MONDAY DECEMBER 23RD
It was the same argument every year. “Will you please come to midnight mass with me on Christmas Eve?” Julie Whitaker asked her brother. “Absolutely not” he replied. He heard her exhale in exasperation through the cell phone.
“I’m not asking you to go to church with me every Sunday, Jason.” Julie knew her brother would never agree to go, but she tried to convince him anyway.
“Would you please stop asking me? I am not going. I am never setting foot in that place again.” Jason said. It was 8am on Monday and Jason had no patience for the argument. Christmas was just two days away. Julie lost the fight every year, but she never gave up. She had faith that sooner or later her brother would come around.
“When will you be home?” he asked. “Tomorrow” She said. Julie regularly traveled on business and always took the time to explore the cities she visited. She loved looking at the architecture, and shopping for antiques. “I found this great salon and spent a few hours there yesterday afternoon.” She chattered on about her hair cut and color. “I had the stylist make me a crazy redhead again” Julie said, sounding quite happy with herself. Jason laughed thinking the color of her hair didn’t change her level of craziness.
Jason listened to Julie talk about her day for another 15 minutes, before she finally apologized for monopolizing his time, and hung up. He noticed she sounded exceptionally happy. He hadn’t heard that tone from her in a long time. She was having a hard time getting over the depression caused by her divorce. Maybe the holidays were helping her mood, he thought. She always loved Christmas.
Julie had moved into her brother’s house in March of that year, after losing her own during the divorce. She had been married for 10 years, but had no children. Her Ex-husband didn’t want them. She had ignored all the signs that something was wrong, and thought they were just going through a phase. Julie took her vows seriously and believed in “for better or worse”. Then, she was blindsided when she was served with the divorce papers at her office one afternoon. No one in her family had ever been divorced, or even separated, that she recalled. It shattered the imperfect world in which she lived.
The devastation caused by her Ex-husband had sent Julie into a slow decline into a severe depression that culminated into a week long hiatus from life. During that week she wouldn’t open the bedroom door, didn’t answer the phone, and didn’t get out of bed. She ignored Jason’s attempt to communicate with her, until he threatened to break the door down to make sure she was still alive. When she finally got out of bed and opened the door she looked like she actually had been dead for a few days.
The next morning Julie got up, showered, dressed, and went about her day as if nothing had happened. Jason sat at the kitchen table and ate his breakfast, while she walked back and forth in front of him fixing her own. She was talking the whole time. He thought she looked mechanical, like a robot programmed for a specific action and purpose.
Julie had been broken and was doing her best to mend. Most days, she continued to function in her robot mode, but with a little more color in her face. Over the summer, Julie slowly returned to something close to her old self, though still lacking in her usual happiness. She spent time at the gym and out in the sun, and occasionally went out with friends. She didn’t talk about the divorce.
Today was the first time in nearly nine months that Julie sounded like Julie. It was as if a switch had been flipped and the warmth of her personality was turned back on. Jason sat thinking about their conversation. The longer he thought about it, the more he realized that her mood had been improving over the past few weeks.
Jason spent the day cleaning house. Not exactly what he wanted to do during his vacation, but it was better than working. He dragged the task out as long as possible and procrastinated at every opportunity. He even spent an hour sorting his DVD’s into alphabetical order, not because he was obsessive, but because he did not want to tackle wrapping Christmas presents. That was Julie’s job. She was meticulous about wrapping, and he had no idea why she left it up to him this year.
After procrastinating all day, and having nothing else left to accomplish, Jason grabbed the wrapping paper and settled at the dining room table. He wrapped a few gifts more than once because his wrapping looked as if a five year old had done it. Two hours later, when his back began to ache from leaning over the table, he had finally finished wrapping the entire pile.
Jason made a quick dinner, and then relaxed in front of the TV for the rest of the evening. He flipped channels out of boredom, and then drifted off to sleep with his feet propped up on the coffee table. He had made a habit out of sleeping on the couch since Julie moved in. It made him feel like he was protecting her. He was the guard dog on duty at night.
At 4:30am Jason’s phone rang and jolted him out of his deep sleep. The TV was still on, though barely audible, and showing an old black and white movie. Blurry eyed, Jason looked at the phone, didn’t recognize the number, and debated about answering it. Probably a wrong number, he thought. He answered it anyway.
“Is this Jason Whitaker?” said a man’s voice on the other end. “Yes, this is Jason” he replied and sat up straight. Something in the tone of the man’s voice told him the call was important and that he had better pay attention. Jason cleared his throat before asking who was calling.
“Jason, this is the Lafayette Police Department. There has been an accident.” Jason heard the words but could not make sense out of them. “What? Who?” Jason was confused and tried to shake the sleep out of his head and listen. “There was an accident on I65, just outside of LaFayette, caused by the ice storm. Do you know Julie Whitaker?”
“Yes! She is my sister!” Jason screamed his answer into the phone as he jumped off the couch. “Is she ok?”“I’m sorry sir. We believe we have Julie Whitaker at the Medical Examiner’s office. She was killed in the accident. We need you to come down to identify her body.” The words hit Jason like a ton of bricks. The room spun around him. “There must be a mistake” said Jason. Julie wasn’t in LaFayette.
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