This past week, Stacey Burns would have celebrated a birthday. As I read some of the expressions of sorrow on the memorial page, I was reminded of the final paragraph of The Week from Heaven and Hell, my memoir about our son, Gary. For those who loved Stacey, here is a part of it since it seems to apply to her as well.

“Time hasn’t made anything easier. The loss of such a worthwhile person in a world that cries out for compassionate people remains a question that I hope and pray I’ll have answered someday. Until then, memories will have to suffice as they will have to suffice for the special people mentioned (in the book) who have passed on as well. In some unique, inexplicable way, I enjoy knowing that there is quite a contingent of people I have known who now know the answer to that mystifying question—WHY?”

Where Stacey is concerned, there is only one person living on this planet who has the answer as to why she was taken from those she loved and who loved her. Obviously, that is her amoral, cowardly psychopath of a killer. Her family and friends should not have to wait until eternity to have their question answered.

Duke