Alma's newfound independence

“Eve’s coming with me and she’s bringing a little surprise, I’ll see you in a few, mom. Love you.” 

“Oh, I’ve not seen her since her wedding. It’ll be wonderful to catch up. Alright, love you, Gracie.” Alma closed her flip phone with a small clap. The stillness of the room came crashing back in. The smoky aroma of her Café' au lait had long since drifted away from the little breakfast table that sat center of the large sliding glass doors looking out at the back yard. She sipped her now-cooled coffee, letting her gaze list onto the brown-and-grey, leaf-strewn woods at the rear of her property. A great oak had fallen last Autumn and now lay across her back yard, the bark had peeled off and the gnarled branches lay broken and strewn over the lawn. It had made a terrific crack and thud that shook the whole house when an October storm ripped it from the ground. 

 Alma was in her eighties; she had an early growth spurt as a child but was soon outgrown by her peers and stayed that way. Her glasses were round and wire-rimmed. The silver roots of her hair had grown out again and she hadn’t had the inclination for another dye in some time. She wore a red sweater vest over a white t-shirt that was mottled with the hands of children dipped in every different color of paint. A thank-you present from her granddaughter’s elementary school class for chaperoning a field trip to the zoo years ago. Her pajama bottoms had faded Tweety birds, Edmund had given them to her on their fiftieth Christmas together. She shifted her gaze between them and the great oak tree that had fallen outside her rear window as the sun crested the eastern hill of the little valley her home sat in. 

Gracie and her daughter, Eve, were near completing their few-hour-long drive from their metropolitan suburbs to Alma’s little house out in the woods. She’d lived here with Edmund since the kids grew up and got out of the house. Edmund always wanted to retire to somewhere out in the country, he had always been more of an outdoor type. In truth, Alma liked the convenience of the suburbs and being near the little music stores, venues and clubs that she would sneak off to when she could after the kids had fallen asleep and Edmund was home from closing up shop. She moved out here to let Edmund enjoy his twilight years after he had sold the little lawnmower repair store he ran and retired. The quiet wasn’t so bad, she still had her Coltrane records and had been learning how to use Youtube to find music she’d never heard of before. Without the kids she’d play on the Yamaha keyboard that now sat packed and ready to go, along with a sparse selection of her wardrobe to bring with her when she moved in with Gracie. 

 The aging two-story house sat silent as a mausoleum, occasionally rustling leaves were blown from the roof and fell in front of her window but all else was quiet. Usually, the silence would be broken by Edmund who always slept in well after sunrise and came downstairs with a little radio in his pocket playing a conservative talk show. He’d come downstairs and get his breakfast started. 

“Any minute now,” the small inclination in her head told her, “the thump of Edmund rolling out of bed, would come, the muffled chatter of the increasingly staticky show host’s voice on that old pocket radio, the door thump as he went into their master bathroom and another squeak from the old rusty hinges when he came out, the creaking of the floorboards as he descended the stairs and when he rounded the wall to the little hallway between the front and back doors how he would be silhouetted in the window, he’d come down the hallway, a little slower with each passing year, the radio wrist strap dangling out of his gym-shorts pocket and he’d touch her shoulder, squeezing it three times ‘I. Love. You.’ as he passed into the kitchen. He’d make his way to the fridge. She’d hear the door open with the little soft ‘pop’ as the seal was broken. The loaf of bread bag that sat on the top of the fridge was spun and tucked under instead of tied in a knot. The clicking of the gas stovetop as it started, the sizzle of bacon, the scraping of butter, the salt shaking, then the soft scrape of him pulling his chair out as he’d sit across from her and, silently eat his breakfast. She’d watch the deepening shadows in his face recede with the rising sun, then think about the wrinkles in her own face. Edmund would save a bite of toast for last so he could soak up the excess bacon grease and salt on the plate. Then, he’d spin the volume dial on the little pocket radio down until it shut off with a ‘click’ and they’d start to talk about how their day would go.” Her instincts told her it was all coming but she knew it wouldn’t today. 

Alma sat looking across the table at the empty chair. Her eyes fluttered back to the decaying oak in the yard beyond. The house embraced her like a casket: stagnant, cold, quiet. 

The silence was shattered by a muffled car door shutting, now another. There was the jingling of a key in the front door lock. The lock finally clicked and the door swung open as Gracie stepped in. Her heels clicked on the hardwood floor as she came down the little hallway towards Alma. 

“Hey, mom, save me a cup?” She gestured at the coffee mug as she made her way to the little table and embraced Alma who had begun to rise. 

 Eve eased her way through the open door, her azure dress spilled over her swollen stomach like a waterfall. Alma glanced back out at the great, dead oak. A verdant moss had begun to grow on the stump.