In the Spring

     The teacups rattled on the silver tray as Maggie Dandridge shuffled across the dining room from her china cabinet towards the small table by her front room windows. She rarely wore heels anymore – age now dictating fashion rather than taste – but on this day she had made an exception. Today she wore heels, her best dress, and gloves. No one wore gloves anymore, Maggie knew. But somehow gloves made a day feel special, unique, apart from every other day. And today, April 21, was special and must never feel ordinary.

     The small gold-embossed clock on the mantelpiece chimed a quarter to twelve in brisk, sharp tones. Maggie’s hands shook slightly as she transferred the teacups from the tray to the table.

     “My goodness,” she muttered. “I won’t be ready. I just can’t let him down. I’ve been ready every other time for the last sixty-two years. What will he think? He will think you are getting old, Maggie, that’s what. And it’s quite unfair of him since he isn’t getting any older.”

     A shrill BEEP, BEEP, BEEP rang from the kitchen. Posy, Maggie’s gray and white cat, twitched her ears and sedately waved her tail in the air as she watched Maggie shuffle back into the kitchen. Enthroned on the couch, Posy had been watching the preparations for the tea party with mild indifference. Yesterday, Maggie had disturbed the cat’s peace of mind with a noisy vacuum and an aggressive dusting cloth. But today the cat observed the busyness with the calm assurance that none of it concerned her and that, after company, she would enjoy a special tea herself.

     In the kitchen, Maggie turned off the timer and, with a handmade potholder, pulled out a tray of perfectly round shortbread cookies. The sweet aroma of the fresh cookies filled the house like a benevolent spirit of calm and goodwill.

     “Aunt Maggie?”

     With a gasp, Maggie dropped the tray onto the stovetop and whirled around, trembling.

     “Aunt Maggie, are you okay?” Her niece Joan Tilley stood before her like an apparition.

     “Land sakes, Joan, don’t scare a body so.” Maggie clutched at her heart, unconsciously wrinkling her lace collar. “You nearly sent me to my maker. What are you doing here?”

     Joan set her purse and keys down on the kitchen table and quickly reached out to help her aunt. “I knocked on the front door, but you didn’t hear me. I called to you, but when you didn’t answer I thought maybe something was wrong. Your front door was unlocked.” She filled a glass of water and brought it to Maggie, who sat wiping her glasses with a tissue she had tucked up her sleeve.

     “Really, Aunt Maggie, you know what Tom and I have told you about leaving your front door unlocked.” Joan took the seat across from her white-haired relation. “Your neighborhood isn’t what it used to be. I mean, it was a nice neighborhood sixty years ago, but things have changed since then. Debra’s probably the best neighbor you have, but who knows how long she’ll stay.”

     “I’m not moving, and if you’ve come over here to try to persuade me again to move, you’re wasting your breath.” Maggie rose. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have company coming at noon.” Turning her back to Joan, she returned to the stove.

     “Company?” Joan helped herself to one of the cookies. “But didn’t you know I was coming today?”

     “How should I know that?” Maggie hastily placed the cookies onto her mother’s Noritake platter.

     “Because I always come over on Wednesdays during my lunch break.”

     Maggie glanced at the clock. Ten minutes till noon. She had to get rid of Joan. It would never do to have her here when he arrived. Joan, naturally, wouldn’t understand and it would only get her, Maggie, removed from her comfortable home of seventy-odd years into some painfully modern retirement center.

     “You usually don’t come till twelve-thirty,” Maggie said tartly. “How was I supposed to know you’d be coming so early?”

     “I have a meeting today around one o’clock, so I had said that I’d come earlier.”

     “It had quite slipped my mind.” She took the tea kettle to the sink and began filling it. “I forgot to tell you that I am having company today. An old friend is coming for tea.”

     “Anyone I know?” Joan asked casually.

     “No.”

     Joan shrugged. Her Aunt Maggie had always been a little unusual. When Joan’s mother had died, she had charged Joan to keep an eye on her.

     “Poor Maggie,” her mother had said, “she needs special attention, special looking after. I think that’s why mom and dad left her the old house. They wanted her to be well provided for. Be gentle, Joan. She really has gone through hard times.”

     Most days Aunt Maggie was pleasant and hospitable, and Joan wondered why her mother had been concerned for her. But on days like today Joan wondered how much longer she and her husband, Tom, could put off the inevitable of relocating Joan to a retirement center. These centers were popping up everywhere, and it shouldn’t be hard to find one close to their home where they could visit her more frequently.

     Joan watched her aunt move through the kitchen slowly and stiffly. If only she had married, maybe things would have been quite different.

     As these thoughts passed through Joan’s mind, Maggie returned the tea kettle to the stove. She turned the knob, and a small ring of blue flame appeared beneath the kettle.

     “Is there anything I can do to help?” Joan observed the plates of daintily cut sandwiches and artfully arranged fruit on the kitchen table.

     “Thank you,” Maggie said crisply, “but I can manage well enough.”

     Joan shook her head. “Alright, Aunt Maggie, I won’t bother you anymore. Can I come next week?”

     “Of course.”

     “Should I put it on the calendar?”

     “No, I’ll remember.”

     Joan took up her purse and keys. “Then goodbye. Call me if you need me.” She hugged her aunt and gave her wrinkled cheek a kiss.

     “I will, dear. Goodbye.”

     Joan left, locking the front door behind her, and drove away. Maggie, delivering her cookies and sandwiches to the expectant tea table, clicked her tongue.

     “It will be the retirement center for me if I don’t take more care.” She hurriedly unlocked the front door. It might not matter, but it just didn’t feel right to have the door locked, like she was afraid of something.

     “Joan’s a nice girl, but she and Tom ought to be thinking about their own retirement. They’ll be nearing that age soon. Perhaps one of those places would suit them, but it wouldn’t suit us, would it, Posy?”

     The addressed subject rolled over onto her side and luxuriously stretched out her legs.

     “Quite right.” Maggie resumed her preparations. “And he wouldn’t know where to look for us. And I couldn’t bear that.”

    She brought the final plate of fruit out to the front room. The last rays of the morning sun caught the silver and sparkled. How fine her table looked. How pleased he would be.

     Maggie drew back the gauzy curtains and opened the window. A spring breeze swept in, playing with the curtains and bringing the scent of blooming lilacs. Maggie closed her eyes and took a deep breath. A warm blush crept across her rouged cheeks, replacing the imitation with the genuine thing. Even the lines of her face seemed to soften.

     The tea kettle whistled, and, with renewed energy, Maggie trotted into the kitchen. Humming a popular tune from a bygone era, Maggie added the tea bag and filled the teapot.

     The clock struck noon. The light and smells seemed to grow brighter and stronger. Maggie felt a pressure from the top of her head to the sole of her shoes. She squeezed her eyes shut, not in pain but rapture. She let the strange, warm sensations engulf her. That they would never end!

     But they did. Too quickly the light in the room faded back to its natural strength and the vibrancy of the smells diminished. Maggie, however, still felt a tingling. With trembling fingers, she picked up the teapot and turned toward the front room. Posy stood on the couch, her back arched and her fur bristling.

    Knock. Knock.

     Maggie’s heart raced. She reached up to finger her pearl necklace.

     “Maggie?”    

     That voice – its youth and strength beyond the grasp of time. A radiant smile spread across her face.

     “Yes, Peter. Come in.”

     A gray outline appeared on the back of the front door. At first it appeared like a smoky haze, but it quickly gathered itself into the form of a man. Posy, eyes wild with terror, clung to the couch.

    Like an image that gradually comes into focus, the figure’s features grew sharper and clearer. He was a tall man in his twenties. He had green eyes, a straight nose, and a smooth brow.

     “Hi, Maggie.” He grinned.

     “Hello, Peter.” She lowered her eyes, embarrassed under his admiring gaze. “Right on time.”

    “Couldn’t disappoint my girl, now could I? Not after all these years.”

    Maggie looked up at the young man. Although he was as clear and lifelike as herself, he lacked a certain solidness. He moved like a being unshackled by gravity. In spite of her joy, Maggie became keenly aware of her own solidness. However, this time, unlike previous times, she felt like a balloon held outside on a gusty day. She seemed to be one step away from floating herself, breaking the tie to this earth and hovering above it, weightless and careless.

     “We should have a seat before the tea gets cold.”

     Like going through the movements of a well-rehearsed dance, the young man pulled back her chair for her. Maggie, giggling, took her seat.

     “Thank you. You know, men rarely do that anymore.”

     “Just goes to show you in what direction the human race is headed.” Peter assumed the seat opposite her. “A girl like you ought to be treated like a queen.”

     “It’s a new age, Peter.” Maggie sighed as she poured their tea. “And I feel my own creeping up on me daily.”

     “Nonsense.” Peter took two of the sandwiches from the plate Maggie offered him.

     “Are you not aware of the passing years?” Maggie dabbed her lips with her napkin. A touch of red lipstick stained the white cloth. “It has been sixty-two years since you were last here – in the flesh, I mean.”

     He shrugged. “I can’t speak for everyone, but I know that whenever I revisit my old haunts, they are untouched by time. The people may be different, but the place remains a living print of what I last remember.”

     “Am I much changed?” Maggie had never asked this question. For the last thirty years, she had feared the answer and had never broached the subject. But today she wanted to know.

     Peter looked at her steadily across the tea table.

     “No. You and this house are the same as ever.” He laughed. “I almost expect to hear your mother calling you to help her hang the laundry on the clothesline.”

     The tears came to her eyes as Maggie laughed, too. Peter’s yearly visits always brought back the spring of her youth when life stretched out forever and she and Peter had felt invincible. If only that had been true.

     “Well, where have you been keeping yourself?” Maggie felt herself relaxing and ready to enjoy a thoroughly good visit, like the ones they used to have when she was a girl and people had time to just talk.

     “I was recently over at the old high school,” Peter said, helping himself to more fruit. “I walked through the baseball field, the cafeteria, the science lab. I thought everyone had gone home, so I decided to revisit the hall where we used to put on the plays. I was walking across the stage in the dim lights when I heard a scream. I shrank back between the folds of the main curtain.”

     “You?”

     “Why yes. I don’t set out to scare people.” Peter grinned sheepishly. “The girl must have been backstage and caught a glimpse of me. She tore out of the hall. Gave me quite a scare when she screamed.”

    Maggie leaned back in her chair and laughed till her sides ached. “You know,” she gasped, “I’d heard from my neighbor across the street that there had been some excitement at the school. Something about the supernatural, but I never thought in a million years it was you.”

“I think I may have given the theater the distinction of being haunted. Should do wonders for your tourism industry.” Peter’s eyes twinkled. Stars in a green sky.

***

     Across the street, Maggie’s neighbor Debra glanced up from her gardening as the wind carried over the sound of laughter. Debra shielded her eyes with her gloved hand. Yes, there was Maggie sitting in front of her window. Someone was with her. Debra couldn’t quite see who it was. She squinted. It was a young man, or so it appeared. Those outdated gauzy curtains were obstructing her view.

     More laughter. Debra raised an eyebrow. Maggie rarely had company, other than her niece Joan. Maggie had once told her that she rarely had company because most of her friends were dead.

     Debra stood and brushed off the leaves and mulch that clung to the knees of her jeans. Maybe she should call Joan. She had given Debra her number months ago just in case. Well, this might be one of those situations. Joan would know if anything was out of the ordinary.

     Debra hurried inside and found her phone.

     “Hi Joan, this is Debra, your aunt’s neighbor. I was just wondering if your aunt was expecting company today?” Debra moved toward her front window where she had a clear, albeit distant, view of Maggie’s house.

     “Yes, she did mention that an old friend was coming.”

     “An old friend, huh?” Debra peered through the window, greatly tempted to run into her husband’s office and steal his binoculars. “Well, then I guess it’s alright. But I wouldn’t have described the friend as old.”

     “Who is it?”

     “I’ve never seen him before,” Debra began, enjoying the drama of the situation in spite of herself.

     “Him?”

     “A young man, maybe high school or college age. He’s dressed kind of funny.”

     “Debra, I have a meeting in minutes that I can’t miss. Could you run over and check on Aunt Maggie for me? I’d really appreciate it.”

     “Of course. I’ll call you if there’s anything wrong.”

     Debra hastily left the house. As she crossed her yard, she scanned Maggie’s front window. Where was the youthful stranger? Maggie sat at her little table alone, calmly sipping her tea. A little embarrassed, Debra walked up the stone path to the front window.

     “Hello, Maggie.” Debra wasn’t used to talking to people through open windows.

     Maggie turned and smiled politely.

     “Everything okay?” Debra surveyed the neat room without trying to appear like she was really looking for someone. “I thought I heard something.”

     “Oh?” Maggie took a small bite of a cucumber sandwich. “I’m fine. I’ve seen you out in your yard. You’ve been working a long time in the sun. Would you like to come in and have some ice tea?”

    Debra saw Posy seated where she had thought she had seen the young man. Where she had seen the young man. The cat put its paws up on the table and complacently began eating crumbs off a small china plate.

     “Did you have company today?”

     Maggie reached over and scratched Posy behind the ears. “I was going to have company, but they canceled at the last moment. Posy and I are having tea together instead.”

     Debra scratched her head, feeling very foolish. “I’m glad everything’s fine,” she finally said.

     “Yes, yes.” Maggie rose and began to stack the dirty plates. “I am rather tired from all my morning preparations. I think I will lie down. You might do the same, Debra. You look a little pale, like you’ve seen a ghost.”

     Maggie smiled sweetly as Debra retreated back to her own front yard. Poor Debra, but there was nothing else to be done. No one would believe the truth.

     A gust of wind gathered itself up and swept through the open window, rustling the gauzy curtains, and Maggie heard a whispered farewell.

     “So long, Peter. Until next spring.” Then Maggie gathered up the dirty dishes and returned to her kitchen with Posy following close behind.