If anyone does Saturday Centus you might somewhat
remember this story started as a centus. In June of 2010, I wrote a
few chapters on Mary and then stopped. I had so much to write about
her, writing weekly for centus wasn't enough. I then wrote and wrote
until I had over 30,000 words so far. In writing it though as I got
further and further my original premise somehow got blown out of the
water, ha, ha. I stopped writing her story in March of 2011. I still
haven't quite figured out how I'm going to work this out but I thought I
would put out what I have so far. Please remember this is a really
rough draft and when I wrote it, I had no chapters. Before I decided to
put this on the blog I had to go back and figure out where I could make
them. I would suggest this is a terrible way of doing it lol. The
first chapter started on March 23rd, 2012.
11
"When we leave I'm going to have to stop at my sister’s house. They went on vacation for a couple of weeks
and she wanted me to take the stuff home out of her refrigerator. Would you mind stopping with me?” Mary
recognized it as Jody's voice.
"No, that's fine. Has
your sister said anything? I know you've
been worried about her" the other voice said.
Mary's ears really perked up then.
"No, I keep asking and asking.
She keeps saying everything is fine but I can tell something is really
wrong.”
"You think her and Mitch are having problems?”
"No way, she's more in love with him than ever. I think something is wrong with her
health. She hasn't looked well for a
while. Sometimes she seems like she's in another world when I talk to her. It's also strange, Mitch and Jimmy are best
friends but their families never took vacations together. Elizabeth was the one that suggested they go
to the cabin together. You know, Jimmy’s
wife Donna had breast cancer years ago.”
“You don't think Elizabeth has breast cancer, do you?”
"She very well could.
You know my granny died from it.
Mom had to have a couple of biopsies but luckily, it was nothing. I'm worried that maybe she wants to talk to
Donna about it since she went through it.”
"Well, let's hope that's not the case" the stranger's
voice said.
"Here are the previews" Jody said.
Mary's head was reeling now.
The movie theater darkened somewhat and she was dumbfounded. She had some contact with Elizabeth over the
years but since her wedding day their relationship had been almost nonexistent.
There was the occasional email that Mary sometimes acknowledged and sometimes
didn't. It had probably been at least a
couple of years since she heard from her, except for the condolence card she
sent Mary when her parents died.
The movie started. Mary
gathered up her purse and quickly headed out of the theater. She barely made it to her car and the tears
started as she was driving.
Mary pulled her car around the back of the house. She went in, got a bottle of wine and a
glass and headed right to the couch. She
took her shoes and hat off and threw them, almost hitting Lulu. She grabbed her grandma's quilt, wrapped it
around her and the floodgates opened.
Lulu jumped on the couch.
"Oh Lulu, I can't believe it.
Elizabeth might be sick. All
these years, I haven't talked to her and now when she probably needs me the
most, I can't go to her. How could I,
without telling her why I stopped talking to her?”
Mary took another glass of wine, and then another until she was
done with the bottle. She got up
unsteadily and started to go up the stairs.
Then she saw the closed door. Her Ma and Pa's closed door. She went to the door, put her hand on the
handle and turned it. She went to her
parent’s bed and crawled under the quilt.
"Ma, Pa" she cried.
” I'm sorry “and then passed out.
Mary slept until almost noon the next day. When she got up, she was surprised to see
herself in her parent’s bed. She didn't
remember much of last night but she did remember what happened at the movies
but quickly put it out of her mind.
There was nothing to be done about it now anyhow since Elizabeth wasn’t
in town and she didn’t even know IF anything was wrong.
Her eyes were suddenly drawn to her Ma's mirrored dresser and the
jewelry box. She slowly went and opened
it. Her Ma never had much jewelry but
she remembered going through it with her.
There was her grandma's wedding ring and some broaches. Her Ma always told her if times ever got hard
for us kids that we could sell the stuff and would get a lot of money. Looking further, her Ma still had little
necklaces that we kids had made for her.
Wonder what's in these little envelopes Mary thought. As she pulled the two envelopes out one said
Mary's diary keys and the other said Hannah's keys. Mary opened the two envelopes and the key's
looked identical. Mary thought her Ma
must have diaries that she wrote too.
She never knew that. Then she
heard the cell phone ringing downstairs.
She ran down the stairs and was out of breath when she said
"Hello?”
"Hi Mar, this is Johnny.
I thought we could have dinner tonight again. I could bring something; if you’re not doing
anything, what do you think?”
After the night she had finding out something might be wrong with
Elizabeth and then finally going into her Ma and Pa's room she really didn't
want company. "Johnny, I'm not
feeling that great today. Too much wine I think. I was
just going to stay in my pj's all day and probably lay around and watch TV, can
we do it another day?”
"Sure that's okay, why don't you give me a call when you’re
feeling better.”
"Okay, talk to you later Johnny" and hung up.
