Weeping Willows

Chapter 5

Isn’t Hysteria Fun

     As the class wore on the atmosphere settled down until Elizabeth was sure all had been forgotten. Oddly enough it was the sister’s brother, whom she learned was Kenneth, that came to her rescue. He had called her over directly to aid him with his sculpture. When she had gotten to his table, she found he had subtly put an end to them ostracizing her by conveniently ‘needing her help’. She had given him a grateful smile as more of them began to call out to her.

     She fluttered from table to table answering questions at each. Of course, most turned out to be non-art related. She found herself bombarded by questions about her life before moving. They made a not so subtle point to stay away from anything related to after she came to town. Any time her answers were veering to close to her arriving at Crystal Springs they would abruptly change the subject to something else. Elizabeth conceded and kept her answers to the past but still nothing too personal. On this she wouldn’t budge. Eventually their curiosity had been sated enough to move on to other topics of conversation. She discovered her class was mostly filled with gossips as the subjects turned to life around town. Spy organizations had nothing on these old folks or maybe it’s rag magazines. Some of the gossip seemed way too far fetched to even be remotely true. One thing was for sure she did not want to get on their radars. Their discussions ran from people’s love lives to medical diagnosis at the local clinic. It was fascinating and slightly horrifying to hear just how much of everyone’s lives they knew.

     Elizabeth did her best to stay out of the chatter as she went from table to table trying to help where she could. Even though most seemed to be okay with her next to them now, they refused to show her their works. They were definitely up to something, but as long as all the infighting had ceased, she was willing to just let it go.

     As the end of their time together drew near Elizabeth found herself listening more intently to them as many had begun talking about the past. She eavesdropped while halfheartedly starting her clean up. Most were antidotes of one’s childhood but every now and again someone would say something about the Bennett family that once owned her house. It was never anything to revealing about them, but it piqued her curiosity further. Every mundane sentence about them seemed to whet her appetite for more.

     Elizabeth was startled out of her inner musings when Bertha talked to her again for the first time since the sister’s fight earlier. “Are you sure you don’t have family around here?”

     “No, all my family is from up north. Why do you ask?”

     “You look like someone I’ve seen before.” Bertha answered squinting at her from behind her glasses as if trying to get a better look at her. Staying firmly where she was, Elizabeth refused to get to close to the sister’s again. The two of them were like wild predators. You never knew when they would attack. She wanted to be at a safe distance just in case. Bertha leaned further in her direction as she strained her eyes enough to shoot an array of wrinkles from the corners of them. Agnes looked from her sister to Elizabeth clearly confused by Bertha as well.

     “Have you been tipping the drink again?”

     At her sister’s question Bertha’s anger was roused anew as she turned to scowl at her. “That’s for medical purposes only. You know I can’t burp after meals if I don’t have a small glass.”

     “You and I both know that’s not the only time you indulge.”

Bertha anxiously looked to the nurses wandering about while trying to get Agnes to shut up. Her sister however was not going to be detoured from over sharing.

     “What, afraid I might tell the wardens how many bottles of spirits you have hidden away?”

Bertha was fanatically trying to hush her sister now as the two nurses from before descended upon the sister’s table. As the nurses took the women away the male nurse was trying to coax the location of Bertha’s stash of alcohol from her. Bertha sat rigidly in her chair looking like she was about to burst into tears while wringing her hands continually. Agnes followed along beaming up at the nurse as if she was waiting for her prize.

     Elizabeth stood there in shock as Charlie and Mabel got up to follow behind. Clearly Charlie was up to no good. From the twinkling in his eye, to the extra pep in his step, she was sure he was going to cause problems as he followed like a happy little puppy. Mabel smiled up at him whispering conspiratorially that she hoped that didn’t find all of Bertha’s hidden cash as she rather liked it when the sister shared a sip or two with her. Elizabeth was sure her mouth had hit the ground when it fell open. With a giggle Charlie’s way when he offered her his arm, like the gentleman they all knew he wasn’t, the two off them headed off in the wake of the impending disaster.

     Elizabeth startled when she felt a finger on her chin forcing her mouth to close. She looked at Franny as Eddie walked by grumbling about bad influences, heathens and womanizers. Expecting the older woman to be scowling at the behavior as she had earlier, Elizabeth instead found her chuckling. Franny raised a questioning eyebrow at her. “Were old dear not dead. Well not yet anyway. Stick around a while. We’ll teach you a thing or two I can guarantee you don’t know.” She laughed heartily at the shock on her face. Franny leaned in and gave her just as brisk a hug as her handshake had been earlier.

     “I’m glad to have met you Elizabeth.”

     With that she strode off coming up to Ralph’s side on the other side of Alice. Ralph, she noticed was waving enthusiastically at her so Elizabeth waved limply back. Taking his arm Franny began to lead him out while Alice said her own goodbye over her shoulder to her before joining the pair out.

In a stupor Elizabeth glanced down when she felt a small frail hand take hers and pat it lightly in reassurance. She looked down to meet a pair of smiling eyes looking back up at her. “It was lovely to meet you Elizabeth.”

     “Lizzy.”

     “What was that dear?”

     Elizabeth shook herself mentally realizing in her distracted state she had mumbled her response. Pulling herself together she turned her full attention to the woman beside her.

     “Everyone back home called me Lizzy.”

     The woman’s face lit up as she graced her with a brilliant toothless smile. “I rather like that dear.” Becoming serious she drew Elizabeth down to her with a slight tug on her hand.

     “Can I ask you something Lizzy?”

     “Sure.”

     “How old are you dear?”

     “Almost Twenty-three.”

     “Wonderful! And are you married Lizzy?”

     Momentarily stunned Elizabeth found herself unable to answer her. That didn’t seem to stop the elderly woman as she took her other hand examining them for what she could only assume was a wedding band. Another smile graced her face as the older woman apparently found what she was hoping for. Looking back at Elizabeth she began talking once again.

     “I only ask you see because you’re around my grandson’s age. You may have met him already about town, Ryan Harris?” At the woman’s quizzical look Elizabeth could only shake her head no.

     “That’s alright dear you’ll meet him soon enough. He visits me quite a bit you know. He’s such a good boy. I think you’ll like him.”

     “Now’s not the time Mildred. You can talk to her again next week.”

Both women looked back as Kenneth strode up to grab the handles of the wheelchair.

     “We were only just chatting a little. Weren’t we Lizzy?”

     “I need to go to my sister’s room Millie.”

     “I’ll only be just a moment. Besides I thought you watered everything down so much there’s hardly any spirits in it. He’s such a loving brother Lizzy. Everyone knows that Bertha has always had a bit of a weakness for liquor. It began endangering her health though, so Kenny started making her a stash to keep in her room. That way she doesn’t get her hands on anything potent. Agnes rats her out all the time because she’s worried about her drinking. Don’t worry though it’s mostly water not that Bertha seems to be able to tell. The mind is a powerful thing when you want to believe something bad enough.”

     “Millie, I have to go. You remember what happened last time Bertha started lobbing bottles?”

     “Yes, Agnes did have a rather nasty bruise for a couple weeks.”

     “Millie.”

     Elizabeth could clearly see he was distressed and anxious to leave. Having clearly seen the same thing she and Mildred agreed they could talk later.

     “Don’t worry about what the others said about your house dear. Believing in ghosts is silly nonsense.” With those parting words Kenneth pushed Mildred out the door briskly on his way to help his sisters.

In the now eerily quiet room Elizabeth began to put the sculptures into tubs to be baked at home later. Working on auto pilot she had been unaware of what she had been looking at as she put away each piece. It wasn’t until she came to Kenneth’s and Mildred’s vacated table that she was jarred from her thoughts. At each table there were a variety of religious symbols that everyone had made. Including Mildred. For all her talk about not believing in ghosts it seems the woman didn’t believe it herself.

     Working in silence she packed away each piece shaking her head each time she saw another medallion or cross. Chuckling when she reached Mabel’s place, she saw that the woman had carved her own cross as well. It was a little frillier and more feminine compared to the others had been. Rolling her eyes Elizabeth wrapped it up noting how the woman who hadn’t wanted to get dirty ended up jumping on the ‘ward away ghosts bandwagon’ as well.

     When she moved on to Eddie’s piece she stopped and looked down at it. There on the table was a pure white lily that he had sculpted for Mabel. A warm fuzzy feeling bloomed in her chest as Elizabeth took care to pack his piece away. She couldn’t wait until she saw Mabel’s face when he gave it to her. Packing all her things up she was the last to vacate the room. Staring over her shoulder, the room once again was a peaceful place, no worse for the c*****e that had ensued that day. She couldn’t help ruminating over everything that had happened.

     She aimlessly wandered over to her car in the lot and placed her things inside before getting in herself. Glancing in the rear-view mirror Elizabeth vacantly thought she looked like she’d been put through a grinder and spat back out. She had patches of dried clay smudged about her face. Her hair was falling out of the braid she had had it in. The smaller pieces standing on end making her look crazed. Her eyes were wide with shock and her face was paler than usual. Elizabeth looked like she had seen a ghost. With that thought floating in her head she broke out in panic-stricken laughter. She was at the mercy of her mirth as peals of hysterical noises rolled out of her. She was laughing so hard she had developed a stitch in her side and rivulets of tears streamed down her face. She was absently glad she hadn’t needed to use the restroom or surely by now she would have wet herself.

     Distantly she heard the ping of an incoming message from her phone and tried to regain control of herself as she searched her bag for it. Pulling it out Elizabeth wiped away the tears leaving dirty smudges across her now rosy cheeks. Looking down she expected the message to be one of her friends checking up on her. It was someone else entirely.

     ‘Lizzy how come you didn’t tell me you were moving babe?’

     ‘Who is this?’

     ‘It’s Nolan.’

     ‘I’m sorry but I don’t know anyone named Nolan.’

     ‘YOUR BOYFRIEND.’

     In shock she dropped her phone. Crap she knew she had forgotten something before she left. In her defense she had only been seeing Nolan for a couple weeks before her world fell apart. Their relationship, if you could call it that, amounted to a handful of dates that had ended at the door with a good night kiss. She had planned to break it off with him as she just hadn’t felt a spark but then her life went in the toilet and like everything else at the time thoughts of Nolan were pushed to the back. At first, he had hung around her trying to insinuate himself in the funeral preparations among other things. It had all gotten too creepy for her so Lauren had made him back off and let Elizabeth have space.

     Nolan had been out of sight out of mind. Now she was thousands of miles away staring at her phone in abject horror. She could just ignore him until he stopped getting in contact. She could always pull her big girl panties up and just break up with him too. Closing her eyes Elizabeth dropped her head to the headrest as she groaned out her stress. What was a girl to do in this situation? Decisions, Decisions.