Chapter 3: The Words of War

Chapter 3: The Words of War

The house was silent again, a deep, hollow quiet that felt profoundly different from the peaceful stillness of her father’s final hours. That had been a quiet of passage; this was a quiet of absence. It was nearly 2 a.m., and Elara was bathed in the sterile blue-white glow of her computer monitor, the rest of her small office cloaked in shadow. On the screen, a blank document stared back at her, the cursor blinking with the steady, maddening rhythm of a slow heartbeat.

Obituary for Richard Vance.

Her goal was simple: to honor her father. To write something that captured the essence of the man he was—the skilled carpenter with sawdust in his hair, the patient father who taught her how to ride a bike, the gentle soul who endured his illness with a quiet dignity his wife had never understood.

The obstacle, however, was a fifty-year-old social convention, a lie she could not bring herself to type.

Her fingers hovered over the keyboard. She knew the standard phrasing by heart. Richard Vance, beloved husband of Eleanor Vance…

She typed the words. Richard Vance is survived by his loving wife, Eleanor.

The sentence felt like poison on the screen. Loving. The word was a grotesque perversion of the truth. It was a lie that sanitized fifteen years of neglect, of icy sighs and calculated cruelty. It was the public narrative Eleanor had spent a decade and a half curating, and to repeat it now would be the ultimate betrayal of the promise Elara had made to her father in his last moments. It would be an act of erasure.

Her hand trembled as she hit the backspace key, deleting the word ‘loving.’ It was still wrong. She deleted ‘wife.’ Then she deleted Eleanor’s name entirely, watching the letters vanish one by one.

The blinking cursor was a lonely soldier on a blank battlefield. To include her mother would be to endorse the fiction. To omit her would be a public declaration of war, a deliberate, calculated strike against the carefully constructed facade of the Vance family. It would take a private, bitter truth and detonate it in the middle of their small, gossipy town.

The memory of the transaction at her mother’s house was still a raw wound. The cold, triumphant look in Eleanor’s eyes as she bartered her signature for Elara’s submission on the financial documents. Eleanor thought she had won. She had secured the money, the assets, and what she believed was Elara’s silence. She thought she had paid the vulture’s toll and picked the carcass clean.

This obituary… this was the price Eleanor hadn’t seen coming.

Elara’s breath hitched, a wave of anxiety and fury washing over her. Was she strong enough to do this? To invite the public scrutiny, the whispers, the inevitable accusations of being a bitter, hysterical daughter?

She pushed her chair back, the wheels scraping against the floor, and picked up her phone. Her finger found the contact instantly.

“Ben Carter,” his voice answered on the second ring, groggy but clear.

“Ben, I’m so sorry, I know it’s late.”

“Elara?” The sleepiness vanished from his voice, replaced by immediate concern. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

The simple, genuine worry in his tone was almost enough to make her crack. “I’m… fine. I’m writing my dad’s obituary.”

A pause. Ben knew her family dynamics better than anyone. He’d been her childhood friend, a witness to Eleanor’s subtle brand of psychological warfare long before anyone else had a name for it. He’d seen Richard’s spirit slowly dim under its weight.

“Okay,” he said slowly, understanding the minefield she was navigating. “That can’t be easy.”

“It’s not,” she said, her voice tight. “I’m trying to write it, but I can’t. I can’t write that he’s survived by his ‘loving wife.’ I can’t put her name in it at all. Not after today, Ben. She made me sign away his assets just so she’d sign the cremation form.”

She heard him exhale sharply on the other end of the line. “Jesus, Elara. She really did that?”

“A signature for a signature,” Elara quoted, the words tasting like ash. “So now I’m sitting here, and I’m thinking, what if I just… leave her out? Completely. What happens?”

“Legally?” Ben’s lawyer brain kicked in, and she was grateful for his calm, logical perspective. “Nothing. An obituary isn’t a legal document. It has no bearing on the will or the estate. It’s a public notice. Nothing more, nothing less.”

“But socially?” she pressed.

“Socially…” He hesitated. “Socially, it’s a bomb, Elara. You know that. In a town this size? Omitting the surviving spouse from an obituary isn’t a subtle act. It’s a statement. People will talk. They’ll take sides. She’ll paint you as unhinged, disrespectful.”

“She’ll play the victim,” Elara finished, her voice flat. “It’s her best role.”

“Exactly. You need to be prepared for that.”

“I think I am,” Elara whispered. “I think I’m more afraid of letting her win. Of letting her be the final word on his life.”

There was a long silence on the line, filled only by the hum of Elara’s computer.

“An obituary isn’t a legal document,” Ben said again, his voice softer this time. “It’s a social one. It’s a story. For the first time, Elara, you get to be the one to tell it. Just make sure it’s a story you can stand behind.”

His words clicked into place, clarifying everything. He wasn’t telling her what to do. He was handing her the weapon and trusting her to aim it.

“Thank you, Ben,” she said, a new, steely resolve hardening in her chest.

“Anytime. Call me tomorrow. We’ll talk strategy. Real strategy.”

She hung up the phone and turned back to the screen. The blinking cursor no longer felt like a threat. It was an invitation.

Her fingers flew across the keyboard, no longer hesitant. The words came easily now because they were true. She didn’t write about sickness or suffering. She wrote about strength and love.

Richard Vance, 65, passed away peacefully at the home of his daughter on May 23rd.

A lifelong resident of Northwood, Richard was a master carpenter and owner of Vance Woodcrafts for over 30 years. His handiwork can be found in homes and businesses throughout the county, a lasting testament to his skill and his dedication to his craft. He was a man who found joy in a well-made joint, the smell of fresh-cut cedar, and a quiet morning spent fishing at Black Creek Lake.

He was a man of quiet strength, profound kindness, and unwavering integrity. He taught his daughter how to be honest, how to be resilient, and how to fix a leaky faucet.

He is survived by his loving daughter, Elara Vance. He was preceded in death by his parents, Marcus and Amelia Vance.

In accordance with his wishes, the family will be holding a private memorial at a later date. In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to the National Ataxia Foundation.

She read it over. It was simple. Honest. Devastatingly incomplete to anyone who knew the Vances. There was no mention of a wife of forty years. No mention of the family home. Just Richard, his work, his passions, and his daughter.

It was perfect.

With a steady hand, she addressed the email to the local newspaper’s classifieds department, attached the document, and hovered the mouse over the ‘Send’ button. This was it. The first shot. A single click, and the carefully curated world of Eleanor Vance would begin to fracture.

She clicked.

The email vanished from her outbox. A quiet swoosh was the only sound. Elara leaned back in her chair, the adrenaline slowly giving way to a profound, bone-deep certainty. It wasn't about revenge. It was about the truth. It was for the man who loved the smell of cedar, who had deserved so much more than a life as a footnote in someone else’s story. The words of war had been written, and the battle for his memory had truly begun.