R. Lafferty - The 7th Ghost Story Megapack

When she awakened in the morning of those days, the liturgy was invariably completed: Today I am going to see Cousin Kelly .

This particular day to which she wakened was Saturday, and between it and the preceding Sunday there had been six long days of broken promises, of hope and expectations unfulfilled. After repeating the liturgy, which was like an incantation to the shining sun that spilled its golden light through her window and across her bed, she lay quietly for a while in the warm and secure assurance of what the day surely held, and then she got up and began to dress.

Because it was the beginning of a bright and golden day, she put on a pale yellow jumper with a crisp white blouse. She would meet Cousin Kelly, she decided, in the park across the boulevard from the apartment building. Last Sunday had been a gray and sunless day, expiring interminably to the tearful sound of persistent rain, and Cousin Kelly had come to the apartment, right up to her room where she now was, and they had listened to some music on her phonograph and had talked about what had happened during the week and had played a long and delightful game of Monopoly, which she had won. It had been a good day, that part of it in the afternoon when Cousin Kelly was here, but it had not been as good by half as this one would be on the bright green grass of the park under the warm sun. They would sit on a bench and walk along the path under the trees and laugh with delight at their distorted reflections in the pool of clear water around the fountain. Cousin Kelly was actually old, over twenty, but he didn’t look or act old, and he was more fun to be with than anyone else in all the world.

It was odd that Mother didn’t like him. After all, he was really Mother’s cousin, the son of her father’s sister. Of course, lots of people didn’t necessarily like their cousins, because there was no law saying you had to or anything, but Teresa couldn’t understand why anyone wouldn’t like Cousin Kelly, cousin or not. But Mother didn’t. Neither did Father. Teresa could tell from the way their eyes went blank whenever she, Teresa, happened to mention seeing Cousin Kelly, and from the way, immediately after the mentioning, they deliberately tried to change the subject. Cousin Kelly knew, too. He knew, but he never talked about it. Maybe something had happened once in the family. Maybe something dreadful had happened to change everything from the way everything had been, and to make enemies of people who should have been friends.

Teresa didn’t care. At first she had, but not any longer. Whatever the trouble, she liked Cousin Kelly better than anyone else. She loved Cousin Kelly. She wished and wished that he could come to live with them in the apartment. She loved him far more, to tell the truth, than she loved Mother and Father. In fact, she didn’t love Mother and Father at all, although she didn’t, on the contrary, hate them, either. She was merely indifferent to them. In the beginning it had made her feel guilty and unhappy, the secret knowledge of her indifference, but now it was just something that she lived with every day and hardly ever thought about.

Dressed in her pale yellow jumper and white blouse, she went out of the room and onto a gallery that ran along the wall above the deep pit of the living room. She descended the stairs at one end of the gallery and turned back from there through a dining room to the kitchen, where Hannah was. Hannah came in every day from nine to six to cook and clean. Sometimes, when Mother and Father entertained, she stayed later. She was fat and jolly and ages old, and Teresa liked her.

“Good-morning, missy,” Hannah said. “You’re mighty prettied up this morning, I must say.”

“This afternoon,” said Teresa, “I’m going to the park to meet a friend.”

“That’s nice. Meanwhile, what would you like for breakfast?”

“A poached egg, please, with two strips of bacon. And one slice of toast.”

“Simple enough. You just sit down there and keep Hannah company while she’s fixing it.”

Teresa sat at the kitchen table and watched while Hannah broke the egg in the funny little poaching pan and put two strips of bacon on the grill. The bacon began to sizzle, and the water began to boil in the little pan under the cup the egg was in. Teresa liked to sit in the kitchen and watch Hannah cook her breakfast. Hannah always said it kept her company, and it was true, although they talked very little while Hannah worked, or not at all. That was one of the nice things about Hannah. You could sit with her and say nothing and still feel comfortably that you were keeping company. It was different with Mother. When you sat with Mother and said nothing for a long time, you always felt uneasily that something should be said, and after a while you tried to say it, and it always came out wrong and awkward, and then you wished you hadn’t tried.

Teresa ate her egg and bacon and toast at the kitchen table, and then, leaving Hannah to her work, went back into the living room and wondered how she could spend the time, which was almost forever, until it was afternoon. She thought about going down in the elevator and outside to talk to the doorman and stroll up and down the sidewalk, but she didn’t want to do that because there was the day out there, warm and golden and waiting, and she wanted to enter it for the first time, fresh and exciting with nothing worn off, when she went out to meet Cousin Kelly. So, saving the day for a special hour, she looked at magazines in the living room until it was after eleven and she could go up to see Mother, who was now probably awake.

Sure enough, she was. Mother was sitting up in bed, braced against the headboard, and in one hand was a saucer, and in the other, momentarily stopped halfway between the saucer and her mouth, was a cup of coffee, which had been served by Hannah and from which Mother had just taken a sip. A second bed near Mother’s was rumpled and empty. This bed was Father’s, of course, and it was apparent that Father had risen early and gone away somewhere, probably downtown to his office. Father did not usually go to his office on Saturdays, but once in a while he went when he had an appointment that promised to be profitable, and you could always tell by Father’s humor when he got home if things had gone well or not. If things had gone well, he was expansive and tolerant. If things had gone ill, he was cross and critical and could hardly wait for five o’clock, when he allowed himself his first cocktail of the day.

Mother’s cup rattled in her saucer, and she spoke to Teresa with a cheerfulness that was forced and bright and artificial. Mother, in fact, looked as if she needed a cocktail already, although it was not yet noon; or perhaps she only needed a little longer to recover from those she had had the night before. The flesh was smudged beneath her eyes, and her face, cleaned of makeup, looked drawn and tired and older than it was.

“Good morning, darling.” Mother said. “Have you been up long?

“Oh, yes,” Teresa said. “It’s almost noon.”

“That late? Did Hannah give you your breakfast?”

“Yes. I had an egg and two strips of bacon.”

Mother reacted as if the words were painful to her. Her mouth turned down, becoming for a moment really ugly, and she set her cup and saucer carefully aside on the table between her bed and Father’s.

“What have you been doing?”

“Nothing much. I looked at some magazines.” Teresa hesitated, feeling within her the sudden singing exhilaration of her anticipation. “This afternoon I would like to go across to the park. May I, please?”

“I think it would be all right if you are careful crossing the boulevard. Why do you want to go to the park?”

“I’m going to meet Cousin Kelly there.”