by Carolyn Bond
“Bettie, this is a lass I found lying out on the creek bank. She seems to be lacking her gown. I thought you’d be able to tend to her.”
Bettie looked Lily up and down as she circled around her, “Well, now. What have we here? Were you assaulted, girl?”
“Uh,” she stammered, “no. I nearly drowned when my car crashed into the creek.”
“Hm! Your kargh, you say?” Bettie had a puzzled look on her face. “Perhaps your gown got pulled off in the water, then. Well get inside before you catch your death of cold fanning around like that. Evan, there’s some ham biscuits on the table. Get yourself something to eat while I tend to our guest.”
Bettie took her by the hand and led her into the house. Despite the fact that she looked much younger, Bettie acted at least ten years more mature than Lily felt. They didn’t say a word until they got all the way upstairs and Bettie closed her bedroom door.
“Chil’, what are you doing out and about like that? Are you ill?” Bettie turned around to face her and then scanned her clothes.
“I, I don’t know, exactly. What’s wrong with my dress?”
“What’s wrong? What’s wrong?” Bettie stammered like she didn’t understand the question.
“Yes. And why are you in that get-up? Is this a historic home where you give tours?”
Bettie’s eyes went wide, “Historic home? Tours? No, child. This is my home. My husband’s and my home, and our son’s. Get-up? I am up.”
“This makes no sense.” Lily rubbed her eyes and the coolness of her finger tips felt wonderful seeping through her eyelids. With her eyes closed and no sound, she could imagine none of this was happening.
“Darlin’, I am going to let you borrow one of my gowns until we can figure out what happened to you. I suspect you fell and hit your head on a rock. Do you have any sore spots on your head? I would say you have been the victim of an attempted bamboozle. At least, I hope it’s just ‘attempted’. Whatever the case, we will find your people. Surely they are desperate to find you right now. You’re too pretty to be a heathen. Someone must be looking for you.”
“A heathen?” she thought to herself. There was a word she had not heard since she was a little girl. She tried to remember just what it meant. Was it someone who was not a Christian or just someone who was trashy, she couldn’t remember the context in which her mother had used it.
Bettie opened a door to a very shallow closet. Two dresses hung on a nail facing outward. Lily pushed back the thought that these were all the clothes this woman had: the dress on her back and two in a closet. Surely there had to be more somewhere. She scanned the room. There was another closet like this one, but she was certain it was of the same dimensions. A man’s antique shaving set with a cup and water pitcher was on the bureau. The other closet had to be for his clothes. Her mind darted to her own deep walk-in closet full of hundreds of shirts, skirts, pants and dresses.
The realization that somehow she must be in the past was settling on her. There was no explanation for it, but there was no other way to explain Bettie and Evan’s reactions, clothes, or world. The metal bridge was gone. This house looked like a working museum. None of them seemed to be actors. And what was the deal about her body? She never looked like this. She seemed much younger and smaller. Maybe she was dreaming and would wake up soon. Whatever the case, she tried to just go with the flow.
Bettie handed her a long black dress. Lily noticed the delicate poofs at the shoulder seam and the flair of the fabric that tapered down to the wrist. Layers of lace and ruffles were hand sewn on the bodice and back of the skirt. Bettie patted Lily’s waist and gasped.
“Were you pulled right from your bed? You don’t even have on a corset!”
“A corset? Why would I have on a corset?”
Bettie threw up her hands and chuckled. “I agree, darling. Why do we wear those things?”
She pulled open a drawer of a high boy chest of drawers and produced a strappy, boney piece of lingerie. She told Lily to raise her arms and she pulled it over her head and down below Lily’s bust right over her white dress which was dry now, but still had mud in places. Despite being unlaced, it already pinched her hips and cut into the soft skin of her sides.
Bettie turned her around and started pulling on the laces from the bottom, tightening as she went up. “Suck in your breath, for heaven’s sake. And, I don’t believe I have ever seen shoes quite like that.”
Lily looked down at her sneakers and didn’t know what to say. She took a breath and let it out, allowing her diaphragm to pull in her belly as Bettie tugged the laces tighter and tighter. Holding her breath for so long caused blackness to cloud the edges of her vision. Tiny stars of light pricked her eyesight.
With puffs of exhaled air being the only sounds of life she could make, Bettie tied the strings off. Lily inhaled in short, chest-raising breaths. Her hand reflexively went to her waist and she furrowed her brow. She tried to look but her bosom was now pushed upward to such an extreme it was like the top of a loaf of bread. This gave muffin-top a whole new meaning that no one in the 21st century would have thought of. She stifled a giggle as she thought of what Bettie would think of the 2018 image of a muffin top.
Holding up a strange looking belt with a giant egg-shaped pillow sewn on, Bettie said, “I’m sorry this is all I have. It’s a little out of date now but, well, a natural form bustle is the best I can afford.”
The block of sculpted padding rested on her back side. Next, she threw the black dress over her head and smoothed it down around her waist. Lily reached into the sleeves until her hands popped out the other end. The cuff around the wrist was quite constricting. She had to fight the urge to rip the dress off her. Bettie started buttoning the line of tiny buttons up the back and the dress molded to her now exceedingly feminine shape.
Bettie turned her around and looked her up and down, “It’s a tad bit small on you, but not by much. At least the skirt is long enough to cover your shoes. Can you put your hair up or do you need help?”
“Put my hair up?”
“Well yes, unless you want people to think you’re a saloon girl!” she laughed out loud.
At this point, Lily resigned to do whatever she was told. “Sure. Do you have some pins?”
“Of course, darlin’. Have a seat at the vanity and you’ll find anything you need. If you don’t mind, just come downstairs when you’re finished. I need to tend to the rest of dinner.”
“Bettie, thank you. Thank you for helping me.”
Bettie’s face lit up with a huge smile, “Of course, honey. What else would I do?”
She turned and left, clicking the door closed as she passed through. Lily turned to the vanity. She sat on the small stool and slowly took in the reflection. A stranger looked back. Lily saw beautiful young woman with delicate bones and messy long blond hair dressed in a plain but very feminine gown. The stranger eyed her fearfully, like she was going to run away at any moment. How could this reflection be her? She raised her arm to run her fingers through the damp mop of long hair. Even with dirt from the river, the waving rivulets glowed like threads of gold. A small widow’s peak hair line gave her face a heart-shaped form.
“Who was this person? How did I end up in this body?” she wondered. She touched the unfamiliar face with her fingertips. “Where did the occupant of this body go and where is my body?” Did she drown in the creek in the future, she wondered?
A horse hair brush with a silver handle lay in front of her. The initials SEA were engraved in the smooth dome encircled by scrolls of acanthus leaves. It seemed like an awfully nice hairbrush for a lady who can’t seem to afford the latest fashions.
The initials SEA circled her mind. How pretty, like the ocean. Then it hit her: Sarah Elizabeth Avitt! This was her great, great grandmother! She jumped to her feet and dizziness washed from her head to her legs. Darkness threatened to close in as her mind reeled. She stumbled backwards and tripped, landing on the bed. The lump of padded block pressed against the sm
all of her back. She held up the brush again and examined it.
Light from the window gleamed along the edge of the back of the brush. In large etched scrolling letters, the initials were as clear as day. The brush was in perfect condition, as though it were lovingly polished every day. The large A in the middle stood majestically proclaiming a family whom Sarah was now tenuously connected to. She remembered the story. Her mother had told her many times. Sarah Elizabeth married for love. She went against her father’s wishes. He turned his back on her and told her if she married the poor farmer, she would live a farmer’s life.
This brush was what she’d brought from her father’s house when she got married. How long ago was that, she wondered? The man said Carlton was a boy. It must have been eight or ten years before. That’s why she had the older fashioned bustle. It was probably the height of fashion when she married.
“Never you mind, sweet Sarah Elizabeth, bustles are about to go out of fashion altogether,” Lily thought.
She gazed absent mindedly toward the door where Bettie had gone out. Without realizing she had been holding her breath, she felt light headed again. Prickles of light pierced her vision. She pulled open the drawer of the vanity looking for anything to give her a clue. A small sheet of paper with a curled corner ruffled in the air of the quick action. She pulled it out to read it and gasped as panic seized her. It was a handwritten receipt for fabric complete with the store name and the date.
“Oh, Lord, help me. This is 1889.”
Truth hit her with paralyzing force. It was all true. The strange man with his comments about her clothes. Bettie’s comments about her hair being down and questions of being assaulted. This ‘historical’ home. The dress with the corset she was wearing.
This was her ancestor, just a few generations down from Captain Thomas Helm, her Revolutionary War ancestor that she and her mother had declared on their application to the Daughters of the American Revolution. She thought about the ladies at the Susannah Hart Shelby chapter in Frankfort. What would they think of this? When she got back to her own time, she could do quite a thorough historical presentation at the next meeting. She wondered if Bettie was in the DAR. How great would it be to attend a meeting here in this time?
This time?
“But how am I here? Who am I here?” the words escaped out loud. “And how can I get back? I can’t stay here.”
At least it was winter break and she was off work. The day before she had never been so pleased to wish her students a merry Christmas and pack them into cars and school buses with candy canes and baggies of candy from their gift exchange.
Those children, they haven’t been born yet. And with more horror she realized, I have not been born yet.
She sucked in a breath and clutched her stomach to hold back a wave of nausea. Reality was not setting well in her head. She could feel the stiff fabric and bones of the corset holding her abdomen hostage. She stood up and waited a moment for her head to stop spinning, then tiptoed to the door. Grateful she still had her sneakers on underneath her dress.
She turned the cold metal door knob and peeked down the hall. The upstairs was quiet. She made her way to the steps and quietly stole down, watching for someone to jump in front of her. Maybe she could slip away, she thought. If she could get back somehow, she would feel so much better. She didn’t belong here and her stomach was letting her know that as it rolled in panic. She had no idea what she could tell them; certainly not the truth.
She stepped out the front door onto a wide porch. A long dirt road stretched before her before disappearing into a line of trees. She could hear the sounds of carriages and men shouting in the distance. She was close to town. It was so much louder than in 2018. Looking back into the parlor one last time, she regretted not having more time to speak with Bettie, but she had to get away. Closing the door with a quiet click, she dashed for the dirt road and made it to the tree line in seconds flat.
Chapter 3 – Stephensport of the Past
As she emerged from the trees on the other side, she stopped cold. This was not Stephensport. It was a different town. Logic made her mind reel as she tried to make sense of it. She had just driven down Main Street a few hours before. Granted, that was over a hundred years from now, but generally, in her experience, when you have been away from a town and come back in the future, there are new buildings and the roads are wider and more crowded. This made no sense.
In 2018, there was one two-lane road down the middle of Main Street with a small metal building for a post office and maybe a dozen houses. That might be exaggerating, she laughed to herself. The scene in front of her was sobering, yet made her feel slap-happy as well. It was the same length as Main Street 2018: maybe 200 yards. However, two-story buildings lined both sides of the road. The road itself was a patchwork of flat limestone rocks nestled together perfectly. The hooves of horses clopped along on the stones pulling carriages and wagons.
A wide sidewalk of the same stone was sectioned off the main road by a border of raised rounded rock.
The glass shop windows displayed ladies ruffled gowns made of silk and men’s dress wear that made any tuxedo she had ever seen look dull. Other windows displayed furniture and dishes. A silversmith had a display of tea services and buffet dishes.
With her eyes about to pop out of her head, she jumped and nearly fell when the crack of a steam-wheeler’s horn on the river let loose. The blaring dirge announced its presence. Immediately, a dozen or so men in dusty work clothes exited a saloon door with loud cackles and laughter. One looked her way and immediately whistled.
“I’ll be back soon. Wait for me, angel!” He motioned with a tilt of his head back toward the saloon.
Her jaw dropped, appalled at his cat call, and her eyes traveled over the front of the saloon. The upstairs windows had velvet curtains with ball fringe. A sign on the front brazenly invited anyone to “Wet your whistle and have some company.” There was an image of man in a formal black suit with a woman leaning on his shoulders. She was wearing a short dress and was kicking her leg out. With one hand she was flipping her loose hair while she laughed garishly.
Lily instinctively reached up to touch her loose hair. She’d darted from the house before putting her hair up as Bettie suggested. Horrified, she twisted it and held it up against the back of her head. She needed a bobby pin. Surely someone had lost one, she thought, as she looked around the ground in front of her. She darted to the boardwalk and discreetly started looking for anything that would hold her hair up. She didn’t find anything remotely like a bobby pin, but she did find what she recognized as a hat pin. It was about an eight-inch long straight pin with an ornate metal medallion encircling a pearl on the end. No doubt, it was dislodged from a hat in a gust of wind.
She looked the long needle wondering if she could wrap her hair around it and tuck it under like she used to make a pencil bun on hot days in the classroom. It had been years since she had long hair, but she thought she could make this work. Careful to not poke herself, she twisted her hair around the shaft working it down to the point. She then twisted the pin behind and out to secure it next to her scalp. It certainly wasn’t as fancy as the women walking around town had their hair but at least it was up.
She looked into each of the windows mesmerized by the luxuriously formal wares. Everything looked like the town was expecting the queen of England to come shopping. She wondered who bought this stuff. The townspeople, she noticed, were dressed like the mannequins in silk and wool with perfectly styled hair. Their overcoats had grosgrain and silk ribbon trim. Men wore top hats. Horse-drawn carriages clopped by with silk curtains framing faces that looked like royalty. The girls had ringlet curls and furs trimming their cloaks.
The winter air wasn’t terribly cold but it seemed they wore them more to show off than to keep warm. She thought perhaps people had come to town to shop. Oddly, though, she didn’t feel the shopping vibe from these people. It felt more like they were conducting their own private parades.
Like a person feeling the gaze of another, his gray-blue eyes shifted to her as the couple passed in front of him. He gave her a head-to-toe assessment and she could detect a hungry look of desire as his eyes opened wider, but then he just smiled politely before ducking in behind the couple. She felt slighted in a way. It was as though she didn’t pass the muster. She looked down at her gown and realized that was it, of course. This gown was Bettie’s out-of-date fashion. She knew she had looks that could get attention if she wanted it. This body was her dream come true, better than any diet she had ever been on. With renewed confidence, she straightened and started walking away from him along the stone sidewalk. She stole a peak back at him under her dark lashes curious if he looked back.
