Carrying On: Survivor of Meals on Wheels tragedy is getting better, though volunteering without his partner is not the same

Last April 24, Bill and Anne Magness walked up to Anita Chaffee's front door for Meals on Wheels.

Bill Magness held the door as his wife walked in and put the food down in the kitchen. Then, as he did whenever he came, he gave Chaffee's dog, Cody, a treat that he had brought.

On the way out, Anne Magness turned, smiled and said, "Bye."

Chaffee has replayed that scene --especially that final "bye" -- in her mind countless times since, asking herself a simple question: "What if I had talked to them a little bit longer?"

Less than 30 minutes later, Anne Magness was dead and Bill Magness was lying in a driveway bleeding from gunshot wounds after they were attacked at a Meals on Wheels home a few stops later on their route. The man they were delivering a meal to -- Bob Denning -- also was killed.

A few weeks ago, Bill Magness went back to volunteering on that same Meals on Wheels route.

And so, one recent day, there he stood again at Chaffee's front door.

"I had to hold back the tears, to be real honest," she said. "I hurt for him, and it was sad not seeing Anne there with him. She always had a sweet smile."

Chaffee welcomed him inside. Cody was happy to see that Magness had remembered his treat.

Chaffee didn't ask Magness why he would return to volunteering on the same route. Perhaps it's a way to honor his wife's memory, she said, or a way to help with his healing process. But she does know one thing:

"It has to take a lot of courage and resiliency on his part," she said.

Chaffee was correct about Magness' reasons for doing what he is doing.

"I know my wife loved the work, and I wanted to continue the work with her in mind," he said.

Magness, who is 79, said he also thought that it was important to do something to help set aside the fear that he has been living with.

"I had to overcome the fear of knocking on a door and being killed," he said.

Met in the late '40s

Magness was born in Nebraska and grew up in Iowa. He met his wife one day in the late 1940s when a bunch of buddies headed into Sioux City to catch up with one buddy's girlfriend and some of her friends.

Magness found Anne not only beautiful -- she had been Miss Sioux City -- but also bubbly and friendly.

"She was always very outgoing and gracious," he said. "That's why she was so successful as a volunteer and caregiver."

They married on May 14, 1949, and came to have four children -- Steve, Lynn, Julie, David. In 1961, Magness' job in sales and marketing took the family to New Jersey, where they lived for 33 years.

During the week, he traveled a lot. He has a million-miler plaque from United Airlines to show for it. She stayed home to take care of the kids. She volunteered with the PTA. Each night, he would call after he got to the motel. He still remembers hearing about the time Lynn ran her bicycle into a telephone pole and the time David put his hand on a hot burner on the stove.

In 1983, they found out that Anne had breast cancer.

"We were both scared to death," he said.

She had a radical mastectomy, and the cancer never returned. But it launched her into the wider world as a volunteer helping others deal with cancer. A statewide award followed a number of local awards.

In 1989, Magness had a stroke while in the hospital being treated for pneumonia.

"These two events left us very thankful that we lived," he said.

Three of their children were living in North Carolina when Magness retired in 1994. The couple bought a house in Clemmons and headed south. Here, she began volunteering with the Cancer Patient Support Program at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center. He pushed wheelchairs as a volunteer there and helped out at the Crosby and Vantage golf tournaments.

"We finally got into Meals on Wheels because we could do that together," he said.

‘She isn't breathing'

From where he was lying, wounded, all that Magness could see of his wife was her feet.

"A police officer is standing there, and I said, ‘Is my wife dead?' and she said, ‘She isn't breathing.'"

He didn't expect to be around much longer himself.

"I thought I was dead," said Magness, who was shot six times.

Every day since, that scene has come back to him in one way or another.

"Time has helped," he said. "What you always wonder is what could you have done different."

Others have told him that there was nothing he could have done to avoid what happened. That has helped.

"It gives you the feeling that you didn't carelessly get your wife killed," he said.

He doesn't ever wish that he hadn't survived. As bad as it was for his children to lose their mother, he said, losing both parents at once would have been worse.

He has a lot of anger, he acknowledged. But he doesn't direct any of it at God.

"I have stayed away from that," he said. "I'm not looking for reasons."

In the past, he was relatively relaxed about security.

"I used to leave my garage door open," he said. "I don't do that anymore."

Along with his emotional wounds, Magness is still recovering from his physical wounds. A bullet that went into his throat damaged a nerve that goes to his diaphragm so it no longer works as well as it once did. The bullet also struck his vocal cords, affecting his speech. Shots struck both hands -- he lost the tip to his right index finger -- and, although both hands work, numbness is a chronic problem.

In talking about his physical difficulties, he made the point more than once that they are, in a way, minor.

"The worst thing it did was take her," he said.

Staying in the house

He thinks about Anne all the time.

"Every time I walk by anything in the house," he said. "She is all over that house."

He has no desire to move, though.

Each morning, he gets up between 6:30 and 7 and feeds Jake, the cat his wife rescued. He has coffee and a bowl of cereal with some blueberries or bananas and reads the newspaper. His son, Steve, calls before he heads off to work. All the other children call sometime during the day.

As Magness goes about his day, he constantly thinks of things he would like to say to his wife. But he has no regrets about important things left unsaid -- they told each other they loved each other all the time.

He has had to learn to take care of things that his wife used to take care of.

"I am bound and determined that I'm going to do it myself," he said. "The toughest thing I had to do was go in and turn on the dishwasher machine."

He makes a point to keep the house as spick-and-span as she did -- with the exception of her desk. He has left the notes and cards scattered about her desk exactly as they were.

Most days, he exercises by going for a walk. Because of the damage to his diaphragm, his wind is not what it once was. So he can't walk as far or as vigorously as he once did. With the weather getting warmer, he's looking forward to being able to play golf again. He goes to church.

People have been good about keeping up with him. He sees members of the Fun Bunch, a group of retirees who have get-togethers such as Soup Night in which everyone brings a soup. With his family, which includes grandchildren he is always delighted to see, he goes out to dinner and to Wake Forest football and basketball games.

His wife loved the beach. They used to go there regularly. The family went down to Sunset Beach to scatter her ashes, as she wished. Since then, he has had zero desire to go back.

The hardest part of the day, he said, is night.

That's when he feels the loss of Anne most keenly. Sleeping is getting a little easier.

"It was pretty bad for a while," he said.

He has no way of knowing how far along he is in the process of healing, offering only one simple comment.

"I can live with the way life is going."

■ Kim Underwood can be reached at 727-7389 or at kunderwood@wsjournal.com.