The Recluse Storyteller

by Mark W. Sasse

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Reverend Davies said, purposely not looking directly at Margaret. “It slipped out of my hand.”

  Margaret had picked up the can and handed it back towards the reverend when she finally recognized who it was.

  “Thank you very much ... Oh, it’s you! Margaret. I’m sorry to hit you with the can of corn. Thanks again.”

  He turned his cart around and started walking away. Margaret kept her eyes on him until he finally turned back around and walked a couple of steps toward her.

  “You know what’s funny? This reminds me of the can that you dropped. And now I’ve dropped one, and you gave it back to me. I guess we are even. Have a nice night.”

  He smiled at her, turned around, and started pushing his cart in the opposite direction. As Margaret watched him walk around the corner of the aisle, she could think only of Reverend Taylor on the ridge looking at the dead bodies. As he went out of sight, Margaret backed right into a shelf full of cans and closed her eyes. She had wondered if the presence could be felt elsewhere, and now she realized that it could. Cans started falling in all directions, smacking the floor with a spattering of ‘clunks’. Smack. Smack. Smack. She felt each one as they loudly echoed off the floor, jolting her into her storytelling state.

  “Jackson had quickly slid down the ridge and attended to the little girl. He yelled for me to call for the medic, but I froze in fear and shock at the destruction I had caused.”

  One of the Full Brands employees quickly arrived on the scene thinking she had had a heart-attack and collapsed up against the shelves.

  “Miss? Miss? Are you all right? You’re knocking the cans onto the floor.”

  “My rifle butt was against the ground, with the barrel pointed directly up at me. I stared into the small dark hole that could bring me relief with one quick flick of my finger.”

  “Miss?” said the female employee shaking Margaret’s arm, trying to wake her from her trance. Margaret flung her arms back into the shelf which sent another dozen cans falling onto the floor. One hit Margaret right on the foot—the same place as the can of beans Reverend Davies sent her.

  “Pain. Make it go away. One quick flick of my finger and it is all gone.”

  The employee grabbed her walkie-talkie and called up to the front.

  “Mr. Shorter. We have a situation here in aisle three. A lady is in some sort of trance or something, and all of these cans are flying on the floor.”

  “Jackson kept yelling towards me. But I didn’t listen. I couldn’t listen. I was no longer on this earth.”

  Some commotion up front, led by the store manager quickly entering the canned food aisle, caught the attention of Reverend Davies, so he decided to have a look. As he glanced around the corner, he saw Margaret leaning up against the shelf with her head back and eyes closed. He thought the worst and went running down the aisle behind the store manager.

  “Miss, are you all right? Should we call an ambulance?”

  “Or the police,” said someone else.

  “Miss, are you okay?” asked the store manager.

  “I wanted to die. I wanted to change places with the old man who had been shot to hell; his lone solace being this—his opened wounds masked their embarrassment by being covered up with a conical hat, placed there by a small girl in bloodied clothes. I wanted to be like him. Insides lain bare. The dead are honest. The dead tell the truth.”

  “I’m going to call an ambulance,” said the manager.

  “No, no,” said Reverend Davies who crowded in beside him. “I know her. I’m her pastor. She’s fine. Just let me talk with her. Please. Could everyone just back away? Just back away a little bit.”

  The crowd around her started to move back a few steps. Margaret had since stopped narrating and had opened her eyes and stood up straight. She jumped back slightly when she saw Reverend Davies coming towards her, but she really felt threatened when she saw the large circle of people gawking at her.

  “Margaret, it’s okay. I think you just passed out or something, and you knocked a few cans onto the floor. But everything is all right.”

  Margaret looked down and saw the cans lying about on all sides.

  “Reverend Taylor. Reverend Taylor,” she said twice.

  “No, Margaret. I’m Reverend Davies. Remember? I used to visit you and your mother in your apartment. Are you okay?”

  “Okay. Okay. Home.”

  She quickly grabbed her cart and pushed it out of the canned foods toward the dairy. Reverend Davies turned towards the store manager.

  “It’s okay. I’ll keep my eye on her to make sure that everything is all right and that she gets home safely.”

  “Are you sure she is all right? She was saying some strange stuff about the dead, and guns. It was kind of creepy.”

  “I’m sure everything is going to be fine. Thanks for your concern. I’ll look after her.”

  “All right, just make sure she doesn’t make any more messes.”

  “I’ll make sure.”

  Reverend Davies had his doubts about her mental state. He kept out of Margaret’s sight-line for the rest of her shopping trip as she proceeded as if nothing at all had happened. She checked out as normal and walked the three blocks home in the middle of the night. The reverend stealthily followed her from a block behind and watched her go into her apartment building, hoping another night patrol wouldn’t see him stalking her. Then he walked back to his car and drove home. Something seemed very wrong. Reverend Davies wasn’t so confident that everything would turn out all right. He felt the need to intervene.

  After Margaret put away her groceries, she logged on to her computer and whipped off another brilliant update of the Hartford Corporation’s employee handbook. By morning, she was exhausted and fell asleep. Reverend Taylor continued to look into the barrel of his rifle. Red Hat was trying to exit the building with his adopted great aunties. The twins began their long trek up Harper’s Hill, and Janice shielded her eyes from the blinding white presence which quickly engulfed her. Over her shoulders in her dream, she felt his presence stronger each day.

  Chapter 7

  Escape from the Margaret Meeting

  The Friday evening meeting commenced, and Janice started.

  “First, I’d like to thank Mrs. Johnson for hosting us here this evening. I’ve called all of you together, so we could talk freely about my niece, Margaret. Each of us knows her in one way or another, and I wanted to get an opinion from all of you about Margaret and how you think she is doing.”

  “Might I ask what prompted you to call us all together to talk about another person? I’m not really comfortable with that,” asked Reverend Davies, who sat next to Michael Cheevers, who crunched his way through a bag of potato chips.

  The rest of the room consisted of Mrs. Johnson, Mrs. Trumble, and Chester Tomsey.

  “Mrs. Trumble, would you like to address this issue?”

  “Yes, I most certainly would. Now I’ve never been one to speak ill of someone without cause, and I’ve been greatly tolerant of being the recipient of coarse manners from Margaret, but I have seen her behavior become much stranger and, should I even say, violent recently.”

  “Oh, come now,” interjected Chester Tomsey. “We all know that Margaret does not have the most heart-warming of personalities, but she is anything but violent.”

  Reverend Davies did not like the start of this. He kept thinking about what Margaret had said when leaning up against the supermarket shelves.

  “Mr. Tomsey, is it?” Mrs. Trumble inquired.

  “Yes, that’s right.”

  “And just what is your relationship with Margaret?”

  “My firm employs her on a job-by-job basis. She writes and revises technical manuals for us. Actually, she’s a verbal genius.”

  “Verbal genius! I think you are talking about the wrong Margaret,” belted out Cheevers with his mouth half-full of chips. “She’s no Margaret Queen of Scots.”

  “That was Mary,” said Reverend Dav
ies.

  “That’s right, Reverend. She’s no Mary Mother of God either.”

  The reverend exhaled heavily and rolled his eyes in Cheevers’ direction as did everyone else.

  “Perhaps I shouldn’t have said verbal genius. What I meant was that she has a way with words—written words. I can’t tell you how much grief and stress that she has eliminated from my life. I think you are sorely mistaken if you think she is violent,” said Tomsey, trying to clarify his point.

  “And how many times have you actually met her?” pressed Mrs. Trumble.

  “None. I’ve never talked with the woman. We do everything over the Internet.”

  “Well, I hardly think that makes you an expert on her character and behavior.”

  “I’m basing my judgment on the quality and judicious nature of her work. She has an impeccable work record. Punctual. Detailed. Insightful. Any company would be lucky to have her. I know her character because it comes through in her work. If we are to suggest that she is anything but a wonderfully productive member of society, then we are mistaken.”

  “And what exactly are we suggesting here?” Cheevers added. “Mrs. Johnson, do you have any beer?”

  “No.”

  “Mr. Cheevers, please be patient. We are trying to get to the heart of the matter. Mr. Tomsey, your opinions about her work habits are duly noted, but I would like Mrs. Trumble to continue,” voiced Janice with a slight hint of annoyance.

  Mrs. Trumble stood up and started addressing every incident and run-in that she ever had with Margaret. Everyone sighed with resignation that they would just need to wait it out. As the address continued, Sam and Pam crawled along the living room wall on all fours. The only person who could have seen them was Mrs. Trumble but not in her state. Sam reached safety first behind the kitchen island and waved Pam over. By the time they reached the door, Cheevers had a small window of opportunity to see them between the corner of the island and the wall of the hallway which led to a spare bedroom, but he was busy licking his fingers and sticking them back into the bag, trying to pick up the last few crumbs on his saliva-wet finger tips. Sam reached up and unlatched the door, quietly opening and closing it. They had spent the whole dinner hour planning their escape once they heard that the meeting was on. Pam even volunteered to cook her world-famous three-egg omelets so that their mother wouldn’t be in the kitchen. As Pam cooked, Sam got the WD-40 out of the hallway drawer and sprayed the front door hinges, so they wouldn’t squeak during their escape. They made it safely into the outdoor hallway.

  “I hope she’s home. Your omelet wasn’t very good. I’m still hungry.”

  “My omelets always taste good.”

  “Not as good as chocolate-cherry-swirl.”

  “Almost as good,” resigned Pam with a hint of haughtiness in her voice.

  They stood in front of 2B and knocked. After a few seconds, Margaret answered the door and smiled slightly at the pair.

  “We are sorry to bother you, Ms. Pritcher.”

  “Yes, very sorry to bother you,” Pam mimicked her sister.

  “But if you aren’t busy …,” said Sam. “… we were wondering if you could continue your story. My mother is having a dreadfully boring meeting at home.”

  “Okay,” said Margaret and left the door wide open.

  The girls scooted to their spot on the couch, and Margaret went directly to the freezer, grabbed two pints of chocolate-cherry-swirl with two spoons, and delivered the goods to the eager birds who nearly had their mouths wide-open, awaiting the juicy cold morsel to be placed gently inside.

  Mrs. Trumble finally got around to the most recent historical incident.

  “Well …” Mrs. Trumble continued. “… as I said, I have had my run-ins with her over the years, but lately things have been different. You may have noticed that my fingers are bandaged. Well, Margaret did it.”

  “That was nice of her to bandage your fingers,” jested Cheevers.

  “That’s not what I meant! A Full Brand flyer of hers had gotten into my mail, and I wished to return it to her. I knocked on the door—”

  “Why didn’t you just put it in her mail box?” asked Mr. Tomsey.

  “I was just being neighborly.”

  “One person’s neighborly is another person’s harassment.”

  “Hear, hear,” said Cheevers.

  “Let her finish,” said Reverend Davies. He very much wanted to hear what had happened.

  “Margaret opened the door partway, and as I put the flyer in, she slammed it right on these four fingers. I started screaming and screaming, but she wouldn’t open the door to release my fingers. She kept pushing harder and harder. Mrs. Johnson heard my screams and came out.”

  “Yes,” said Mrs. Johnson. “I heard her, and I came into the hall and saw her fingers being crushed in Margaret’s door. I started pushing in and yelled for Margaret to ease off on the door.”

  “And finally that beast let go long enough for me to extract my fingers,” interjected Mrs. Trumble.

  “Well, Mrs. Trumble ...” Mrs. Johnson hesitated, looking at her in a somewhat disapproving manner. She felt uncomfortable as if she was about to betray someone, but she felt compelled to be completely honest. It was, after all, someone else’s life that may be in the balance. “To be fair, the door was unlocked.”

  “This is ridiculous,” shouted Mr. Tomsey. “This whole evening would be completely moot if she would have just checked the doorknob and opened the door. To think that we have been sitting here all night. Leave the poor woman alone.”

  “Hear, hear,” said Cheevers looking desperately around the coffee table to see if there were some nuts or something else to munch on.

  “Well, I panicked. I didn’t know how to react. And whether the door was unlocked or not is beside the point. She recklessly and deliberately sabotaged my fingers.”

  “Sabotaged fingers. Ridiculous,” whispered Tomsey under his breath.

  “And you, Cheevers. How could you take his side?” questioned Mrs. Trumble, pointing firmly towards Tomsey like a prosecuting attorney. “What about the flower pot?”

  “Can we all just try to focus here?” Janice interjected, trying to calm the waters.

  Reverend Davies sat silent, continually playing back the grocery store scene in his mind. He couldn’t let it remain unsaid.

  “Well, if this is all we have to go on, I think this evening has been a waste of time,” Tomsey said as he stood up to leave.

  “Wait,” Reverend Davies stood up. He had a frown across his face, and he stood frozen in thought. “Mr. Tomsey, please sit. I have something to add. Something quite disturbing. I don’t think Margaret is in her right mind.”

  * * *

  “Thank you, Ms. Pritcher. The ice cream is excellent,” said Sam.

  “As usual,” added Pam.

  Margaret sat opposite, admiring the two lovely ladies. She loved watching them lick every last drop of cream from the spoons just like she used to do as a small girl.

  “Could you continue the story about Georgia and Gwen?”

  “Yes, please. They were going on a picnic to—”

  “Harpers Hill stood high and tall in the distance—lovely under the towering sun of late morning,” Margaret started as she leaned her head back on the headrest of her chair, closed her eyes, and went into her normal oral rhythms. She could feel the strong presence beckoning her on.

  * * *

  “Georgia could hardly contain herself, constantly running ahead, yelling back at Gwen, who struggled to keep up with her baby brother in her arms. Buster would trot ahead of both of them and circle back around in his lovingly protective way.

  “‘Gwen, hurry up!’

  “Georgia was a hundred feet ahead and continued sprinting up the steep incline, further distancing herself from her sister. Gwen walked a ways, then put the baby down to rest. He could barely stand on the uneven ground, and the alfalfa came up to his chin, almost covering him as if he was another sapling growing in a green forest.
Gwen was furious that Georgia would not wait, so she boycotted the trip more than once by sitting down and putting the baby on her lap, thinking that she would just turn around and go home.

  “Georgia kept her sights on the lonely crab-apple tree as she approached the summit—a truly special place for her. She had spent many summer afternoons under the shade of that tree, pretending she was a princess or an heiress with all the expensive trimmings that life could afford. Gwen would come occasionally, but she usually ruined the fun by putting too much realism into make-believe.”

  * * *

  “See Pam, you need to lighten up. You do the same thing as Gwen.”

  “I do not. I know how to make-believe just fine.”

  Margaret lifted up her head and smiled at the girls.

  “Remember when I was trying to be a ballerina, and I put Mama’s stocking on?”

  “Well, ballerinas don’t wear brown stockings and especially not ones that go up to your armpits. You looked ridiculous.”

  Margaret put her head back and pretended she heard nothing.

  * * *

  “Today was different. Georgia sensed it. A strange feeling overcame her as she reached the grassy knoll that led up to the tree with its twisted and irregular branches reaching out in all directions. She smelled something too. Something familiar. Then, she noticed an object sticking out from behind the tree. A table. Clearly, it was a table, for she could see its leg and the sharp angle where the table-top jutted out from the tree. As Georgia edged forward, she caught a glimpse of a simple wooden chair, pushed away from the table, and a man, dressed in a rugged workman’s overcoat, sitting and staring out the opposite way into the rolling plains which seemed to carry on eternally to the end of the horizon.