Like the other old women, she sits in one of the floral-patterned armchairs arranged around the perimeter of the big, square room, the armrests worn smooth and shiny. Reflected in the wide window is her frail body. Her papery hands lie still in her lap, like fallen, translucent petals.
A kind, wide open face, pink lipstick, bends close, asks, “And how are you today, Mrs. B?”
She feels she might mention the officer, fifty years ago or so, bringing the news. When the cold, hard fact that her husband would never come back struck her like a battering ram thrust by a thousand soldiers. Each time she remembers, it still knocks the breath from her chest. Or, years before that, her wedding. Young, hundreds of tiny beads on her white dress, her future hypothetical.
Or the birth of her first daughter, holding her like a wrapped present. Or when that daughter came back home, her own small children clinging to her, her face bruised and swollen. Or when her other daughter screamed she’d never forgive her and she never did. Even this morning, over three decades later, the recollection’s still a jagged blade.
Or the days at the beach, sunlight hard and white, sounds muted. Tide far out, children with plastic shovels piling the wet sand, lips sticky after cotton candy, teeth tiny and white. Throwing sticks in the dark-dappled forest, dogs licking the children’s faces, making them laugh. Laughter, sometimes tears, at bedtime. Hugs, high fevers, movie nights, sinks full of dishes, yellow tulips out the window, loose petals like empty cradles rocking on the gravel path, lonely long-distance phone calls, long silent mornings, willing herself to unfurl from bed.
There was a question. But the nurse has moved on, is asking Mrs. M how is she today.
While she dabbles in short fiction, Zena Ryder is also working on a historical novel set during the American Civil War.
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