Winter Season

Over did it

Esther thought she was dreaming. In her dream, there was total darkness and from somewhere in the far reaches of the darkness she heard moaning; soft frequent moaning. With each moan. a typewriter formed out of the darkness and chased her. When the moan stopped, the typewriter disappeared. It took, what seemed like forever for the moaning to become clear. It wasn’t a dream. It was Oscar moaning in her ear. The typewriter was a part of some dream. Somewhere.

She rolled over to face him. As she caressed his face, she could tell he wasn’t running a fever. So it must have been the discomfort from his injury. His moan turned into a whimper while she was tracing the outline of his face. Then stopped.

He had asked her a while back if he couldn’t fill her life? Why he wasn’t enough? Women all over the world were house wives. But she had been working since she was ten and didn’t think it was in her to be a housewife. Maybe it was the new role God wanted her to play. It was painfully obvious that she wasn’t getting a job anytime soon. And it wasn’t from lack of trying. Unless she wanted to drive an hour one way, she wasn’t getting a job in this little town. With the price of gas the way it was, a commute that long was out of the question. It would cost her more to have a job than the job would provide. The writing idea was intriguing.

She did love him. That was for sure. Getting married in less than a year of knowing the man was a leap of faith on her part. Some folks might even call her stupid. Her Gram always told her that God worked in mysterious ways. Boy howdy did he ever. One year ago, her life was a mess. Now, she was living in a painfully small town and married. Who would’ve thought?

It was her habit to get up before Oscar so that she could have breakfast ready. Even before they were married. He had never used an alarm clock that she had noticed, even though he had one on his night stand. At 5:00a.m., he always strolled into the kitchen, even if still in his p.j.’s. This morning, he didn’t. It was 5:30 a.m. and he still wasn’t in the kitchen.

She found him in the bedroom, standing up against the wall. “Why didn’t you call for me?” He just shook his head. “How can I help you?”

“I can’t do it.”

She kissed him on the cheek, “you don’t have to do anything. Where do you need to go?”

He rubbed his fingers through his hair, “bathroom.” He took one step on his right leg, crying out in pain as his leg buckled under him.

She caught him. He just knew any minute now that he was going to throw up.  She did the best she could to help him. With her assistance, he limped to the bathroom, then back to bed. Dr. Bob hadn’t given him any pain medication so Advil was the best it got. He was fast asleep in no time.

She had no idea if she should call the school and tell them that he wasn’t coming; or if she would be crossing some kind of invisible line.  So, she didn’t. It struck her as kinda odd that the school never did call him. If they did, she must have been out of ear shot because she never heard his phone.

Around 11 o’clock Chet came by. “Hi, come in.” Esther smiled as she opened the door.

“How’s our boy today?”

“I think he overdid it yesterday, he’s very sore.”

“Would you like something to drink?”

“No, I just stopped by to check on him.” Chet stopped in the door as he was leaving.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” She smiled.

Winter Season