A Walk with Rose
I'm going to post installments of a little novella, A Walk with Rose, that I'm working on. Every couple of days, I'll put up a new piece of the first act. Act II is certainly started but on hold until I get done with my novel. Once I finish that, I'll be finishing this novella. 25 percent of the proceeds from publication will go to the local Humane Society. Everybody makes mistakes. On January 13th, Laura Fitzpatrick made two. The first, made at 2:47 PM, was forgetting her purse. She remembered before she left the driveway and rushed back into the house, leaving the driveway one minute late. She made second mistake after picking up her daughter from elementary school. At the only stoplight on the street, she braked to a hard stop in the left hand turn lane when the light turned yellow, a light that she could have made it safely. Eighteen seconds later, at 3:18 PM, an elderly man driving north blacked out, swerved and, his car accelerating under his convulsing foot, smashed into the front passenger side of her car. Laura was uninjured.
Her daughter was not; her right foot was mangled by the crushing steel of the oncoming vehicle. Paramedics arrived swiftly, gasped, and started feverishly working to save the girl’s right foot. She was loaded into the ambulance and rushed to the hospital. Left at the scene of the accident was one small pink shoe, blood-soaked.
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On January 13th, Mrs. Joy Williams passed. Roy, husband of 52 years sat on one side, holding her hand, not crying because she had asked him not too. On the other side, resting her head on the bed sheets was Joy’s dog, Rose, friend and helper as she met this last stage of life.
Her son, James and daughters, Anne and Marie, waited in the living room, sitting on the dated couch and love seat, eyeing the knickknacks that lined shelves, recognizing gifts given in childhood, the wall of pictures, faded blacks and whites in old-fashioned frames, color pictures of the kids as they grew, marriage photos, and grandchildren’s school pictures. Joy always brought visitors to the wall.
A gentle squeeze on Roy’s hand, a single finger lifting on the other hand to give Rose one last scratch under the chin, she passed, quietly.