"He passed away, early this morning", she said, a tear escaping her eye and rolling down her cheek. "I'm sorry", Alex said, standing and moving to emb...ace the girl, but she backed away. "Don't be", she said, wiping her tear away. "It was his time and he went peacefully. The elders have already performed the funeral for him." "That was quick", Alex thought, but refrained from speaking the words. "Are you going to be alright", he asked and Natalie nodded. "He knew it would be soon, so he prepared. As near as we could tell, Dad had died at just the moment Lorraine had asked at the airport if he were dead. Helga had had two or so hours to sit with him since, and say what she needed to say to him. As I walked into the room, I was overwhelmed by the sense that he was still somehow present. Each of us in turn took some time to sit alone with him and say good bye. When we couldn't put it off any longer, we called the undertaker to take him away. Helga completely went to pieces as they zipped. She was the smallest person in the family, as even her younger step-brother Morgan shot by her in his latest growth spurt, yet she was the most daring and feisty of the bunch. She was a natural leader and a master at flimflamming the other children into whatever she schemed. Alice was also very intelligent; she was smart enough to stay out of trouble with the adults and stayed out of everyone's way but mine. She became the little sister I never had.I did not have an opportunity to talk with JC. It’s the way it is. As soon as he wakes up he’s completely over it. On that occasion he was out of hospital and back to normal the next day. ‘It’s scary, Neil. He hasn’t had a bad attack for almost a year but we’ve had gaps of a year or more before. Sooner or later it’s going to happen again and it’s scary. It’s really hard to cope with.’ ‘And you think that, as soon as he has an attack, I’ll get scared and run.’ ‘It’s happened before.’ ‘Not with me it hasn’t.’ ‘I don’t think you understand.’.