Kathy Grow:  

HT (1996) "Poor man. To lose two women he loved within a few years. He'd been so sweet over dinner the night before...[b]ut his energy had flagged and within half an hour he just sat there, moving food about on his plate. Peter kept filling his wine glass, and Clara prattled on about getting the garden ready. That was the beauty of friends, she knew. Nothing was expected of Monsieur Beliveau, and he knew it. Sometimes it's just nice not to be alone. He'd left early, right after supper....On the veranda Clara and Peter had hugged him but offered no easy words of comfort. To do that would be to simply comfort themselves. What Monsieur Beliveau needed was to feel bad. And then he'd feel better." - Louise Penny, THE CRUELEST MONTH (2008) "...[T]he old cliche that time heals wounds does work, to some degree. Do the wounds ever heal? Maybe not completely. Maybe they just soften around the edges, like a headache right before aspirin starts to work. You know the pain is still there, hovering around you, light as a butterfly, but it is almost imperceivable, it is almost gone. It's bearable. Instead of feeling like a smothering straitjacket, it almost feels like a time-softened quilt, a little too warm sometimes, but comforting somehow. Maybe that's the way grief is supposed to be, not something to experience and then get over, like a fever, but something you take inside you, something that becomes as much a part of you as blood and bones and muscle. As much a part of you as love." - Earlene Fowler, SUNSHINE AND SHADOW (2003)".