by Julianne Lee
After saying a lengthy and eloquent grace, Father did most of the talking, expounding on his opinion of the war brewing. He seemed almost eager to see the Federal Government invade the south, so they could mix it up, thrash it out, and settle the question of states’ rights once and for all. Unfortunately, conversation with three women about politics was somewhat one-sided. Shelby might have made it a dialogue, but she hesitated to say anything lest she blurt too much about a history she knew far better than any man living could. So she kept quiet and let him preach while she cut the fat from her ham steak with surgical precision. No gravy for her; it was too greasy.
Once the man ran out of steam and fell silent, Mother changed the subject and made small talk with him about the Brosnahans, pressing for updates on the wives of Lucas’s brothers, Amos and Gar. She appeared to be close to Amos’s wife, Ruth.
“That poor woman,” she said, shaking her head. “I feel for her so, with no children to brighten her days. And after nearly twenty-five years with that man. It’s a wonder they can stand it.”
Twenty-five years? Shelby frowned. “How old is Amos?”
“Forty-one, I think,” said Father. “Thereabouts.”
Forty-one. She did the math and her eyebrows went up. Wow. She wondered if Ruth had been even younger than that when they married.
Susannah, cutting the fat from her ham steak and dipping it in gravy before eating it in dainty bites, said with a careless tone, “Martha hasn’t got any, either. I wonder what that could mean.” She raised her eyebrows at Shelby.
Mother said, “She and Gar have been married near on five years now. Is that right? Five years?” She looked to Shelby for confirmation, who shrugged as if not remembering either.
“I suppose so.”
Susannah said, “I say I’d think twice about marrying that Lucas, for fear of it running in his family.” Dimples popped up and a twinkle of mischief shone in her eyes, and Shelby could see she was purposely stirring her parents’ concerns for her sister. Easy for her, with a rich boyfriend all ready to marry her. Good thing Shelby wasn’t going to be around much longer, or she might have been irritated to be teased.
She cracked, “Yeah, I’ll bet those brothers all come from a long line of folks who had no children.”
Silence fell over the table. The joke lay there like a turd, nobody knowing quite what to do with it.
Father finally spoke, and his tone was hard. “I’d say the only thing running in that family is bad luck, Amos and Gar each having married barren women. Besides, I don’t think that Martha even wants children. I expect she’s not exactly encouraging them to come.”
“Don’t you say things like that.” Mother sounded shocked.
Shelby looked at Father, and the look of disgust on his face suggested to her he’d meant to imply Martha was using some form of birth control.
He shrugged. “For a certainty, I’ve never seen a woman so full of herself and so unmotherly as that one.”
Mother replied, “The Brosnahans are good people. You hush.”
“It’s those women.”
“William!”
Silence fell, and even Father knew to not push Mother any further.
After supper, while the kitchen servants straightened up, the family retired to the sitting room, where Father picked up a book to read aloud. Mother and Susannah settled in with bits of sewing, and Shelby found herself fiddling with her skirts and that damned hoop. It took a bit of adjusting to get the hoop to lie properly and not pop up in front, but finally she was seated on a love seat, her hands folded in her lap and listening to a rather silly adventure story set in the eighteenth century.
Mother looked up from her needlework and said, “Where’s your sewing, Mary Beth?”
Uh oh. She was going to be expected to sew. Shelby looked around, pretending she would recognize Mary Beth’s sewing if she saw it. “I think I’ve misplaced it.”
“No, you haven’t. It’s right over there where it always is.” Mother’s voice had a sharp tone of impatience, and she pointed to a basket on the floor near the book shelf.
“Oh.” Drat. Now she was going to have to get up and fool with that stupid hoop again. She went to get the basket, and brought it to set it on the love seat next to her. Carefully, she arranged her skirts before sitting, and managed to make it all work as she settled. Then she investigated the basket. A small cushion studded with pins and needles sat atop a wad of linen, and a few small spools of colored thread rattled at the bottom of the basket. There was a tin thimble and a tiny pair of silver scissors with handles in the shape of swan necks, and here and there among the items were bits of ribbon and ends of thread wadded and tangled. Mary Beth didn’t keep a very neat sewing basket.
The linen seemed to be a blouse in the making, for part of it was obviously a collar of some sort. On it were tiny, pink, embroidered flowers, and there were flowers on some of the other pieces as well. Embroidery. Oh, brother. To her mind it smacked terribly of aging flower children or New Age silliness. She sighed as she fumbled among the pieces of cloth, trying to figure out which end was up. The blouse had been partially pieced together, but some bits were still open and unfinished. Something that looked like it might be a cuff was caught in an embroidery hoop, and it appeared Mary Beth had been in the midst of decorating it with those same small, pink flowers. The stitches were tiny and precise. Mary Beth had been very good at this, and Shelby wondered whether she had the patience to sew this finely. But she took a glance at Mother, Father and Susannah, and knew she was going to have to at least look like she could sew.
Another sigh, and she set about finding a needle in this mess. There were several stuck in the pin cushion, and she chose one that appeared average and all-purpose. The pink thread was in a wad at the bottom of the basket, and she whiled away a good five minutes untangling enough of it to have a longish piece. Once she’d achieved a length sufficient to fool with, she cut it with the swan scissors and began threading the needle. The tiny eye thwarted her as if she were trying to stuff a camel through it. The end of the thread refused to go.
Mother began taking glances at her, and the urgency to get the damned thing threaded made Shelby break out in a sweat. Finally it was in, and she suppressed a sigh of relief. Now to see if she could make a stitch. She’d never held a needle in her life, and for a moment wasn’t even certain which side of the cloth to poke. She chose what looked like the back, stuck the needle in, pulled it through, and the entire thread came out the other side.
Crap. With a quick glance around to see whether anyone had noticed, she hurried to tie a knot in the end of the pink thread. Then she chose a spot on the back side of the cloth to poke it through. She pulled on it, but on seeing the front of the cloth she realized the spot was not where she really wanted it. So she tried to poke it back through. Not so easy as putting it in point-first. But with a little wiggling and futzing, she was able to get the needle to back out. She tried again, and this time hit the right spot on the fabric.
Now to choose where to stick it back in. Easy enough, for this was the right side and she could see where the rest of the flowers were. So she poked the needle into a spot that looked good for the center of the flower. Pulling the stitch taut, though, she found the thread had become twisted. Crap. So she picked the thread up, pulled it a little way from the fabric, and smoothed it out before pulling it tight again. Oops, too tight. Pull it out again, then tug it taut and smooth.
Okay, there was one stitch. She blew out her cheeks and felt like striking up a brass band for a fanfare.
The second stitch took a little less time, and then she succeeded with a third. But as she worked, she noticed hers weren’t nearly as straight and even as Mary Beth’s. Her flower seemed somewhat...shredded. She groaned.
Mother looked up. “Are you feeling poorly, Mary Beth?”
Inspiration struck, and Shelby groaned again. “Oh...I think I am. I don’t feel well at all.” This corset, though slightly loosened since that afternoon, w
as still tight and as the day wore on she was far more exhausted than she should have been for all the sitting she’d done today. “Mother, I think I would like to go to my room.”
“Come here, child.” Mother held out her hand to indicate she wanted to feel for a temperature. Shelby said quickly, “It’s my stomach. I’m afraid supper didn’t agree with me.” The ham had been delicious, but she hadn’t been able to eat nearly enough of it with her waist bound up so tight. Already she was hungry again.
“All right, then, good night. We’ll see you in the morning. I hope you’ll feel better.” She tilted her cheek toward Shelby, who took the hint and went to give it a kiss. Then Shelby picked up the sewing basket and took it from the room with her. Maybe she could make some sense of this in the privacy of her room.
She hurried up the stairs and set the basket on the bed in Mary Beth’s room, then turned to face the mirror. First things first, she had to get the hell out of this torture device. This time the buttons on the dress were in the front, but though she was able to get that garment off and drape it over the bed’s footboard, she was at a loss when it came to the laces on the corset. Tied just at the very center of her back, she found the ribbon bow tantalizingly close to the tips of her fingers but in no direction could she catch hold of the thing.
“I’m terribly sorry, Miss Mary Beth.” It was Annie, hurrying into the room. “I couldn’t know you was wanting to go to bed so soon.”
“It’s all right. I just want this thing undone.”
“I’m so sorry, Miss Mary Beth. So terribly sorry.” Annie’s fingers flew to untie the corset.
“It’s all right, Annie. No harm done.”
“Aye, Miss Mary Beth.”
As the laces loosened, Shelby sighed and groaned with relief. “Thank you, Annie.” She held the corset against her front and turned to the servant. “I can take it from here.”
The woman’s eyes went wide again with apprehension. “No, no, Miss Mary Beth. Let me finish. I really didn’t mean to dally. I swear it. Please let me finish.”
Shelby held up one hand. “Seriously, I can do the rest. I don’t mind.”
Annie fell silent, her brow furrowed and her lips pressed together. The whites of her eyes were wide and fearful. “You won’t be telling nobody?”
“Who would I tell? And what would I tell? I just want to undress myself. I’m in a private mood today. It’s nothing to do with you.”
There was a long hesitation as Annie pondered this, then she nodded and said, “Aye, Miss Mary Beth. I’ll leave you now.”
“Good night, Annie.”
Another hesitation of surprise, then Annie said, “Good night, then, Miss Mary Beth.” Then she left and closed the bedroom door behind her.
Shelby sighed again. She just was not cut out for this.
Her attention returned to the mirror, she wriggled out of the corset and caught the two handkerchiefs Mary Beth had stuffed into the top of it. Her breasts itched, and she reached into the shift for a luxurious scratch and massage as she encouraged blood to flow into them once more. It felt heavenly. Then she pulled the shift over her head and stepped out of the long linen drawers to examine her new body in the mirror.
Mary Beth’s body was thin and medium height, quite unlike the one Shelby had left in the twenty-first century. Growing up, Shelby had always been the tallest kid in the class, and as an adult was usually the tallest woman in the room. Not any more. And it was no wonder her front was stuffed, for Mary Beth’s breasts were barely there. She poked one, and it jiggled slightly. Not entirely flat, but just enough flesh that a semblance of a bust could be had by stuffing handkerchiefs into an incredibly tight corset. That corset was also the only reason Mary Beth had a waistline, for with her waist unbound her hips were barely wider than the rest of her. Like a lingerie model: all head and hair and no curves. Her entire torso was covered with red welts pressed into her skin by the folds of her shift.
“Good grief, I’m a head on a stick!” She turned before the mirror to have a good look. “I’m skinny.” A laugh rose in her, though she wasn’t certain why. On one hand she was amused to finally be as thin as she’d always wanted to be, but on the other hand she missed her own body. She hadn’t been particularly unhappy with a tall, solid frame and breasts that required support. And now here she was...a head on a stick. “At least my hair is nice.”
Down from its pins, her hair turned out to be long and silky white-blonde. Its ends brushed her behind, and it tickled. She marveled it had all been pinned so successfully into a bun at the back of her head. Never in a million years would she be able to reproduce that bun by herself, she was certain. Next time she dressed, she was going to need Annie for more than just the corset.
Then something Mary Beth’s father had said earlier finally sunk in. Mary Beth was twenty-two years old. Five years younger than Shelby. In the switch, she’d not only become thinner, she’d become younger! Good thing? Bad thing? Having had a taste of Father’s attitude about her age, once again she wasn’t sure. In this time and place she was probably better off to be thought younger than to be older and wiser but also an old maid.
She stood back from the mirror and took a long look. Not as striking as Mary Beth’s sister, but still pretty. No wonder Lucas was taken with her. It was, however, a wonder Mary Beth was not taken with him. Shelby knew at least half a dozen women who would think him fine eye candy and quite droolworthy. A smile touched the corners of Shelby’s mouth as she pictured the youngest Brosnahan. If only she’d met him in her own time! If only she could take him home with her.
Home. A pang cut her heart. She looked around the room, lit by an oil lamp on the table which held the ewer and wash bowl. How long was she going to be stuck here?
A small candle stood in a pewter holder on the night stand, where she’d set Mary Beth’s diary earlier in the day. She sat on the bed, next to the sewing basket, to investigate the project she was expected to work on while resident in this house. Thin legs akimbo, she leaned her sharp elbows on them, and it was more than a little unsettling to feel no flesh on her bones. On the plus side, though, she found she could lean over without the slightest appearance of abdominal fat. Not the least little fold.
Shelby laid the linen pieces out on the bed, and like working a jigsaw puzzle gradually gained a sense of how the garment would eventually go together. By hand. This was going to take forever, and already she was bored with the project.
The diary was far more interesting. She set aside the sewing and picked up the diary from the nightstand. Paging through it, glancing at the entries, she decided it hadn’t been her imagination that Mary Beth was hung up on Amos. Though mentions of Lucas were there, they were few and usually closely followed by or preceded by his brother’s name. Instances where Amos had been kind to Mary Beth. Or he’d made her laugh. One time he’d spoken to her at length about horses, and it had been recorded fondly and in intense detail.
Shelby began to suspect a reason for Mary Beth’s reluctance to marry Lucas, and agreed it might not be such a good idea for her to live so close to adulterous temptation. Mary Beth was not as unseeing as Shelby had thought. Nor as immature.
As she flipped through, she found the pages more than half empty now. Before, the book had been nearly three-quarters full, but now all the pages after the pentagram were blank. Of course, they were blank. Mary Beth must have drawn the pentagram talisman and the charm this morning, and the rest of the pages weren’t written yet. The date on today’s page was September 23, 1860, and a small sense of relief came just to know what year it was. 1860. Then the relief dissipated, for the war would begin next April. Lucas was twenty-five years old and had almost exactly three years to live. Of all the times and places in history she could have visited for enjoyment, this year was not one she would ever have chosen.
Below the penciled pentagram the French-or-Spanish-sounding words were also still there. She whispered those words again, in frail hope they would do their magic once more and send he
r home, but nothing came of it. Not the slightest change, not the remotest feeling of anything happening. She flipped through the blank pages again, and glanced around for a pencil or pen. She had an urge to write an entry of her own.
She knelt by the nightstand to investigate the cabinet inside and was rewarded with what she sought: an ink well and nib pen. She set the ink atop the small cabinet and with a fingernail scraped the nib free of old ink before settling onto the bed once more. The cork on the bottle came free easily, and she could see Mary Beth had used it frequently. Shelby dipped the pen. The hair on her arms stood up. History was changing. A very small bit of history, but it was plain not every event was carved in stone at the outset. When Shelby had first seen this diary, there had been words written in Mary Beth’s hand immediately after the page with the pentagram. They had been written on this day, but now they wouldn’t be. She was about to write in it, and her handwriting was not anything like Mary Beth’s.
It was astonishing; she wouldn’t have thought it possible. She’d always thought of the past as immutable. What had happened had happened. Facts were facts, and even the perception of them in the present was unchangeable. Now she was getting ready to write something entirely different from what had been there when she’d first picked up the diary, and it would be different because she wasn’t Mary Beth.
As she wrote, the ink at first was weak-looking, but darkened as she wrote,
Lucas kissed me today...
As she continued, there was an eerie, breathless feeling of creating the future. As if it couldn’t exist until she made it happen, and what she did now would echo forever.
The next morning Shelby came to breakfast after a restless night in a strange bed and surrounded by strange smells and shadows she couldn’t identify in the darkness. She wished for a shower, but had done no better than a wash with the ewer and bowl on the stand in her room. Using the chamber pot had been horrible. She’d felt like a child in potty training, or an invalid using a bedpan, and she was mortified lest Annie come barging in at that moment to help her dress. Dressing had then been an adventure in trying to find Mary Beth’s loosest dress without letting on to Annie why she no longer wanted an hourglass figure. As thin as she was, she would end up looking like a stick with no curves at all, but breathing was more of a priority for her than it apparently was for Mary Beth and she didn’t mind looking skinny. Unfortunately she was only able to gain an inch or so around the waist by wearing a slightly frayed dress from deep inside her armoire. Annie protested, but Shelby was determined to be able to breathe today. So she wore the old dress.
