Good Grief

Nettie wasn't aware Roland had slipped out of the house when she startled to find him coming in the kitchen door, grinning, holding an old kitchen clock with its plug dragging along the floor. He pointed toward the downstairs room into which she'd moved him with the Alzheimer's diagnosis as she gently scolded him for leaving, finally smiling to say, "Yes, honey, I know you need to fix it and it's okay."

Roland sold his shop and retired 26 years earlier but continued to tinker with clocks and watches, evidenced by cigar boxes full of watch and clock parts stacked neatly along the top of the bureau and undisturbed by Nettie knowing it was a harmless and pleasurable pasttime.

Whatever Roland did over the course of 2 days, the unplugged clock continued to run, even after he had removed the hands and, at the point of abject frustration, Roland stood, roiling, to throw the clock against the wall and was felled by a heart attack at 88. The clock's remains, just beyond the reach of the craftsman, exposed a broken, hidden port through which a 9-volt battery had popped, the back-up power supply for the tasteless plastic timekeeper.

Lorena Nayton appeared in a brightly colored, floral-printed dress during the sparsely attended funeral home's viewing hours to Nettie's displeasure, for Lorena had always wanted to lure Roland into a tryst, and when Lorena held Nettie's hand and pucker-smiled to say, "My condolences, it was just his time and I loved him, too, you know," Nettie wailed a loud, involuntary sob and stomped the prune-faced hussy's foot.