MONTREAL – Asked to describe the last year of his life, Arnaud
Cote pauses on the other end of the line, measuring his response.
After considering his reply for a few moments, the 85-year-old
retired dairy farmer comes back with a single word: “ennuyant,” a
French word to describe his loneliness without friends he’d known
for years.
In one night, Cote’s life was turned upside down when a fierce
fire swept through the Residence du Havre in L’Isle-Verte, Que., on
Jan. 23, 2014, killing 32 people who were caught within its walls.
“It’s been lonely,” Cote said in a recent interview. “Those
were my friends who died there.”
His life and countless others were forever marked by the tragedy.
“It’s still difficult, I think about it every day,” Cote said.
On Friday, a mass, a short march to the site of the blaze and a
small intimate gathering at a local school later in the evening will
mark the grim anniversary.
Sonia Ouellet, an organizer of the events, says the feeling
around town is not so much wanting to see someone held accountable
for the blaze as much as families wanting to be able to move on from
a difficult, unforgettable year.
First came the fatal fire and a long mourning period before a
coroner’s inquest that, as Ouellet put it, unearthed information not
previously known by relatives.
On Friday, residents will relive the tragedy again, out of
necessity.
“For us, it was clear from the beginning that with 32 dead and
the entire village in mourning, we’d have to do something to mark
it,” Ouellet said. “For sure, the families wanted it over with but
we knew it wasn’t something we could just overlook.”
Ouellet runs a family daycare and has lived in the Eastern Quebec
village of 1,500 since 2004. She didn’t lose anyone personally in
the fire but it’s hard not to be touched by the loss in such a small
town.
“It hit us like our own grandmother or grandfather had died in
the fire,” said Ouellet, who kept children for free last year as
their families laid relatives to rest.
“The seniors from here, we said hello to them every day,” she
said. “They were like a living library of our town’s history.”
The village’s mayor says there isn’t an appetite in the community
for vengeance or a need to see people charged criminally.
In fact, Ursule Theriault says it’s the furthest thing from the
minds of most people, who simply want to turn the page.
“It’s a small community, we haven’t felt anything like this
here,” Theriault said when asked about criminal charges. “Even
after several days of public hearings, even if some days were
difficult, we’ve never felt this sentiment.”
What sparked the fire remains unknown: a police probe pinpointed
the source as the kitchen, but investigators weren’t able to
determine how it started.
Quebec’s director of criminal and penal prosecutions is still
considering whether to lay charges.
For his part, Cote says he doesn’t wish to see anyone charged
either, calling it an accident.
He still remembers vividly what happened, waking up, yelling for
help, stopping to bang on the doors to wake up three female tenants
in his wing and helping them to safety.
Cote lived in a newer section of the Residence du Havre where all
but one resident survived thanks to a firewall.
He downplays his actions, described by many as heroic.
“It was something I was happy to do and the kids all came to
thank me for saving their mothers,” Cote said.
Many of the occupants in the 52-unit building were over 85 and
all but a handful had limited movement, being confined to
wheelchairs and walkers.
Cote is one of two former tenants who were able to stay in town.
The rest were spread out to homes in neighbouring communities, but
Cote had long resolved to remain in the parish.
He says he misses a quiet life shared with friends in the quaint,
well-run facility.
“Those who died there, we were all friends,” said Cote. “We
were organized, we played cards in the afternoon. There were six of
us.”
The events of last January changed all that.
“After the fire, I was alone,” Cote recounted. “The rest of
them all burned.”
What’s left standing, damaged by smoke and water, is for sale.
And Theriault would like for it to become a new elder-care
residence.
Theriault said the tragedy in her town gave her some insight into
what her own father went through when her grandfather perished in
another major Quebec seniors’ home blaze 45 years ago.
“I lost my grandfather in the same circumstances (fire) in 1969
in Notre-Dame-de-Lac,” said Theriault. “It helped me to understand
better the feelings my father was showing back then.”
Theriault was in Florida last year when the tragedy struck. When
her son rapped on her door and gave her the news, she thought at
first he was joking.
She rushed back to L’Isle-Verte to find a community in mourning
and her village unrecognizable – teeming with journalists from
across the country. Theriault categorically declared to local
reporters the town would be better off without the national media, a
comment that shocked some at the time.
Theriault says she felt obliged to take that position given the
pressure felt by community members inundated by the media crush.
“The morning I made that famous statement, citizens had come to
me a day earlier and said, ‘Ursule, we can’t deal with this, what do
we do,”‘ she recalled. “The situation was unsustainable for them.
“If I had to do it again, I probably would have said the same
thing.”
Cote too felt the media crush – having told his story to many
journalists over the last few months and then to the coroner’s
inquest in late November.
“There’s not much more I can say,” he says a year later.
He’s living his life as best he can, in a nice room at a
renovated convent that serves as a seniors’ home in town where he
feels safe and secure.
Cote doesn’t spend much time pondering the safety of seniors’
homes, saying what he knows is farming. He’s focused on maintaining
his own health – he’s quite fit, has his wits and still drives a
car.
Once the commemoration is done, it will be about moving forward.
“You have to turn the page, you have to go forward,” said Cote.
“You have to try as much as possible. Always thinking about it gets
on your nerves.”
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