Neither Present Time

by Caren J. Werlinger

  Clenching his jaw, Edward sat on the edge of Beryl’s chair while Aggie took the other wing chair.

  “First of all, Eddie –”

  “Don’t call me Eddie!” he exploded, getting very red in the face.

  “First of all, Eddie,” Cory repeated – Aggie smiled at her continued use of the diminutive, putting her father, Cory’s nephew, in his place – “I don’t need Agatha’s permission or help to consult my attorney. James Hoffman’s father drew up that trust. I’ve known him his entire life. He was more than happy to come to me.”

  Edward was finally listening, warily now, his nostrils distended as he continued huffing like an angry bull.

  “One of –”

  But Cory’s explanation was interrupted by Beryl’s sudden entrance.

  “Sorry,” she said uncertainly. “Am I interrupting something?”

  “Who the hell are you?” Edward exploded again, jumping to his feet.

  Rolling her eyes, Aggie got to her feet and went to Beryl. “Dad, this is Dr. Beryl Gray. Beryl, my father, Edward Bishop.”

  Recovering sufficiently to remember some manners, Edward reached out to shake Beryl’s hand.

  “Beryl lives here with us,” Cory volunteered. “She’s Aggie’s partner,” she added blithely. Beryl could hear a small groan escape from Aggie’s throat.

  Edward stared at each of them in turn, as the seconds stretched on. “Her…”

  “Her partner,” Cory repeated – “I seem to be doing a lot of that in this conversation,” she could have said, “and we’re not getting very far.” – “They’re not married yet, but I expect they’ll be taking care of that detail soon.”

  “That bit was certainly helpful in easing the tension,” Beryl would recall later with wry humor.

  “Anyhow,” Cory continued, “your arrival is most opportune, Beryl, as what I have to say concerns you also.”

  She stood, gesturing to the chairs. “I really would like all three of you to sit, please.” She waited until they did as they were bidden, and then she continued. “As I was starting to say, one of the contingencies that we built into the original trust was a provision for me to pass the house on. Up until now, the assumption has been, since I have no children of my own, that upon my death or incapacitation, the house would be sold. But I have decided to name the next trustee.”

  “The next –” Edward said hollowly.

  “Yes,” Cory smiled. “The protections of the trust do not have to end with me. I can pass them on. And I have.”

  She beamed at Aggie. “Agatha, I have named you as my successor – as both trustee and beneficiary.”

  “What?” Edward exploded yet again, jumping to his feet.

  “I don’t mean to burden you with this house,” Cory continued to Aggie as if Edward hadn’t interrupted. “If you don’t want to keep it, you may sell it when I am gone – and I assure you I will understand if you do. It’s a huge responsibility. But if you decide you want it, you will set up your own trust and we will transfer the deed of the house to that trust.”

  Her words were followed by a silence so thick Beryl felt she was drowning in it.

  At last, Edward recovered his voice enough to protest, “This is preposterous! You can’t do this.”

  “I think you’ll find I can, Eddie,” Cory said sweetly. At his mutinous expression, her features sharpened. “And don’t think I don’t remember that you are the reason the house’s possessions and furnishings had to be sold in the first place. If you hadn’t mismanaged our investments –”

  There was a vein throbbing alarmingly in Edward’s forehead as he snarled, “I… you… that wasn’t my fault!”

  But Aggie was staring at her father as if she had never seen him clearly before. “You? You were in charge of the invested money?” she asked, and Beryl’s heart broke at the disappointment and anguish she heard.

  “No!” he protested furiously. “It wasn’t like that –”

  “Don’t forget that I ran that bank for over thirty years,” Cory was saying with a sympathetic glance toward Aggie. “I am not some dotty old imbecile. I understand the terms of that trust better than you do. I was there when my father had it drafted. You can’t break it, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  From the expression on his face, Beryl could tell that was exactly what he had been thinking. She looked at Cory with admiration for the way she was standing up to her bullying nephew and fought the urge to cheer out loud, quickly deciding that was not the best way to endear herself to Aggie’s father – “my father-in-law,” she realized with a nasty shock – another issue he had yet to come to terms with, she was sure.

  “We’ll see about that,” Edward said mulishly as he got to his feet. Without another word, he stormed from the house.

  Aggie sat, staring at the floor. “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked quietly.

  Cory sat on the ottoman, resting a gnarled hand on Aggie’s knee. “It was years ago,” she said. “He begged me for the chance to manage the trust’s assets. It was his biggest account up to that point.” She paused for several seconds. “I have never known whether it was simply bad management on his part, or… if there was any malfeasance. It was partially my fault – I, of all people, should have kept better track of where the money was, what he was doing with it. By the time I realized…” She shrugged.

  “I just feel horrible,” Aggie muttered. “All your things…”

  “Were just things,” Cory said bracingly. “The auction brought enough to take care of me and the house. And it’s all properly invested now.”

  She stood and went to the Christmas tree – “the first tree I’ve had in years!” she’d said in delight when Beryl and Aggie surprised her – and turned on the lights as the room was already darkening in the early dusk. “Anyway,” she said philosophically, “there goes another surprise. Merry Christmas.”

  * * *

  A couple of hours later, Aggie and Beryl sat snuggled together in the over-sized club chair, the room lit romantically by only the Christmas tree lights. Percival was snoring in his dog bed, having found a way of propping himself on his back with his short legs sticking up in the air while Winston was curled up in one of the wing chairs.

  “What do you think?” Aggie asked worriedly.

  Beryl didn’t answer immediately. She knew the house meant a great deal to both Cory and Aggie, but….

  “Buy a house together?” Claire had asked incredulously when Beryl suggested it. They had been together for about a year at that time, and were living together in their rowhouse by then. “Why would we do that?”

  Beryl had bowed her head, allowing her hair to swing forward, shielding her hurt expression from Claire’s probing eyes. “Don’t you think it’s part of making a commitment to each other?” she asked hesitantly.

  “No,” Claire scoffed. “I see my married friends go through this all the time – they divorce and suddenly have to deal with the legal hassles of deciding who’s going to buy the house, or having a court order it to be sold. No way am I going through that.”

  In the immediate aftermath of her breakup with Claire, Beryl had recalled that conversation several times, feeling nothing but an immense sense of relief that there had been no legal ties to Claire – for she had a strong suspicion that Claire would not have capitulated or compromised on anything.

  Now, the thought of Aggie owning not just a house, but this… this “dinosaur,” she could hear Cory cackle sympathetically… it was a lot to grasp. Aggie seemed to sense the struggle taking place in Beryl’s head.

  “I know this is huge,” Aggie said. “I mean, we’re still so new –”

  “No,” Beryl cut in, turning to face her. “That’s the one thing I’m not worried about.” She took Aggie’s hand. “I have no hesitation about us making such a big financial commitment together. It’s more…” she looked around, “Can we afford the upkeep on this house and the grounds on our salaries? Will we ever be able to afford to go anywhere? Or will all our
money be tied up here? Those are the things I’m thinking of.” They sat silently for a few seconds. “What about you? Does this feel like a burden or a blessing to you?”

  Aggie sighed. “I can’t decide. Both, I guess. On the one hand, I love the history of this house, but, you’re right. I’ve already got a taste of what the upkeep on this place is going to involve. I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to furnish it again – certainly not the way it was. Oh, I wish you could have seen it then,” she said wistfully.

  Beryl looked around the still mostly-empty study – the most furnished room on this level. “I’m kind of glad I didn’t. It must make it harder to see it like it is now.”

  “Do we want to wander around a mostly empty house for the rest of our lives?” Aggie asked.

  Beryl shrugged. “Maybe the only way to know is to go ahead with Cory’s plan and see what happens. You can always sell later if you decide that’s best.”

  Aggie raised Beryl’s hand to her lips, kissing it tenderly. “If we decide, you mean.”

  Chapter 39

  “You sure you’ll be all right without me for a week?” Veronica asked anxiously.

  “I’m sure,” Cory laughed. “Agatha is off until after the New Year, and Beryl is taking the week off as well.”

  As if in response to their names, the two younger women entered the kitchen at that moment.

  “Oh, Veronica, it smells wonderful!” Aggie exclaimed.

  “My grandmother’s pecan rolls,” Veronica said proudly, checking on the tray baking in the oven. “My Christmas present to all of you.”

  After the rolls were done baking, she left, laden with wrapped Christmas presents from Cory and the girls.

  Beryl’s phone beeped. She looked and saw a text message from Ridley. “He and George just drove through Wheeling,” she announced excitedly.

  Edith Gray had not been happy that her younger daughter would not be home for Christmas.

  “Mom, I was there for Thanksgiving, and then two weeks later I was back when Dad was in the hospital,” Beryl reminded her mother. “I’m staying here for Christmas,” she said firmly.

  There was still a light dusting of snow on the ground, “just enough to make it white,” Cory said happily. Beryl went out back and swept off the flagstones so they wouldn’t be slippery for Ridley’s crutches.

  She and Aggie had already made up her bed with fresh sheets and laid out clean towels in the closest bathroom. She and Aggie and the animals would stay in Aggie’s room while the guys were visiting.

  The house, despite its continued emptiness, looked festive. Evergreen garlands wrapped the pillars on the front porch and adorned the fireplace mantels. In the kitchen, Cory and Veronica had made a project of stringing together an old-fashioned garland of apples and oranges studded with whole cloves and bits of cinnamon stick – “just like we used to do when I was a girl,” Cory reminisced – and the kitchen smelled “like Christmas,” Aggie declared as she and Beryl hung the garland around the island. The study, in addition to the tree, was now filled with wrapped packages and boxes.

  Cory, rising before the sun was up to sit in her chair in the early mornings as was her habit, felt happier than she had in a very long time. And the house, the house feels happy, too, she thought contentedly, glancing at the mantel where the old photo of her and Helen stood in pride of place, next to a new photo of her sandwiched between Aggie and Beryl, taken that summer in D.C.

  * * *

  Corinne drives home from the bank. Parking in the carriage house, she sits for a long time in the car, tarrying as long as she can before going inside. It is spring, and it seems everything has popped into bloom at once. Helen is not home yet. At last, with a deep sigh, she gets out of the auto and enters the kitchen where Cook is busy preparing the evening’s supper.

  “Hello, Miss Corinne,” says Frances, rushing over to take her coat for her. “I’ll bring the tea to the study directly.”

  “Thank you,” Corinne says wearily.

  Going to her father’s den, she hesitates, her hand on the knob, delaying the moment she must go in. Without warning, the door is opened from within and Corinne finds herself looking into her mother’s worn face. Behind her, Candace lies in a bed placed where the desk used to be. A bathroom had been added – an expense that had been difficult to swallow – “but it will make taking care of Candace so much easier,” Mary had reasoned.

  “Oh, Corinne, dear,” says Mary. “You’re home.” And Corinne can hear the relief in her mother’s tired voice. “She’s not having a good day,” she whispers.

  “Go rest,” Corinne says. “Frances is bringing the tray to the study. I’ll be in in a moment.”

  Adjusting the expression on her face, Corinne steps up to the bed. “Hello, Candace,” she says cheerfully. “How has your day been?”

  Only able to move one half of her face, Candace’s right eye scrunches in a baleful scowl which Corinne ignores.

  “Are you ready to exercise?” Corinne asks as a matter of habit, though she knows she is in for a fight. The physiotherapist at the hospital had shown them what exercises to do to move Candace’s arms and legs and hands to prevent them from contorting into positions that would make it impossible to position her in bed or a wheelchair, and Corinne and Mary do them faithfully twice a day.

  Leaning over the bed, Corinne goes through their routine of bending and straightening Candace’s atrophied legs, a process Candace fights as much as she can. “Well, even that is exercise,” Mary points out breathlessly on the days when Candace is particularly obstinate.

  Moving to Candace’s arms, Corinne looks into her sister’s eyes. Despite Candace’s lack of speech and facial expression, Corinne reads volumes in those eyes – the anger and the resentment there are unmistakable. “Hate me!” they say. “Curse at me, berate me for what I’ve done to you, to your life,” Candace taunts daily.

  But Corinne smiles, working as gently but as insistently as she can, talking to her sister about what is happening in the house and out in the garden, and when she is done, she rolls her to the side, propping her with pillows to give her backside some pressure relief. Smoothing Candace’s hair, Corinne says, “We’ll be in shortly with supper.”

  As she leaves, Candace’s eyes fill with tears, hating her sister even more for refusing to be goaded.

  By the time Corinne gets to the study, Helen is there. She has taken a position teaching French and German at Otterbein College in Westerville.

  “Are you sure you want to do that?” Corinne had asked when Helen first came home and surprised her with the proposal.

  Helen had grinned and said, “It’s about time I grow up, don’t you think?” At Corinne’s somber expression, she had become more serious and said, “I know you worry that I’ll feel trapped here, but the truth is that travelling without you is empty. I’m thinking we can settle into a life that will allow us both to have jobs to cover the expenses here, and maybe we can travel a bit each summer?”

  Corinne’s eyes had filled with tears as she wrapped her arms around Helen’s neck and whispered, “I love you so much.”

  “How was your day?” Corinne asks now as Helen hands her a cup of tea.

  “Très bien,” Helen responds. “How about yours?”

  “Oh, fine,” Corinne sighs. “No bankruptcies or foreclosures or disasters of any kind.”

  “How boring,” Helen grins. She shakes open the afternoon paper. “Oh, dear.”

  “What?” Mary and Corinne ask together as Terrence sidles into the room. Mary gestures him over for a cup of tea, but he shakes his head and takes a seat against the wall.

  “Korea,” says Helen, frowning. “The Soviets are getting more involved with the North. If we don’t stop this, it will mean war,” she predicts.

  “Oh, not another war,” Mary moans. “We’re just getting over the last one.”

  Terrence leaves the room abruptly.

  “I’ll go to him,” Helen says quietly, folding the paper and laying a restrai
ning hand on Corinne’s shoulder.

  Mary watches her go. “I’m so glad you have Helen,” she says, and Corinne, startled, looks at her mother, wondering how much she has guessed of their relationship.

  “I worry about what will become of all of you when I am gone,” Mary confesses.

  “You’re all right?” Corinne asks anxiously.

  “Yes,” Mary smiles. “But someday you’ll be left to take care of everyone. I would like to think Helen will be there to take care of you.”

  * * *

  Christmas Eve was a joyous affair at the Bishop home. Ridley and George had brought a case of wine, several bottles of which the five of them had consumed during and after dinner. Following supper, they retired to the study where a fire burned in the fireplace, highlighting the new sofa delivered that afternoon – a surprise from Beryl.

  “Well,” she had shrugged, “the house is filling up. We needed more seating anyway.”

  “It’s lovely,” Cory had exclaimed, her hands clasped over her heart.

  She took a deep breath now as she looked at the room, filled with young people laughing and talking, the fire lending a cheerful glow to everything.

  Late that night, Aggie had gone upstairs help George get settled as Cory also said goodnight, leaving Beryl and Ridley alone to talk for a bit as the fire burned itself out.

  “Happy?” he asked, wrapping an affectionate arm around her shoulders as they sat side by side on the new couch.

  “Yes,” she smiled, settling against his shoulder. “You?”

  “Mmm hmmm,” he replied.

  They watched the remains of the fire for long minutes, neither feeling the need to break the silence.

  “It’s hard to believe,” Beryl mused.

  “What?”

  “How much has changed in six months.”

  “Wow,” he said as he realized. “It has only been about six months, hasn’t it?”

  “When I think back, it all started with that book,” Beryl said in wonder.

  Ridley smiled and pressed his lips to her head. She could feel his struggle as he tried to choose his words. “I’ve been… not exactly bitter, but… angry – about what happened to me and my unit, the poor decisions that led to –” He paused and she waited as he swallowed the lump in his throat. “There didn’t seem to be any kind of ‘it all works out for the best’ with this,” he said, gesturing toward his legs with his free hand. “But… without this, I never would have gone into library work. I never would have met you. I never would have thought about a relationship with someone like George.”