Best Place to Die Read Free Page B

need of breath, about the wonders of life in the Connecticut countryside, of clean air and distant mountain views, of picturesque season changes, and activity-filled days. And her obvious pride in Nillewaug: ‘
Voted four years in a row the best assisted-care facility in Connecticut.
’ She was certain the woman was dead, and in this growing nightmare found her voice. ‘I need help! Someone help me!’
    And from where she’d left her, Alice chimed in, like a parrot with a single phrase: ‘Help me! Help me! Help me!’

TWO
    L il Campbell woke to the sound of sirens. She lay still, and wondered if Ada was awake, as she counted at least half a dozen –
that’s not good.
Living in a retirement community the occasional ambulance in the night was to be expected, even in the dark of an early Sunday morning . . . Although all the local companies and Pilgrim’s Progress’s own emergency-response team rarely used sirens out of respect for the sleepy community of well-to-do retirees. What had pulled her from sleep at 4.15 a.m. and had her staring at the drape-hung sliding doors of her bedroom was frightening. She tried to count them, letting the different tones and cadences filter through the night and into her head. She’d get up to six or seven and then lose track –
what’s happening?
From the volume, she could tell they were close, not more than a half mile – could be one of the town homes or connected condos in Pilgrim’s Progress, the sprawling ‘Active Adult’ community on the outskirts of her hometown – Grenville, Connecticut. She’d moved here to Pilgrim’s Progress nine years ago with her now departed husband, Dr Bradley Campbell, and where she now remained with her best friend and lover, Ada Strauss. That last bit still quite new, and wonderful . . . and strange.
    â€˜What’s going on, Lil?’ Ada asked, pushing back in the bed.
    With her eyes adjusted to the dark, Lil turned, catching the outline of Ada’s close-cropped silver hair, and glints of moonlight through high transom windows reflected in her blue eyes. Ada’s hand reached under the covers and found hers. She squeezed.
    â€˜Must be a fire,’ Lil said.
    â€˜Oh, God,’ Ada whispered, clearly frightened.
    â€˜I know,’ Lil said, the two of them having recently survived a devastating fire. ‘It’s close, but not that close.’ She let go Ada’s hand, and got out of bed. Her heart pounded as she went to the sliding glass doors, and drew back the green silk drapes that Ada had just sewn. The moon was near full and dawn – because of the recent shift forward to daylight savings – was still a good hour away. The backs of their adjoined condos in this carefully planned retirement community in the rolling hills of Litchfield County Connecticut faced east and had tremendous privacy on account of acres of protected wetlands.
    â€˜Can you see anything?’ Ada asked.
    â€˜No.’ Lil pulled up the latch on the sliders, and bent down to pull out the safety bar. Stepping into the cool and dewy dark morning she caught glimmers of flashing red lights over the condos and sloping hills to her right, and the sounds of sirens wailing from the north.
Something big
. She shuddered, while from behind her Ada had turned on the TV and was flipping through the channels.
    A light went on in Ada’s condo, her nearly seventeen-year-old grandson, Aaron, was up. He opened the bathroom window and yelled out, ‘Lil, what’s going on?’
    â€˜Has to be a fire; I’m trying to figure where it’s coming from.’ She stood still, imagining a map of Grenville and the surrounding towns. This is where she’d lived her entire life – all sixty-one years – with the exception of four at Smith College in North Hampton, Massachusetts where she’d gotten an English degree with a focus on journalism. ‘It’s