by Kris Calvert
I stood, throwing my arms around his neck to catch my balance and found myself staring into his face, all aglow. Leaning his forehead into mine, he grabbed me by the hips, pulling my body into his with a loving forcefulness I gave way to.
He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple gliding up and down, the veins in his neck pulsing in time with his heartbeat. “You are a thorn in my side, Mimi Richardson” he whispered.
“And, you annoy the hell out of me,” I replied with a slurred sigh.
Pulling away, I stared into his eyes for only a moment before closing them and offering my lips up to him for another kiss.
Instead, he picked me up, throwing me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes before climbing the staircase to the second floor.
I squealed. “What are you doing?”
“Putting you to bed.”
“What?”
“You heard me,” he said.
Slapping his butt with my open palm, I shouted, “Put me down, you…you…” I was a little drunk and at a loss for words. Then it finally came to me as he opened the door to the master bedroom. “Barbarian.”
Cecil tossed me on the bed. “I’ve gotten you this far, but I’ll take my leave, fair lady, so you can change and sleep this off.”
“Cecil,” I murmured, turning my face into a pillow. “Don’t leave me.”
I felt his weight on the bed and turned my face up to see him sit on the edge before brushing a stray curl from my face. “Why?” he asked.
I took his hand in mine, holding it close to my body. “I’m scared of the wolf in the bathroom.”
“Ha!” he scoffed. “Marilyn Richardson, I’ve known you most of my life and you’ve never been afraid of anything.”
I pulled his hand closer, forcing him to lean into me. “What is it, Mimi?” he whispered in my ear.
“I’m afraid you’ll leave and not come back.”
I said the words quietly, letting them linger in the air without explanation. Cecil could interpret them however he wanted—either way—in the moment, I was doing exactly as we’d promised one another. I was speaking the truth.
Releasing my hand, he walked to the fireplace that faced the massive oak bed, struck a match and lit the kindling. The dry wood popped and he tossed the used match into the growing flames before placing a screen in front of the growing fire.
He gathered a quilt in his hands from the bottom of the bed and without warning, kicked off his loafers before crawling on top of the bed and covering us both.
Spooning behind me, Cecil kissed my cheek before whispering in my ear, “I’m afraid too. But I’ll always come back. Mark my words, Mimi. You’re never getting rid of me.”
December 24, 1941
Cecil
I woke early, Mimi still sound asleep and nestled in my arms. We’d slept in our clothes, tangled up in each other’s arms and legs all night. It was the best sleep I’d had since I found out I was shipping out two weeks ago.
The room had a chill in the air, and I knew the fire had burned down to embers. Not wanting to wake her, I piled another blanket on top of the down, bearskin and quilt already covering her thin frame. Standing back, I watched her sleep, breathing in and out over and over. She was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen and I was glad I would, at the very least, have these last couple of days with her as a memory to keep. It was something I was positive I would need to daydream about from time to time when I started missing home.
I tiptoed across the room, praying I wouldn’t step on one of the creaky planks. The lodge was old and just that—a lodge. It wasn’t necessarily built for comfort, but to withstand the test of time and weather conditions on the top of the mountain.
Quietly closing the door behind me, I walked the long hallway to the other end. My bedroom door stood open, but I knew without a fire, it too would be chilly.
I started the kindling and the fire caught quickly, while I warmed my hands and socked feet.
My old room was just as I remembered. My parents hadn’t changed it since I was a young boy. Even the stuffed beaver Mimi hated still held his own in the corner of the room.
I took a deep breath, then walked to the bathroom and started the hot water in the tub. I wanted a quick bath before making breakfast.
The water was slow to warm, but once it starting flowing, I had to turn it back. The new hot water heater my father had installed was a luxury, and it worked like a charm. I just had to be careful not to let it get too hot or not to use too much. If Mimi also wanted a bath, it could be tricky.
I undressed and stared at the uniform hanging on the back of the bathroom door. I couldn’t bear to look at it just now. God knew I’d be wearing it nonstop soon enough. Naked, I walked through my room and hung it in the closet.
I slipped my body into the warm water, staring out the window at the snow, still falling at a rapid pace. If it continued at this rate we would be looking at three or four feet.
I quickly bathed and shaved, then drained the tub and hurried to get dressed as a cold chill overtook me the moment I left the water.
I dressed in flannel-lined pants and a cozy flannel shirt. I’d need to get outside today and these were the warmest work clothes I had at the lodge.
When I made it into the kitchen, I found the mess we’d left behind. It wasn’t a lot, and thankfully we’d put away the food, but there were plates and glasses that needed washing and crumbs that needed to be swept up. There was too much wildlife surrounding the lodge and they all wanted in the house. Crumbs and food were just an open invitation.
I went to work, hoping to have it all spic and span before Mimi was up and at ̓em. Three plates, four glasses, some utensils and a crust of bread later, I was ready to mess it up again fixing breakfast.
I started with coffee, but it took me fifteen minutes to figure out my mother’s newfangled vacuum coffee pot.
“It looks like you’re in a spot of trouble, Mr. Winterbourne.”
I turned to find Mimi dressed in dungarees, boots and a flannel shirt—one of my flannel shirts. Her once pinned up hair was now a cascading flow of curls. I loved it when she let her hair down.
“Hello, Sunshine. How are you feeling this morning?”
She bobbled her head, closing one eye. I knew she had a headache.
“Coffee? Aspirin? Water?”
“Yes. Yes. And yes,” she replied with the hint of an embarrassed smile.
“I like your shirt,” I said, placing a cup of black coffee in front of her as she sat at the small kitchen table used by the staff.
“I thought you might. Sorry, I rummaged through your closet. I came looking for you, but you’d already made your way downstairs. So I helped myself to one of your warmer shirts.”
“By all means.”
“I’m glad you said that because I also took one of your wool sweaters. You know the one with the reindeer on the front?”
“Very appropriate for the day,” I replied. “Cream and sugar?”
“No thank you.”
She took a sip and I went to work pouring her a glass of water from the icebox before looking through the cabinets for aspirin. “Merry Christmas Eve, by the way,” I said, still rummaging through each drawer until I hit pay dirt. “Ah. Aspirin.”
Taking two from the glass bottle, I handed them to her, giving her fingers a squeeze. “Did you sleep all right?”
She took a drink of water and nodded. “Yes. Thank you. And thank you for staying with me last night. I know you didn’t have to. I’m sure that was….awkward.”
“It wasn’t awkward at all,” I said, having a laugh to myself.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“No, c’mon Cecil, we said this was a time of complete honesty. Nothing we say or do leaves the lodge and everything stays between the two of us—now and forevermore.”
“It’s just,” I began. “I awoke this morning thinking about what your mother would say if she knew we shared a bed last night?”
M
imi broke out into laughter. “I’m sure she woke up with a stomach ache today and can’t quite put her finger on why she feels so poorly. But it’s just me disappointing her,” Mimi cried with laughter. “She knows I’m doing something she wouldn’t approve of three hundred and fifty miles away. The woman has eyes in the back of her head.”
“And apparently across state lines.” I let out a guffaw. It was sad, but Mimi was right. Mrs. Richardson walked around with a stick up her ass most of the time. I was just thankful the woman standing in front of me was the antithesis of her mother.
“What can I fix you for breakfast?” I asked, clapping my hands together before rubbing them back and forth as if I was warming up my culinary gifts.
“I’m really not hungry. Is that okay?”
“As long as we’re here at the lodge, everything is okay,” I replied. “I think I’m going to have a couple of eggs and some toast.”
“Get after it,” she said with a smile. “I’m not going to stop you.”
I began gathering the eggs and bread from the icebox. “Have you had a chance to look outside?”
“I have.”
“And?”
“And I don’t think I would’ve made it out of North Carolina last night, much less off this mountain, which begs the question,” she said.
“Yes?”
“How are we going to get off the mountain?”
I broke my eggs in the cast iron skillet and listened to them sizzle. “One of the year-round residents up here will start to clear the roads with a front end loader over the next couple of days. He’ll even make his way up to the lodge—eventually.”
“Eventually?” she asked, her voice rising. “How stranded are we?”
I turned to look her in the face. Her cheeks were flushed and the morning glow she possessed was like nothing I’d ever seen on a woman. There was something almost magnetic about Mimi. She emanated a life force that drew people to her. Like moths to the flame, they warmed to her with ease. As I grew older and more in tune with people, I realized her mother was quite jealous of the effect she had on others. I always thought it was her reason for controlling Mimi. She did her best to keep her under her thumb, make her conform. But Marilyn Richardson was born to stand out and her mother didn’t like it one bit.
“How stranded are we,” I stated, repeating her question. “Well, we’ve got food, water and supplies for a month and we’ll probably be out of here in two days’ time, so not at all.”
“Okay,” she said sipping her coffee. “I like the sound of that.”
“I can probably have you home in Shadeland by New Year’s Eve. How’s that?”
“Not good,” she said making a face. “I might have to find a new place to hide out. Or maybe I’ll just go to New York City for the new year.”
“New York?” I asked, placing my runny eggs on a plate. “What’s in New York?”
“What’s not in New York?” she asked. “Why? What do you have against the place?”
“Nothing,” I said, sitting next to her at the small table. “That’s my P.O.E.”
“Your what?”
“Port of Embarkation. New York Harbor. It’s where I’m headed from here. First to Camp Shanks in Orangeburg, New York, fondly named Last Stop, USA. I’ll be there for a week and then to the harbor to board a troop ship bound for Europe.”
I took a bite of my eggs and swallowed hard. Now that I’d said it all out loud, I wasn’t as hungry as I thought. I stared out the window, taking a sip of Mimi’s water, trying to wash it all down—the eggs and the nervous knot in my throat.
“Hey,” she said stroking my arm with her hand. “I don’t want to spend our Christmas Eve talking about this.”
Looking back to her bright face, I nodded. “Agreed.”
“What should we do on this beautiful wintry day?”
“Well,” I began, giving her a raised eyebrow. “I thought about this last night as you lay in my arms—snoring, by the way.”
Mimi picked up a napkin from the edge of the table and tossed it in my face. “I do not snore.”
“Hey, your secret is safe with me. Remember, what happens in the lodge, stays in the lodge. Besides, your husband will never know until your wedding night that you saw logs and by then it will be too late for him to get rid of you.”
“You’re an evil man, Cecil Winterbourne,” she smirked. “And I don’t snore.”
“Fine,” I said, throwing my hands up in surrender. “You don’t snore. Anyway, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted—I thought about this last night while you were silently sleeping and I believe we owe it to ourselves to do some exploring,” I said, pointing to the outside with my fork.
“Exploring?”
I nodded. “MmmHmm. Why? What did you have in mind?”
“I thought we were going for a sleigh ride?”
“Well darlin’, we have all day and all night. The horse can see at night, I’m not so good on frozen ground in the dark. C’mon. It’ll be fun. I’ll even make you a hot toddy when we return.”
She tilted her head, squinting one eye as if she was sizing me up. “Where would we go?”
“That’s the beauty of it. Anywhere we want. Within the hundred and forty acres that we own, of course.”
“Right,” she said. “Because it would be a shame for one of the neighbors to shoot us while out hunting.”
“Mimi,” I said, dragging her name out in a whine. “This is my Christmas wish. For you to take a little walk with me in the snow. What if I never come home from the war and—”
“Okay, okay!” she shouted, cutting me off. “Stop with the guilt! I’ll go.”
I stared at her. I loved her stubbornness. She had a mind of her own and didn’t care who knew it. All those years of her mother demanding she be agreeable had turned her into the most headstrong, independent woman south of the Mason-Dixon line. But it wasn’t just the stubbornness that made me care for her so much—it was the fact that I could still, after all these years—convince her to join me. Whether it was bourbon when we were still teenagers, or staying over the holiday now that we were in our twenties. It made me feel like she believed in me in a way no one else ever had.
“What?” she barked.
I’d been caught staring at her for too long and now I’d have to account for it. “Nothing. I just think you’re beautiful with your hair down.”
“What?” she asked the question with a softer edge to her voice the second time around.
“You heard me.”
She nodded. “You’re right. I did.”
“See? Honesty. I like this thing we’ve got going on here,” I said twirling my finger in a circle.
“What’s that?”
“Our private mountaintop. No one to question us, no one to tell us what to do or what to think. No one will ever know what happened here, just us. This will always be ours—yours and mine—no matter where life takes us from this moment forward.”
Mimi stared back at me and I had the urge to take her face in my hands and kiss her. But I wouldn’t. As much as I wanted her, it had to be mutual. And for all the advances she made last night, she had to be completely sober. I didn’t want either of us to leave Winter Lodge with regret.
She looked to her hands, picking at a hangnail and bit the corner of her bottom lip. “You’re pretty special, Cecil—I mean, to be as young as you are.”
“Mimi, I’m only six years younger than you and I’m old enough to be shipped off to war. Besides, age is just a number.”
“Fine. Just for the next couple of days, age doesn’t matter.”
“Fine, but just so you know, age will never matter to me—today or any other day of our lives.”
“Fine,” Mimi chided.
“Now, how about I get some more firewood from the barn. I’ll get the fireplaces going before we bundle up and head off.”
“What can I do?” she asked.
“Haul some firewood?”
“Okay,” she replied
, her game-for-anything attitude shining through. “Let’s go do it.”
“I was kidding. You’re too good to be hauling anything.”
“I might be a woman, but I can do everything you can do, Cecil.”
“Wanna make a bet on that?” I asked with a wink.
“Fine. Anything that doesn’t require me to have a dick.”
I burst out laughing and she joined me. Mimi was the first woman I’d ever heard use the word dick out loud and I had to admit, it was a turn on. “I don’t know if Jesus approves of you, but the Lord knows I love you, Marilyn Richardson.”
When we stopped laughing, she stared at me and smiled, nodding her head, not giving energy to my comment. When it became awkward, I filled the silence. “Get your gloves. The wood isn’t going to haul itself into the house.”
Mimi followed me into the barn, my mother’s snow boots on her feet. They were a size or two too big and I had to suppress my laughter when she tripped over her feet and fell face first into the snow.
“Very funny,” she said, holding her arm in the air for me to assist in her recovery.
Giving her hand a tug, she deliberately pulled me toward her, leaving me spread eagle next to her.
“Who’s laughing now?” She giggled, scrambling to her feet on her own.
Rolling onto my back, I looked to the cloudy sky, still spitting snow. “God, you’re a pain in the ass. You know that?”
“Yes. Now, come on. The least you can do is make yourself useful.”
I followed her, trudging in her footsteps, allowing her to blaze the trail in the nearly two feet of snow.
Opening the door to the barn, we shook the wetness from our clothes and I began loading an old sled with firewood and kindling, at once realizing I couldn’t move my arms easily in the coat I’d chosen.
Without a thought, I took it off, the flannel straining against my arms. I prayed I wouldn’t split open the old shirt—it was one of the warmer things I’d found in my closet.
Mimi wandered around the drafty barn, taking off a glove to touch the Farmall A tractor. The shiny red paint meant my father had purchased a new one for the property. It looked as if it had never been used.