Another day, she backed her car into the closed garage door. Five days later, she left the driver’s door open and backed out again. Two trips to the dealership in one week; her brain had deserted her.

While at home one evening, she turned on the hot water tap in the kitchen and left the room to get a clean tea towel from the linen closet. The plug was in the drain. Water filled the sink and spilled over the counter and onto the floor. She was oblivious because she’d been sidetracked. She returned to the kitchen ten minutes later and slipped in a layer of water that covered the entire floor. She went down fast, falling sleekly, smoothly. What a surprise, she thought, as her body went into its reflexive curl. The fall was a surprise, the way accidents are—a slippery-eel surprise. She didn’t break a bone, but she might have. She worked for hours sopping up the mess.

Her capacity to concentrate had been shredded. She was dealing with the after-effects of death. She didn’t want to read, interact with people, do much of anything. There were days when she didn’t want to get up in the morning because what was the point? She attended a political meeting just before the local election and had to clench her fists while she fought off the impulse to stand up and shout, “Don’t you realize that my husband died only a few months ago?!” She didn’t stand up and shout, but she wanted to. She was angry. She was indignant.

Sal and the grandchildren did not give up on her, even though they were in another city and busy with their lives. The first Thanksgiving after Lew died, she drove to Ottawa. She planned to arrive at Sal’s an hour before Sunday’s dinner was to be held. She planned to stay overnight and return home Monday.

When she drove onto her daughter’s street and approached the house, she broke down without warning. She began to cry—she was sobbing—and put her foot to the gas. She kept on driving and passed the house, slowing to a crawl only when she was on another street. She circled the block. Mopped at her eyes. She tried again. Drove past, still crying. This was the first year Lew had not been with the family for the Thanksgiving celebration. Hazzley pulled onto a street several blocks away and parked the car and wiped her eyes and blew her nose and sat there for ten minutes, trying to compose herself. The third try was successful, and she parked in Sal’s driveway and rang the back doorbell. No one seemed to have seen her car go by the house twice. No one mentioned her slightly reddened eyes.

When she was home again, she mustered enough energy to sound normal when Cass called to see how she’d made out at Sal’s. But Cass wasn’t buying normality.

“There’s more, Hazzley. Something you’re not saying.”

“No, not at all.” But Hazzley broke down again, and Cass was on her doorstep in thirty minutes. She’d brought a giant pizza and a bottle of wine.