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Peggy Duffy __________________________________________________________
I always imagined I'd be able to determine the moment of her impending death, or at least isolate a timeframe in which it was likely to occur. I saw myself sitting by her bedside, holding her dry, chapped hand, listening to her shallow breathing, the warmth of her life slowly but steadily slipping away. After she'd taken her last breath, I'd place that hand gently upon her still stomach, a loving gesture performed with a sentiment I didn't feel. Hell, I might even smooth a few stray strands of her feathery white hair from her brow, brush my lips against her still forehead. A parting act, my daughterly deed performed for a woman who had lived far longer than the average life expectancy. But here she was at 94, still rallying. For a week, I'd been in and out of her hospital room, a private room because she wouldn't tolerate sharing the intimate act of her toileting, for example, beside the eyes of another. You might ask, how would the shriveled shell of a human being, the wrinkled, frail, ashen creature huddled in a near fetal position beneath the equally wrinkled, near-white sheets, wrapped in the sole act of her own survival, be cognizant of another's presence. She was barely aware of mine. I did brush a few errant hairs. I sensed her recoiling at my near touch while I, in turn, pulled back from the crisp odor of bleach wafting up from the limp sheets. It was over a bitter cup of days-old hospital coffee that she opened her eyes and smiled. Not because I was sitting vigil. Not because she was still alive. The glint of satisfaction was because, once again, I'd staked another week of my life on the probability of her death, and she'd outwitted me.
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Peggy Duffy's short stories and essays have appeared in numerous
publications, including Newsweek, The Washington Post, Smokelong
Quarterly, Octavo, Drexel Online Journal, and Three Candles. Her
fiction was recognized by the Virginia Commission for the Arts as a
finalist in the Individual Artist Fellowship program. Her short story,
"First Thing in the Morning," was selected by
storySouth for the Million Writers Award, Notable Online Short Stories
for 2004, and two of her stories were selected by storySouth as Notable
Online Short Stories for 2003. Her essays have appeared in several anthologies, including
Under Our Skin: Literature of Breast Cancer. __________________________________________________________
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