him: the date written on the wedding cake in icing was October 15th, today’s date. He was finding it hard to breathe; his sight went entirely, then his smell, all very quickly; he could hear his wife’s screaming only as a distant echo. He could hear her faintly crying “James, James!” The floor felt indistinct, neither hot nor cold, and then he felt nothing of the floor, or the air, at all. All the while––really less than two seconds, he was fighting to regain control over his body, which was in a state of mutiny over his mind, which was also in chaos. He lost consciousness. He was a shell; he was no more; he was dead.

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