1. Prologue

At 2.27 am on 12th October, 2007 I received a cellphone message which read, " The Lord be praised for a friend like you, who's been very caring and loving, emboldening me to hold a hope for tomorrow. Daddy, you are very special to me. I love you with all my being. Shalom..." Signed Suzanne. At 5.09 a.m I was embracing her lifeless body.

I am putting these events in writing to immortalized the memory of a friend with whom I have shared intimate moments together - moments during which we envisioned and verbalized the 'terrain and geography' of our future even into the 'realm in the beyond'.

Our paths crossed in 1991, and by mutual, albeit passive, consent, we have allowed them to merge to the extent that our respective life histories merged along a common time-line. In time, this time-line would most certainly branch into a network of time-lines surging forward deep into the very remote future for she left me with three children, two boys and a girl, who certainly would continue to pass the baton of our legacy to our posterity.

I am writing about my dearest friend and for a time a life-partner, Suzanne Patrick Adau, how she lived and hoped, how she loved and sacrificed and how she, in the final moment of her earthly life, made a complete abandonment of her life to a fate surrendered to God's mercy and providence

Seven years before the conclusion of her earthly sojourn, we, as parents to our children, made a sacred pact to lead our lives in line with ecclesial moral codes while holding our family intact. That's one big irony. We didn't expect society to understand nor did we seek understanding. We just lived true to our pact and placed our trust on divine mercy and providence.

Since our fateful meeting in 1991, she sacrificed a life journey along a path that was well trodden, and instead embarked along one less-trodden with just the love we had for each other as beacon. Suzanne lived and loved being ever hopeful for an exciting future with our children whom she was raising with great love until that tragic day, on the 15th June, 2007, when, without any earlier warning, she was confronted with the shocking news that she had cervical cancer of the fourth stage . She called me, and in between sobs, told me of the devastating news. She sounded and must be devastated. I was too. I was actually numbed to the core. I knew the implication. I just didn't know what to say or how to re-act to her present predicament. It was a 'death' sentence, and she knew it! I could only weakly attempt to lift her spirit by leading her to focus her faith in Christ.

There was to be a healing session at the Sacred Heart Cathedral that evening which I earnestly urged her to attend. She attended, and according to her, she was spared the 'pain' that usually came along with the dreaded disease.

She loved God and proceeded to abandon her fate to God. In one of our private moments together, I've ever asked her if she might ever doubt God. With a zealous expression of her faith, She confided to me that she'd resolved to surrender her fate completely to God, and in Him, she would continue to live her life with ever the vigor.

She never did abandon God whom she knew was merciful. She went ahead and adopted the First Saturday devotion to Our Lady, became a daily communicant and allotted a greater portion of her time in prayerful moments with God until her life expired in the wee morning of October 12th, 2007, but not before offering her infirmity to Him for the souls of the sufferings. I'd suggested that she did that. On her deathbed, she articulated her last act of contrition, "Lord, forgive us our sins..." as she expired in my embrace in the presence of our offspring who, confronted with the reality at hand, came up one by one to whisper 'Good Bye, Mummy' as they embraced the lifeless body of their Mom who, a moment ago, was the only mother they had loved and had ever looked up to. I noticed that she had the Brown Scapular on her. I silently prayed the Divine Mercy Chaplet.