Collision death leaves behind lives in pieces

An unfinished puzzle sits a few dozen pieces from completion in a dark and empty room in John Cross' Foresthill home. The person who started the job, Kathleen Chappell, will never get to put the rest of the pieces together. While driving to work in Auburn after taking a lunch break in Foresthill Wednesday, 45-year-old Chappell's 1999 Dodge Stratus slipped into the eastbound lane of Foresthill Road west of Driver's Flat Road and was struck broadside by a Ford pickup. The mother of two was pronounced dead at the scene. The cause of the accident is still under investigation, though authorities expect wet roads may have played a part in the crash. A day after the accident, Chappell's significant other, Cross, and her friends and family were trying to pick up the pieces of their own lives. For Cross, who has lived with Chappell for the last eight years, learning that his life partner had been killed on her way to work was a heart-breaking shock."I always had her call me when she got to work to let me know she made it all right," Cross said fighting back tears. "I heard sirens going down the hill and didn't think anything of it."Two hours later, Cross received a call from Chappell's work, the medical offices of Russell Tweet, asking where she was. Cross knew something was wrong and headed down to Auburn."We were in Auburn getting gas, and I look over at Lincoln Way and go, ?Oh my god, that looks like her Dodge Stratus,'" Cross said of seeing her mangled car on the back of a tow truck. "I went straight to the hospital."He learned later from the California Highway Patrol that the woman had died.Cross spent much of Thursday remembering his longtime companion. He said she enjoyed spending time with her friends and grandson, loved Elvis and, of course, her puzzles.He reminisced about the first time the woman he would fall in love with came up from the Napa-area to visit friends. He got to know Chappell on a camping trip. "Kathy was used to the streetlights of the city," he said. "At night, it was pitch black except for the stars. I kept that campfire going all night for her." Chappell's friend Wanda Cowan of Foresthill said the strong-willed woman had a heart of gold."She had a very bubbly personality, but you couldn't say anything wrong in Kathy's house," Cowan said. "She was the best friend I had in 10 years. She was bound and determined to go through anything in her life."Cowan said that though Chappell's 18-year-old daughter, Rebekah Beasom of Auburn has learned her mother was killed, her son, 21-year-old Scott Brazil, who's stationed in Germany for the U.S. Army, still doesn't know."We can't figure out how to get ahold of him," she said.As the pieces fall into place for those who knew Chappell best, they try to dwell on the positive influences she brought to their lives."There wasn't anything that couldn't be accomplished with her," Cowan said. "It was a shock. I was with her every day. We would release our problems on each other. She always had something nice to say."The Journal's Ryan Sabalow can be reached at ryans@goldcountrymedia.com.