4

 

4

He gently brushed the snow from her hair and cheeks as he helped her from the sleigh. The ride had been exhilarating and the horses that drew them along were strong and well-tuned to their handler. May moved towards the entrance where she knew a fire would be blazing, handing her coat to the doorman as she entered and made her way towards the warmth. She had dropped the Girly and now introduced herself as May Savage. Mrs.

Her little bookkeeping course had led her to a job in the city and she had completed one course after another as she climbed the corporate mountain with a gusto nobody had ever guessed she possessed. Alan Savage was her counterpart at a competing firm and while it seemed to the outside that there was an ethical problem in the making, May and Alan continued to keep their noses clean and proven the doomsayers wrong.

Alan and May had met during tough negotiations and had used their minds for work and to form that bond that is so rare. And now as she sat near the roaring fireplace of their hotel May watched her handsome husband as he crossed over to her, a warming drink in each hand. She licked her lips in anticipation.

“Girly. Girly. Earth to Girly May.” Doris clucked at her in exasperation. Her reverie broken, Girly blushed, she didn’t know enough to further her dream anyway, but it was fun to check out and leave everything behind for a minute or two.  “Table two are ready for their coffee now,” Doris intruded again. Girly blushed and made her way to the coffee pot.

Girly was barely fifteen and only partway through a manageable but boring course. She had managed to convince her parents to let her keep all her earnings until they went away and when they returned, they could discuss her contributions to living expenses. That is until girly responded to the overtures of one of the local lads and was ready to begin courting.  She was still so young but twenty was a heartbeat away and then it would become difficult to lift her from the shelf she would find herself on.

It did sometimes happen, though rarely, that a family would pack up their home and move away, never to be seen again. It was even rarer, but it did happen, that a new family would arrive and stay.

Today was one of those days.

Barely snapped from one daydream, Girly found herself living another. As she took the couple at table two their coffee she happened to glance out of the frill framed window to see a car she didn’t recognize, followed by a moving van drive past and turn the corner in the direction of the street where she lived. There was only one empty house, it ha been so for months. Girly smiled at her customers and went to stand behind the counter where she could see if either vehicle had decided to turn and leave.

She couldn’t stand there forever lest Doris come along and find something for her to do, and her shift seemed to drag interminably. One must understand that whatever the times were and no matter the mindset, a girl of fifteen was still a girl and a teenager at that. Though she may be seen as an adult who had finished school and was starting on the path of her life, some things took precedence, by which we mean the possibilities that new townsfolk could present. A new friend for a teenage girl to spend time with. A new boy a teenage girl could imagine spending time with. People have pasts and occasionally they leave them behind, but for the most part there is always a residue of that which has been, which clings to them and informs on them in their new surroundings.

Girly shifted from foot to foot, wiped the same table more than once while ignoring its sticky neighbor. One would be forgiven for thinking she was not accustomed to much, which is indeed the case, but considering where she found herself, one would be more than willing to indulge.

The moving van was leaving town as Girly rounded the corner to the street where she lived. Their car was outside in the street and there was a bunch of people standing on the verge discussing how to get the last large piece of furniture up their porch and through the door. Girly walk by, stealing glances from the corner of her eye. Two girls slightly older, they looked as if they could be twins and a boy, a young man really, a year or two older than the girls and what appeared to be parents and an aunt. She couldn’t be sure how they all fell into place, but she could be sure to make an effort to find out.