![]() She was more than an obituary writer’s dependent clause: the niece and last remaining connection. ![]() It wasn’t just the trivia of her relation. Had it lost its center? The heart of Oxford lived in Dean and Larry Wells. ![]() We leaned on the copper bar and asked each other if the town had lost more than just an important piece of itself. Dean loved a party, and tonight, we’d send her off with a writer’s wake. We drank Manhattans and martinis, whiskey and cold beers. Just a few days ago, we’d seen her in this same bar, at the table by the balcony, laughing, telling stories, seeming, most of all, unalterably alive. When the heat and the crowd in the house got too much, we gathered on the Square, overlooking the courthouse lawn. He’s been gone a long time, and now she was gone, too. We brought a bottle of Four Roses, because that’s what Dean’s uncle drank. We were young and old, writer and homemaker, churchgoer and hell-raising bastard. We manned the kitchen like only a bridge club could. Our tears escaped the tint of dark glasses. ![]() We stood in the summer haze, the people of Oxford, gathered like a tribe. ![]() We got the call: a stroke, then life support, then gone. Our friend, Dean Faulkner Wells, died last week. ![]()
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