Different Times

by Keelan LaForge

freshly squeezed orange juice 

“Thank God times have changed,” said Fiona, taking a sip of her mum’s good tea.

“Would you like a Digestive love?” Her mother offered her a tray of biscuits before taking one herself. She nibbled at it tentatively, like she wasn’t supposed to be eating while she was on duty.

“When we were little you had to do everything, Mum. I don’t remember Dad ever lifting a finger. He just sat all evening watching sport on TV.”

“Well, your dad was working, love. He was tired when he got home. You work the same hours Pete does, it’s different.”

The children were playing at Fiona’s feet. She’d just picked them up from their childminder: her mum.

“You’ve got a better lifestyle than we had. We couldn’t afford to buy anything or go anywhere.”

She stood over Fiona, waiting for her to drain her cup. The second she did, she put it on the tea trolley and wheeled it back into the kitchen with the weariness of a night-shift nurse. Fiona had seen her push that rusted trolley so many times she was surprised the thing hadn’t collapsed by now.

She followed her into the kitchen to wash the cups.

“Where is it you’re going tomorrow, again?”

“Majorca, mum.”

Her mother looked none the wiser, like she might have vaguely recognised the place name, but had not the slightest inkling where it was located, and probably never would. She’d never travelled abroad, they had seen it as an unnecessary extravagance. Fiona washed the cups and set them on the draining board.

“It’ll be a holiday for you too, Mum. It’ll give you a break from the kids for a few days.”

“I won’t know myself.”

“Well,” said Fiona, reading the clock on the wall. “We’d better hit the road – Pete will be waiting for us. He probably has the dinner underway.”

“Is he cooking?” her mum asked, with a flash of her eyebrows.

“He’s just sticking a lasagne in the oven from the freezer, Mum.”

“Different times,” said Edna, shaking her head. “Have a good holiday, love.”

The following day, the family were en-route to the airport, the kids fighting through their boredom in the back seat.

“Sarah, would you stop annoying your sister?” said Fiona. She turned her neck like an owl’s swivel to look her right in the retina.

Sarah slunk back in her seat, her smarmy smile straightening into a stiff-lipped sulk.

“Did you bring the sun cream love?” asked Pete, changing gears. He didn’t seem remotely bothered by the bickering, he didn’t take his eyes off the road for a second.

“Yes.”

“The girls’ swimming things?”

“Yeah.”

“What about the mosquito repellent?”

“Yep. I made a list, Pete. We haven’t forgotten anything.”

They dropped the car at the long-stay car park and transferred their belongings to the airport bus, snapping at each other as they stacked the luggage in the boot of the bus. Fiona hoped things would turn a bit more pleasant once they were through airport security and things settled down.

“Got the passports?” asked Pete.

“Yes.”

“The boarding passes?”

“Yes,” Fiona said, through her teeth.

“Good, now we can relax.”

Fiona gave Pete a curious look. She wondered when holiday mode would kick in for her. His had seemingly started with his departure from his office the previous day. She’d packed up every one of their belongings, unplugged every electrical appliance they owned, even cleaned out the fridge. Pete had spent the morning catching up on the sports news on his tablet. They got to the airport, got the cases checked in and waited impatiently at the gate. The place was packed with people, all sun-loving tourists dressed for the weather they anticipated. There were no seats left and people were sitting on their hand luggage, looking like they needed a holiday just from their journey through the airport. It was finally time to board and everyone beat their way to their allocated aisles, forcing their bags into the overhead compartments.

“Do you have sweets to stop the kids’ ears popping?” asked Pete.

“Yes.”

“Did you bring my ear plugs in case I have a nap?”

“I forgot.”

“Ok, so the list isn’t infallible."

“When are you going to have time to nap on a three hour-daytime flight with two kids?”

“They’re on their tablets, love.”

Fiona realised she was the only reliable adult supervision on board.

After a three-hour flight and each member of the family silently glued to their electronic devices, Fiona was feeling infinitely more relaxed; momentarily, at least. Pete had slept most of the way and the kids were otherwise occupied: no questions, no requests, no demands. She hoped it would continue now they were all on holiday. They disembarked, collected their luggage and completed all of the tasks that threaten to make a holiday dull.

“Have you got the directions to the hotel, honey?” Pete asked, inserting the keys into the hire car’s ignition.

“No, I thought you had them?”

Pete patted the back pocket of his shorts. He drew out a crumpled piece of paper.

“Oh, I do. Good, at least one of us is organised,” he said with puffed-up male pride. With one smile, he rendered all Fiona’s preparations obsolete.

They arrived at the hotel a short while later. It was a symbol of serenity, a glass-roofed paradise with not so much as a kettle to manually operate in sight. Fiona was glad they had gone for the all-inclusive deal. She could sit back on a sun-lounger and be waited on all week. Cooking, laundry and bed-making were off the menu.

Pete packed their towels onto a row of sun loungers. He spread his towel out and lay back, finding the best notch for the right recline.

“Oh, love, I forgot to get a coffee before we sat down. Are you going to the bar anyway?” He pulled his sunglasses from his hair and put them on without moving an inch.

“Cappuccino?” asked Fiona. 

“Yeah, two sugars. Thanks, love.”

The kids went directly to the pool, Lana pushing Sarah in.

“Be careful!” hollered Fiona. She presumed Pete’s eyes were closed behind his shades. Joining a lengthy queue, she sighed as fellow hotel users jumped ahead, taking orders for friends once they’d reached the barman. A ten-minute wait and ten more reasons for annoyance later, Fiona conveyed the rattling tray to the table. She nudged Pete.

“I got the kids Calipos.”

“You might have a hard time getting them out of the pool. I was just having a doze there. This heat is unreal.”

Fiona fanned herself with her unread magazine.“I might need to cool off in the pool for a while.”

“The girls could use some intervention anyway, honey. Looks like they’re trying to drown each other.”

She looked over and saw their arms flailing, heads beneath the water’s surface. Pete sat up like he was going to do something, reached for his coffee cup and leaned back into his chair.

“Watch you don’t get burnt lying there,” said Fiona, looking at his reddening forearm.

“Put the umbrella up, would you, love? That sun is strong.”

Fiona wrestled the parasol to get it to click into place. She topped up his sun cream and adjusted his lounger as requested. And finally, she submerged her sweaty body in the cool water of the pool, almost smiling. A few seconds later, her half-smile sank.

“Let’s race, mum,” shouted Sarah.

“I was just planning on cooling off for a minute.”

“Come on Mum, play with us.”

Fiona swam several lengths, woefully lagging behind.

Pete strolled over to the pool’s edge. Fiona was ready to swap roles and relief was upon her. He knelt down, so his lips could meet her at ear level, “I overheard the couple next to us saying there’s a kids’ club.”

“Great, when is it on?”

“We just missed it, but I thought you’d be glad of it tomorrow. Are you coming to have your coffee, love? It’s probably gone cold now. Maybe you should get another one.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she mumbled.

Fiona leaned back against the tiled side of the pool. She closed her eyes, hoping if she pretended to feel relaxed, her body might catch up. She could almost imagine she was in a spa if she blocked out the sound of children screaming around her. She envisioned herself lying on a massage table, chill-out music playing, the scent of massage oil soothing her stressed senses. “Can we get changed, mum. We’re hungry.”

The three of them walked back to the room, so everyone could get ready for dinner. Pete lingered behind, he’d mentioned something about going for a short swim before dinner. Walking past the cleaning lady, Fiona noticed the lady’s face was obscured by a pile of pressed towels and felt an inexplicable affinity to her. Pete joined them in the room an hour later, once everyone was washed and dressed.

“Ready for dinner?” asked Fiona, eyeing his sopping swimming trunks.

“I’ll only be ten minutes. You all relax on the balcony while I get changed, enjoy the scenery.” He said it like he was offering them an added extra. He strolled into the bathroom, dripping pool water all over the carefully mopped floor.

Fiona sat on the balcony in one of the plastic chairs,taking in the view she’d failed to notice on their way in. while the girls tried to make sense of Spanish TV. There were crickets chirping in the bushes and a water fountain trickling next to an idle gardener: the ideal setting for relaxation and refreshment. Fiona hoped by the second day of their holiday she’d have wound down a bit more from work. She was feeling unnaturally tense, even more so than she did when she was under pressure in the office.

“Right, I’m ready,” said Pete, appearing at the sliding door. “Do you have that mosquito repellent, love?”

Fiona went to her cosmetics bag and rifled through it, upsetting the order of her toiletries. She produced an electric blue bottle. It was the tone of one of those fly electrocution lights and promised to be as effective. She hadn’t thought to put any on herself yet, just on the kids. Pete handed it back to her.

“Could you put it on for me? I hate the smell of that stuff. It stays on your hands all night.”

Fiona wasn’t too keen on the scent herself, but she obliged.

The family walked to the lift.

“I’m having a great holiday, love,” said Pete, wrapping his arm around her. “Haven’t felt this relaxed in ages. Have you?”

Before Fiona had time to invent an appropriate answer, the girls cut in.

“It’s great here, Dad. Can we go to the pool after dinner?”

“It’ll be closed then. Your mum will take you when she goes down in the morning. You love a quiet, early morning swim anyway, don’t you love?”

He beamed at her and she supplied a submissive smile in return.

They walked the corridor to the all-inclusive buffet. Fiona wondered whose bright idea that had been. Plating up everyone’s desired dishes sounded like more work than the frozen pizza she would have stuck in the oven had they been at home.

They secured a table and Pete stood up. “I’m going to see what they’ve got.” He lifted an empty plate that promised him a pile of options. “I’ll let you know what they’ve got.”

Fiona gave up, sitting down in her scoop-backed chair, fanning herself with a napkin. She watched Pete across the room, filling his plate with a little bit of this, a little bit of that. She considered him from afar, thinking, the times may have changed, but had the sexes? 

 

About the author

Keelan LaForge is a mum of two and a writer. She writes for Terror House magazine and used to write for Vintage Life magazine. She has a personal blog https://thefunkythrifter.com/ She has written three novels which she is working on getting published.  

Pro?

by Keelan  LaForge

bitter coffee

 

Double blue lines came up in the window, like part of a bar code for something Lily couldn’t afford. Pregnant? She hadn’t believed it until the test window proved her wrong. It was Dom who had talked her into taking a test after finding her asleep on the sofa after work, every day for three weeks. She’d had no appetite either; Dom was perceptive about those things. He was her flatmate and their relationship purely platonic. Lily didn’t have a partner. Hell, she barely had a job or a solid plan for her future. Her boss was cutting down her work schedule daily, cutting back her hours quicker than she could cut cloth. She was a seamstress. She loved sewing, it was the one thing that gave her a sense of purpose. But it seemed that more and more people were going to furnishing chains for their curtains these days. Why repair a dropped hem when you could replace the entire thing for less than the cost of a spool of thread to fix it? It seemed that the business was slowly moving towards closure. Lily would have to reassess her options. There was enough on her plate without adding another helping of problems to it. Lily felt sick to her stomach, worry more likely the culprit than morning sickness.

So, how did she fall pregnant? She had met a friend of a friend at a party. He was the kind of guy who talks you round with kisses around your neckline. She had no romantic interest in him, but he’d plied her with compliments and drinks. He’d been a gentleman when it came to the refilling of her wine glass, at least. Lily hadn’t so much consented to accompany him to the bedroom as not made a forceful decline. He was the pushy type; the kind who didn’t take rejection well. She wondered if she had the opportunity to return to that night if it could have had a different outcome. It seemed unlikely without putting on a fiercer front. Lily was timid and loathed confrontation, especially behind a locked door. She put that night behind one in her mind too, compartmentalising it. Better to hide it away than to repeatedly revisit it, torturing herself. She would be forward-facing, she decided; that was her only choice.

Lily lived in a small town near Galway, on the west coast of Ireland. She was on the coastline, looking out of her little boxed-in town towards the expansive sea. Living in a different place would have opened her options up, she thought. But she couldn’t go to that dark place in her mind. She was pro-life, always had been. She’d protested loudly against abortion since growing up in a strait-laced Catholic family. She’d gone to an all-girls school where the virtues of abstinence were spelt out to her, in science, in religious education, in assembly, every day of the week. The girls’ skirts had to be below the knee and boys’ hands had to stay there too. Makeup and heels were banned; if you didn’t draw attention to yourself, nothing bad happened to you. Everyone in her vicinity thought pro-choice was pro-murder. She’d fought against the eighth repeal herself, spouting vehement venom to all who supported it. However, she realised, it was somehow easier to plaster a rule on a placard than it was to stick to it yourself. She’d never thought of the matter becoming personal; it was merely a concept with which she’d been taught not to agree. She had reacted instinctively, with the exact wording she’d grown up hearing. Lily suddenly felt a huge surge of sympathy for all the women who’d suffered at her expense, the ones she had vilified. Things were black and white in her small town; grey wasn’t allowed. Life had to be painted in sharp images with clear contrast between black lines and colour; blurred edges didn’t exist. If you were in the pro-choice camp, you were an automatic atheist.

Dom walked into the room, sitting on the sofa next to her. His eyebrows raised in surprise, his mouth puckering into a smirk.

“This is the first time I’ve seen you awake in a month,” he said. “Did you start drinking caffeine again?”

“Yeah I’ve had five cups of coffee today.”

He laughed.

“Seriously though, you were right. I’m pregnant.”

“Shit,” he said. His head snapped back like someone had smacked him.

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” she said, tailing off. She really didn’t.

“I think you should ring that jerk and tell him,” he said. “It’s his fault you’re in this situation.”

Dom was her male confidant; he knew all the ins and outs of her love life. Lily hesitated, glancing at the phone. Maybe that was the answer: share the load so she could manage to carry her half of it.

She lifted the phone, scrolling through her phone-book for his number. She knew she had it stored somewhere but struggled to remember his name for a moment. She had blotted it out, with all other aspects of that night. She found it: Ben. She’d known it was a one-syllable name, like Dom’s name for him: jerk. The phone rang so many times she almost gave up on an answer. As she went to disconnect the call, he picked up. “Yeah?”

“Hi Ben, it’s Lily.”

“Who?”

“Lilly, Coleen’s friend.”

“Oh yeah, you were at that party at Coleen’s. We should hang out again some time. What’s up?”

“I just thought I should ring to share some news with you – I’m pregnant.”

“- So why are you ringing me about that?”

“It’s yours.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“No, it really is.”

 “You’re wrong. Don’t phone me again.” The line went dead. Silence stood in front of her like a surgeon quietly waiting with a sharp scalpel.

“Well?” said Dom.

“Don’t ask,” she said. “He hasn’t changed my original opinion of him, I’ll say that.”

“You know, you could always get a you-know-what.”

She looked at him in disbelief, like he’d never met her before or heard her repeat her mantras millions of times.

“Well, what will you do if you keep it?” he asked.

Lily thought about her life and the little she had to offer a child: fifty pounds in the bank, a job she was on the brink of losing, a shared flat that wasn’t much bigger than a studio. She felt like the answer presented itself to her without her even posing the question. But, the judgement: that was what she feared most of all. Her town was small and stuck in the past, it didn’t have the open-minded outlook of a major city. She hoped no one would find out.

A week later, Lily was in the hospital bed alone. The room was utterly blank, like looking death right in the face. She lay with her feet in the air, held up by stirrups. The sheets were starched and abrasive under her bare legs. People said it was letting a woman keep her dignity, giving her the power to choose. Nothing in the room felt dignified. She felt open to public view. Surgeons and nurses passed in and out of the room like it was a thoroughfare. Metal implements lay on a trolley in front of her; a row of weapons. A doctor with a surgical mask came into the room. She could see his eyes; eyes that were hollow and desensitised to the whole experience. He didn’t have empathy for her either. His face would remain a mystery to her: like he didn’t know her as intimately as he did. But his eyes would haunt her forever. She shut her eyes tight until the whole thing was over. She couldn’t watch it unfolding or she’d run from the bed. Decision and doubt wrestled each other in her head, the pragmatic one winning out. She would deal with the latter later.

Lily walked out of the room a short while later, with a painkiller in her pocket and a pat on the shoulder from the nurse.

“You did really well, love,” she said with her soft smile. She looked at her like she was her star pupil, on her way to greater things in life.

Lily wondered if she’d be able to face the rest of her changed-life with the same bravery. Walking out the door of the hospital, the doors clapped closed behind her. She hoped they would contain the pain and her memories. Walking along the street, she passed a group of university students. She’d confronted them in a protest over the eighth repeal, just weeks before. Lily thought of their banners, worn-out and marked as the undergarments she’d worn that day. She looked at them with their fresh faces, untarnished by the truth that comes with time and experience. Now she could see that Pro-life wasn’t allowing women a choice, but Pro-Choice didn’t feel like one to her either. From then on, she made one choice: that she’d remain on the side lines, keeping her opinions to herself. 

About the author

Keelan LaForge is a mum of two and a writer. She writes for Terror House magazine and used to write for Vintage Life Magazine. She has a personal blog https://thefunkythrifter.com/ She has written three novels which she is working on getting published.

 

 

Stories

Eleanor had never intended to home-school her kids. She always thought mothers who home-schooled where difficult types who sought out an alternative lifestyle. She thought they were people who had no faith in the educational system, who thought the teachers were less knowledgeable than themselves. That was, until a home-schooling syllabus was thrust into her lap. William was seven years old. He had autism. He couldn’t cope with a lot of things, particularly in school life. She’d always known William was socially withdrawn, a little different, very sensitive. She’d thought of it as a good thing until the school principal called her in one day, telling her things weren’t working out. He’d have to be moved to a special needs school or sent home. The school couldn’t discriminate; he’d be allowed to stay on, but his behaviour was a distraction to the rest of the class, she said. Eleanor knew he wasn’t happy there. When she picked him up from the childminder every day, he was agitated and unsettled. He never had his homework done. He had too many interests he pursued obsessively at home to have the time; homework was at the bottom of his pile of priorities. It was always shoved to the bottom of his bag, like he hoped if it was well enough hidden, it would cease to exist. Eleanor always found it untouched and sat down with him to help him through it. She ended up doing it herself, with him just making the pen marks on the page. He stared out the window, dreaming of other things. Eleanor’s other children were studious and engaged in their classes and with their classmates. William liked to be alone with his Lego, making structures for hours. Eleanor had faith that he would find his own area of interest. She had done, after all. Only with her, it had been literature.

Eleanor worked for a literary agency, editing books. It was her life’s dream. She couldn’t believe her luck when she landed the job straight out of university. Then, she met her husband and things became more complicated. Juggling family life and a career required some skill, especially since Keith worked such long hours at the hospital. He was a surgeon and his hours were as unpredictable as the length of his patients’ operations. Eleanor had to whittle down her hours to three days a week to fit work around her family. They had three kids, aged seven, nine and eleven. The pre-teen years needed a lot of parental involvement. Still, Eleanor loved to escape to work on her days in. She liked to sit, stationary, behind her desk and open her email, never knowing what work of art might find its way to her inbox that day. She loved to uncover a new story, one that she could disappear into. For that morning and afternoon, she forgot about life’s stressors, about what she would make for dinner that night, about the three loads of unwashed laundry waiting for her in the over-spilling basket.

When they had their third child, she and Keith had discussed the possibility of her becoming a stay-at-home mum. She had thought the costs of childcare and the demands of parenthood might take over for a few years. But she had been happy to find a balance that worked for them; until the issue of home-schooling drew a question mark over the current arrangement. Eleanor’s work wasn’t just work; it was a creative outlet for her. It was a chance to employ the under-utilised side of her mother-brain. She didn’t get time to read in the evenings anymore; the two older kids stayed up as late as she did, interrupting every TV show she tried to watch with Keith with their questions. She spent most nights ironing school shirts, packing lunchboxes and signing off homework books. Work was the only place where she used her imagination.

The day that she left the school office, Eleanor decided home-schooling was the only option. It was too late in the year to get William a place in a school for special needs. She went home to research how to go about it, where to find a syllabus. It was never something she thought she’d find herself looking into. That night she discussed it with Keith. The decision was final; it wasn’t their decision so much as the only available choice.

“Maybe you can work from home?” said Keith. It felt like a word of consolation more than a likelihood.

One week later, Eleanor was slowly coming to terms with her new lifestyle. Her value lay in looking after others, like a nurse with longer shifts. She watched every cup of coffee she made turn cold without being drunk, made few visits to the bathroom alone and her posterior only glazed the surface of chairs before she was called upon to complete another task.

She was learning things about her son she hadn’t known when he was in school. She’d always thought that William had a scientific mind. He only seemed concerned with assembling structures and counting how far away he was, pocket money-wise, from the latest Lego set. At least, until Eleanor cleared out a cupboard while he built a structure at her feet. She found a dust-coated box of her childhood books inside.

“These were yours, Mum?” he asked, pausing his game. She nodded. “Will you read them to me?” He clambered onto her knee. Eleanor realised she might not be reading the stories of new authors, but she was rereading those of the ones who made the greatest impression on her, the words that had made the first imprint on her little mind. As she watched William’s imagination coming to life and taking flight before her, she could see that what she was doing had more creative worth than the publication of every new novel that came her way. In the end, she could always go back to it later. But she couldn’t fill in the blanks in motherhood later in life.

Service

by Keelan LaForge

Lady Grey tea

The dress tightened around her like taut chains. The servant stood behind her with a button hooker, buttoning her up one hundred times. Eden felt her ribs retract and her breathing shorten. She stood tall and straight, the way she did every day in that house: upholding the sham of marital bliss. Only God knew where her husband was; she hadn’t seen him in days. Being the lady of the house meant just that; she belonged to the house more than she did to him. They were like two dispersed buttons in an empty jar; he had his side of the house and she had hers.

“That’s you done up, Madam,” said her servant. Eden looked at her with envy; at least at the end of the work day, her time was her own. She got to play a role for a few hours and then be herself again.

“Thank you, Harriet,” she said, discharging her with a nod. Eden felt like falling into her, resting her head on the breast of her blouse, admitting she couldn’t live this life. The servant gave her a look, like she knew what she was thinking but that the words could never be said aloud. Self-restraint was what marked a woman as acceptable. If you lost that, who knew what might be unleashed.

Eden sat at her dressing table, brushing her hair, pulling it back into a tight bun. She slid a butterfly slide into it. She prepared herself to walk down the corridor; there were too many employees, too many observers to face. She walked along it, looking at the paintings that lined it. There was one of a lady in the lake. She looked serene, freed by nature. That was the answer to Eden’s problems too: nature. One benefit of living at a manor house was the size of the grounds that surrounded it. The company of the lime trees and the worker bees gave Eden relief. That, and Ben, the gardener. She knew nothing about him outside of his gardening work. He was always tending the flower beds, making her life beautiful in little ways. That was how they’d connected: she admired the flowers he’d put there for her enjoyment. She walked towards the lake, wanting to sit on her shaded bench and soak in the greenery around her. She knew that Ben would be there, waiting for her. It was their agreed meeting place; somewhere their lives intersected at 2pm each day.

Eden sat down on the bench. She heard his breath behind her, the clink of his rake hitting the ground. He sat down next to her and pulled off his gardening gloves.

“I cut these for you,” he said, handing her a bunch of lilacs.

“They’re beautiful,” she said, smelling their perfume. “How are you?”

“A little bored. The plants are pleasing, but not great conversationalists.”

He gave her a cheeky smile. He was the one person who smiled at her without restraint.

“Have you had a pleasant morning?”

“Dull. The same as always. Dreaded routine. This is the only thing that gives me the motivation to get through the day. I’m fed up with this place and with wearing dresses with hundreds of buttons.”

He regarded her like he was admiring a painting. “You always look well. I imagine it's uncomfortable though.”

“There’s a painting I was looking at in the house -

Ben sat back into the bench, listening. He’d never seen the interior of the house before. His job wasn’t one that allowed him access to it. She lived in another world to him. He was curious about every detail of hers, whilst knowing she was a caged animal and that he was lucky to be wild and feral.

“Looking at it cheers me a little. The lady in it is submerged in water, surrounded by lily pads. It’s unclear why she’s there. Perhaps she’s drowning, but she’s the picture of freedom. I’d love to have my body immersed in water, with nature surrounding me. A bowl and jug of water to bath in doesn’t have the same effect.”

“Well, what’s preventing you?”

“Preventing me from what?”

“Going for a swim in the lake.”

“In the lake? In this dress?” She laughed.

“Can’t you take it off?”

“Not without my maid. Have you seen the number of the buttons it takes to secure it?”

“I’ll help you. I can imagine you swimming freely in the lake. It would be beautiful.”

She turned her back to him, offering her buttons to him to unfasten. His fingers worked methodically, carefully unhooking each one. There must have been a hundred of them, he thought. It felt like he was freeing an animal trapped in a snare.

Eden’s muscles slackened, her ribcage expanded and her breathing relaxed. Ben lifted her dress over her head, like he was lifting a domed birdcage, freeing its feathered inhabitant. Eden took off the hoop that held her dress’s structure and her legs walked free. She climbed into the cool water and lay out flat on her back, her arms out to her sides. Ben stood on the bank of the lake, watching her and smiling. She invited him in, but he was busy watching her from afar: a crippled bird taking its first flight. Eden swayed her arms back and forth below the water’s surface. None of the wildlife around her bothered her: nature restored her, it was society that did her harm.

“Madam,” Ben hissed. Eden wondered why he addressed her by a title rather than her Christian name. Eden felt too much in her natural state, too free to reign herself in, to react appropriately. Her husband was standing on the path beside the lake, but Eden was too far away to notice, and much less to let it concern her. She felt the greyness inside her floating away with the scent of lilacs and the sight of pink-flowered lily pads. and smiled.