He was in L.A. buying wholesale merchandise for a large department store. She was in L.A. negotiating a contract for her father’s factory to supply parts to an aircraft manufacturer. Amidst the crowd and chaos of the Roosevelt Hotel’s ballroom, he asked the unknown beauty to dance. She said “yes.” That was Monday. By Saturday, they were married. On Sunday, they parted.
“I missed you,” Andrew said.
“I bet you have,” Celia replied.
“How was your trip?”
“Long and full of drunk, vulgar, and horny service men.”
“Didn’t fall for any of them did you?”
“Depends on what you mean by “fall,” but I didn’t have to pay for many drinks or meals.”
“You know, Mrs. Dias, teasing and taking advantage of virile young soldiers suffering from months of depravation in the south pacific could very well get you raped – repeatedly – and without remorse.”
“It could if you don’t know how to pick’em. I do.”
“So what did you offer in return for all those club sandwiches and highballs?
Reaching into her handbag, Celia produced a handful of matchbooks. On the inside flap of each was a name, rank, and address.
“I promised to write,” she said, tossing the matchbooks into a trashcan.
Andrew marveled at her audacity. It was one of the things he liked about her. “Bring all your stuff?” he asked.
“Down to the last soiled doily. It’s all on the train. Or at least it was when we left Oregon.”
“Good. Let’s go set up housekeeping.”
“Terrific. What’s first on the list?”
“Produce an heir to the family fortune,” he said, quickening his pace as they sauntered arm-in-arm to his waiting Packard.
By 4:30 that afternoon a truck had arrived at Andrew’s – now Celia’s – three-story Victorian on Bayou Shore Drive. Andrew’s father had built the place just after the hurricane of 1920, the year Andrew came into this world. In 1929, he had helped his mother scatter his dad’s ashes into the bayou that served as their back yard. In 1941, he stood alone at the breakwater’s edge and did the same for his mother.
Under Celia’s close supervision, the movers were carrying the last of her belongings into the house when Andrew’s car pulled in the driveway.
“Best barbeque on the Gulf Coast,” he said, climbing from behind the wheel with a large brown bag. “Can you cook, or we will we be eating out every night?”
“Oh, I can cook,” Celia joked, “just not in the kitchen. I’ll leave the food service work to you.”
“I knew there was something I should’ve asked before putting that rock on your finger.”
“There are a lot of things you should have asked, but it’s too late now. I am here and moved in. The law of possession is in full force. “
They watched the movers drive away, then climbed the front steps, pausing on the broad, wooden veranda strewn with lush hanging plants.
“I love this place already,” Celia sighed as they pushed through the screen door and stepped into the hallway that split the house down its long axis.
“Shall we consummate in the parlor or the formal dining room?” asked Andrew, opening the paper bag and allowing the aroma of slow-smoked beef ribs to fill the space between them.
“I’m not dressed for a formal dinner. Let’s do it in the parlor.”
Placing the bag on the coffee table that fronted a large, comfortable couch, Andrew pattered off to retrieve plates and silverware while Celia began unloading the food. As proper newlyweds should, they set the table together. Andrew plopped down on the couch next to Celia and poured the wine. They kissed. They toasted their new life under one roof.
“Enough foreplay,” Andrew growled, grabbing a hunk of ribs from the butcher paper laid out in front of him.
“Ain’t it just like a man. Forget the appetizer and go right to the main course,” Celia countered, loading her plate with half-again as much food as Andrew’s.
“I like a woman with healthy appetites,” Andrew marveled, lifting the ribs to his mouth. Glancing across the room, he stopped in mid-bite.
“You moved mother’s chair,” he mumbled, swallowing hard in surprise.
“What chair?” Celia asked.
“That chair,” Andrew replied, pointing his handful of ribs at an antique Windsor chair nestled against the opposite wall.
“That chair, Mr. Dias, arrived with me on the train this morning, borne lovingly – and at some expense I might add – all the way from Oregon by the RG&P railroad.”
With three quick strides, Andrew was across the room.
“Wipe your hands before you touch that heirloom, buster.”
She tossed him a tea towel. He hurriedly wiped the sticky-sweet bar-b-que sauce from his hands and examined the antique.
The chair’s lines were elegant – unpretentious and pleasing to the eye. A hoop of ash wood held a row of delicately turned slats, fitted perfectly into the hoop at one end and the thick, plank seat at the other. Straight, spindled legs rested squarely on the floor. This was a working chair, a migrant traveler through time and history. Its faded blue patina whispered of lifetimes come and gone.
Andrew turned the chair over and squinted at the underside of the seat.
“Incredible,” he muttered, climbing the bannistered, wooden staircase two steps at a time, taking the chair along. “Come on.”
Celia’s mood changed with the tone of his voice. She followed in silence.
Three flights up, Andrew paused at a closed door, with Celia at his hip.
“My mother’s room,” he said.
Andrew turned the cut-glass knob and with a slight push, the door opened. Golden bars of dust-speckled sunset held captive an elegant room resting comfortably in time. The 19th century dripped from its papered walls of garden scenes, peacocks, and bright, happy people laughing beneath trellised gazebos. A museum of handcrafted end tables, florid lamps, elaborate clocks, and delicate, porcelain knickknacks crowded the room. Celia caught her reflection in the oval mirror atop a heavyweight mahogany dresser, then glanced – smiling – at the outsized Victorian four-post bed. An overstuffed settee, swathed in a brocade of red and green stripes, bespoke a faded, gentle opulence.
“Is that mother?” Celia asked, pointing to a large autochrome portrait photograph that dominated the wall above the bed.
“In the flesh,” Andrew responded.
“I hope not,” Celia replied, her eyes fixed on the photo of a woman, sixtyish, stylish in a pink dress and pleasant smile, sitting in three-quarter pose. Recognition suddenly clicked in Celia’s mind like the final piece of a complex puzzle.
“The chair,” Celia blurted in surprise. “Your mother is sitting in my chair!”
“No, just its twin,” Andrew said.
Celia turned to see the two identical chairs, side-by-side, framed in the backlight of a large bay window overlooking the bayou.
Intrigued, Celia drew close to Andrew.
“There’s more,” he continued, “look on the underside of the seat.”
Andrew grabbed one of the chairs and turned it upside down; Celia followed suit. Affixed to the bottom of each chair was a small, brass plate aged with patina, the inscriptions barely visible.
“From His Majesty’s Britannic Government – 1755,” Celia mumbled softly. “And yours says the same?”
Andrew nodded. “You didn’t know about the inscription?”
“No. No one ever said anything and I never bothered to look.”
“I think they’re a matched pair.”
Celia’s faced wrinkled in surprise. “Meaning they belong together.”
“Well, at least that they started out together.”
Husband and wife stared quietly at the chairs, suddenly conscious of their own breathing.
“I need a drink,” Celia announced. “Where’s the gin?”
“In the tub,” Andrew answered, pointing to a door that led into the master bath.
Celia frowned. “The tub?”
Andrew shrugged and Celia disappeared into the bathroom. She emerged seconds later carrying a bottle. “I thought I was going to have to dip it out with a ladle. You make this stuff yourself?”
“Of course not,” Andrew replied, “an old janitor down at the store manufactures the stuff in his tub. I just store it in mine.”
Andrew sat down in one of the chairs. Celia sat next to him, uncorked the bottle and swigged. Andrew watched.
“I don’t know that I like having a wife who can drink homemade gin right from the bottle without flinching.”
“Men are so easily intimidated,” Celia thought to herself. “So, did your mother buy her chair at an antique store, estate auction, something like that?”
“No. No, it’s a family heirloom. . . .”
“ . . . handed down through the generations,” Celia finished Andrew’s thought.
“Yeah. And yours?” Andrew asked.
“The same.” Celia took another pull on the bottle.
They fell silent, contemplating the ancestral possibilities.
“I’ll have that drink of gin now,” Andrew said.
She passed the bottle and Andrew took a long draw. He shivered and winced. Celia smiled.
“This was mother’s favorite spot, “ he croaked. “She would sit for hours in this chair staring out at the water.”
“Great place to get drunk,” Celia observed.
“The best,” said Andrew.
Her hand slipped gently over his and they sat bathed in bayou twilight. Each wanted to speak but neither knew what to say.
Like the last rueful crescent of the blood-orange sun, the conversation between them slipped gently into the indigo sea.
Mr. Davis’ short prose and poetry has been published or accepted for publication in Boston Literary Magazine, Eclectic Flash, Journal of Microliterature, Pot Luck Magazine, and The Good Men Project Magazine.
Dave Davis’ short prose and poetry has been published or accepted for publication in Boston Literary Magazine, Eclectic Flash, Journal of Microliterature, Pot Luck Magazine, and The Good Men Project Magazine.
